TexasCHLforum.com

LLANO — Law enforcement and businesses in the Highland Lakes are preparing for potential calls and questions regarding the Texas open carry law, which goes into effect Jan. 1, 2016.

While some merchants such as the Blue Bonnet Cafe in Marble Falls will welcome patrons who openly carry handguns, others such as H-E-B will prohibit the practice as allowed in a provision of the law.

“We have customers that currently come in (who are carrying firearms), members of our law enforcement and other people that carry (concealed handguns),” Blue Bonnet Cafe manager Dave Plante said. “It’s never been an issue for us. We’re not changing anything.”

Texas will join 43 other states that allow open carry. The states that prohibit openly carrying handguns are Arkansas, California, Florida, Illinois, New York and South Carolina.

NEW PROTOCOLS

To prep for the Texas law, local police and sheriff’s agencies have enacted protocols to handle 9-1-1 calls from alarmed residents or those unaware of the change.

Agencies have outlined how and whether peace officers would approach individuals who choose to open carry.

“We have a protocol both for patrol officers and also for our dispatchers about (phone calls regarding a) man with a gun,” Llano County Sheriff Bill Blackburn said. “We’re not going to necessarily check someone who is open carry, only if they bring attention to themselves by something other than open carry, maybe by their actions or verbiage or situation.”

When calls come into the LCSO, the dispatchers will ask:...
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"Mike Beard, the CEO of The First National Bank in McGregor, said he thinks the law will help employees feel safer at work.

After he and his family were held hostage he changed the bank's policy and allowed CHL holders to bring their weapons to work.

"Because our employees are subject to not only bank robbery but they're subject to things that happened to me because I was held hostage in my home as opposed to in the bank so if anybody was interested we wanted to make it available," Beard said.

Beard also paid for several of his employees to become CHL certified. "