NASHVILLE -- Gov. Bill Haslam said today that Tennessee lawmakers should review a new state law that bars cities, counties and event organizers from banning handgun-carry permit holders to go armed at events like Chattanooga's Riverbend festival.
The governor's comments came following State Attorney General Herbert Slatery's legal opinion last week which said the new guns-in-parks law allows permit holders to carry firearms in any locally owned park, regardless of the event.
"I think that's a really good example of something that I would urge the legislature to go back and say, are there specific situations - now that you have the attorney general's opinion - that you want to provide clarity to," the governor told reporters.
Republican Gov. Bill HaslamHaslam, a former Knoxville mayor, had resisted earlier efforts by fellow Republicans to pass the guns-in-parks law, which superseded cities and counties' ability to make the decision themselves.
Meanwhile, the governor also said he expects to have recommendations later this week on whether National Guard members should be allowed to carry personal firearms on Guard property following the July 16 attacks on U.S. military installations in Chattanooga.
Tennessee Adj. Gen. Max Haston "is going to come back to me this week with a recommendation about what we will do for people who want to use their personal weapons on national property," Haslam told reporters following an education-related event in Mt. Juliet, outside Nashville.
Haslam noted the state has no say-so on the carrying of personal weapons on federal military installations. Some National Guard facilities are located on U.S. military property or co-located with U.S. forces.
The governor ordered seven store-front Guard recruiting stations be relocated to armories following the July 16 bloody shooting rampage in which 24-year-old Mohammad Youssef Abdulazeez first attacked a U.S. military recruiting center on Lee Highway, where a National Guard recruiting station sits nearby, before attacking the U.S. Naval and Marine Reserve Center on Amnicola Highway. There, he killed four Marines and a Navy officer before dying in a confrontation with Chattanooga Police.