Legislation (S.7132B/A.10018) Requires Schools to Consider Silent Panic Alarm Systems as Part of Safety Plans
Outlines Plans for Robust Public Education Campaign on Newly Expanded Red Flag Law to Keep Guns Away from Dangerous People
Governor Hochul: "I believe that will be judged by history and how we respond to this crisis. Do we stand up with courage? Do we make the right decisions? Do we put the lives of others first, the right of a child to stay alive in school versus the right of someone to carry a gun? I know where I come down on that equation. And we'll be judged if we did everything we could today, we're taking a further step. I'm proud to sign Alyssa's Law to protect the children who sit in the classroom."
Hochul: "This is not the end of what we're going to do. As you heard about at the opening, we have a lot of work before us, but we're ready, because here in New York, when there's a crisis, we stand up and take action. We don't tolerate inaction. We won't be content. We will not grow numb. We'll not become desensitized to the shock every time this happens and the news goes on to another story of the day or the story of the hour. That'll never happen here in the State of New York. And I will not rest until we have done everything we can to protect our kids, our teachers, our schools, and make our communities safe again."
Earlier today, Governor Kathy Hochul signed Alyssa's Law (S.7132B/A.10018), requiring schools to consider the use of silent panic alarm systems when conducting review and development of their school safety plans. The Governor signed the bill alongside Alyssa's parents, Lori and Ilan Alhadeff, other members of Alyssa's family, State Senator Elijah Reichlin-Melnick, Assemblymember Ken Zebrowski, Assemblymember Mike Benedetto, Hampton Bays School District Superintendent Lars Clemensen, and United Federation of Teachers President Michael Mulgrew.
VIDEO of the event is available on YouTube here and in TV quality (h.264, mp4) format here.
AUDIO of the event is available here.
PHOTOS are available on the Governor's Flickr page.
A rush transcript of the Governor's remarks is available below:
Good morning, everyone. We just received some very disturbing news from Washington; that the Supreme Court of the United States of America has stripped away the state of New York's right and responsibility to protect its citizens with a decision - which we are still digesting - which is frightful in its scope of how they are setting back this nation and our ability to protect our citizens back to the days of our founding fathers. And the language we're reading is shocking.
As Governor of the State of New York, my number one priority is to keep New Yorkers safe, but today the Supreme Court is sending us backwards in our efforts to protect families and prevent gun violence. And it's particularly painful that this came down at this moment. We are still dealing with families in pain from mass shootings that have occurred; the loss of life of their beloved children and grandchildren.
Today, the Supreme Court struck down a New York law that limits who can carry concealed weapons. Does everyone understand what a concealed weapon means? That you have no forewarning that someone can hide a weapon on them and go into our subways, go into our grocery stores like stores up in Buffalo, New York, where I'm from, go into a school in Parkland or Uvalde.
This could place millions of New Yorkers in harm's way. And this is at a time when we're still mourning the loss of lives, as I just mentioned. This decision, isn't just reckless, it's reprehensible. It's not what New Yorkers want. We should have the right of determination of what we want to do in terms of our gun laws in our state.
If the federal government will not have sweeping laws to protect us, then our states and our governors have a moral responsibility to do what we can and have laws that protect our citizens because of what is going on - the insanity of the gun culture that has now possessed everyone all the way up to even to the Supreme Court.
The law we're talking about has been in place since the early 1900s. And now to have our ability to determine who is eligible for a concealed carry permit - this is not an ordinary permit. This is a special use that you can hide it from people. We have limitations, if it's for a proper cause, someone who's been threatened, someone who needs it for their job as a security guard. We have classifications where it is allowed and has been allowed for over a hundred years.
We do not need people entering our subways, our restaurants, our movie theaters with concealed weapons. We don't need more guns on our streets. We're already dealing with a major gun violence crisis. We don't need to add more fuel to this fire.
But I will tell New Yorkers, we've been ready for this. We feared this day would come and it came. At this very moment when we are about to sign a law into place, the origins of which was a loss of a 14 year old child, Alyssa, in her school.
The confluence of these two events is shocking. But again, I'm going to reassure this state. We are reading the language as we speak. We've been preparing, but we have been working with a team of experts, legal experts from all over this country and organizations like Everytown, true leaders, to make sure that we are prepared.
I'm prepared to call the legislature back into session to deal with this. We've been in contact with the leadership. We're just looking at dates. Everyone wants a little bit of time to digest this, but I will say we are not powerless in this situation. We're not going to cede our rights that easily. Despite the best efforts of the politicized Supreme Court of the United States of America, we have the power of the pen.
And I just want to read some language here. Apparently, the Supreme Court has now decided with this far reaching decision that the two step standard that had been in place since Heller [and] McDonald, where they analyze the Second Amendment, where it combines history. We have a history, yes we do, but also means and scrutiny. Does the means of the restriction justify the infringement.
And most people would say, yes, we have a right to protect people from gun violence. But I'll simply say in our very quick analysis because this is only minutes old, they have now said that the government must demonstrate that the regulation is consistent with this nation's historical tradition of firearm regulation.
That's it. No longer can we strike the balance. Only if a firearm regulation is consistent with this nation's historical tradition may a court conclude that the individual's conduct falls outside the Second Amendment's unqualified command.
Shocking, absolutely shocking that they have taken away our right to have reasonable restrictions. We can have restrictions on speech. You can't yell fire in a crowded theater, but somehow there's no restrictions allowed on the second amendment.
This is New York. We don't back down, we fight back. And we'll be alerting the public, the media in the very short term of exactly what our language is that we've been analyzing. We have language we'd like to now enact into law. We'll be sharing that with the leaders.
And I'm sorry this dark day has come. That we're supposed to go back to what was in place since 1788 when the Constitution of United States America was ratified. And I would like to point out to the Supreme Court justices that the only weapons at that time were muskets. I'm prepared to go back to muskets.
I don't think they envision the high capacity assault weapon magazines intended for battlefields as being covered from this, but I guess we're just going to have to disagree.
So I'll return to our purpose of being here and let people know that our new laws are going be looking at restrictions on sensitive locations, changing the permitting process, creating a threshold for those, we're going to have training requirements. We're going to make sure that people have concealed weapons have specified training. We have a whole lot of ideas and also look at a system where businesses and private property owners would have the right to protect themselves. So stay tuned, stay tuned. We're just getting started here.
And today we are here to talk about another step that we think is so important to protect the lives of our children in a school setting. We lost children and a teacher, a local teacher. Scott Beigel. His parents are here. We lost people in Uvalde, we lost children, teachers.
Today, we're taking our rage and turning into action. Earlier this month, I signed a nation leading comprehensive law to strengthen our gun legislation, close loopholes, raise the age to buy a semi-automatic weapon from 18 to 21. And I call on Congress to do the same, as well as investing over a quarter of a billion dollars into gun violence prevention programs.
I also recently signed into law legislation has strengthened our red flag law, which expanded the list of people who can file an extreme risk order of protection. But ahead of those new laws going into effect next month, I want you to know our administration is being aggressive, working on a robust, comprehensive public awareness campaign to educate key groups, particularly those in schools, that there is a now overhauled red flag law. We're partnering with in person training, virtual trainings this summer with school board members, school attorneys, superintendents, teachers, principals, parents, as well as educating over 660,000 educators.
We think this is so important, people need to know what this means, what rights are behind it, as well as making sure that we're having round tables with local law enforcement county law enforcement all led by our state police and additional training for our state police as well.
So we're creating a comprehensive package of digital and physical education materials that'll be released in the next couple of weeks.
So I wanted to address that as well, but we're not stopping there either. We're not stopping. We now have the strongest gun safety laws in America. But as I continue to say, there is more work to be done. And ultimately I believe that will be judged by history and how we respond to this crisis. Do we stand up with courage? Do we make the right decisions? Do we put the lives of others first, the right of a child to stay alive in school versus the right of someone to carry a gun? I know where I come down on that equation. And we'll be judged, we did everything we could and today, we're taking a further step.
I'm proud to sign Alyssa's Law to protect the children who sit in the classroom. so innocent, just trying to get an education, just trying to listen, trying to make friends. And I want to thank our sponsors for their vision. Senator Elijah Reichlin-Melnick, I want to thank him for being a tremendous leader in our legislature and Assemblymember Kenneth Zebrowski. The two of you stood up, you stood up and when we needed leadership. And I thank you for that.
This legislation requires school districts to evaluate and consider the insulation of silent panic alarms in school buildings that alert law enforcement directly in the case of an active shooter. And why is that so important? This goes beyond the traditional panic alarm systems, a panic button at a desk. You can do that. But there's new technology. There's wireless, panic buttons, computer and cell phone apps, school districts in Suffolk county already using a cell phone app, which actually bypasses 911. Why do you want to do that? Because we saw with the shooting in Buffalo, sometimes the response is not what you need in terms of the dispatch. And we saw in Uvalde, too much time was lost, way too much time was lost.
So you bypass 911, you go right to law enforcement. An app can show that there is an active shooter in a school to draw the attention that second. So no time is lost, because we saw in Uvalde and Parkland police response time is imperative to saving lives.
So teachers and staff will be able to discreetly alert law enforcement as well as other teachers and staff in the building. It's not a mandate, but I stand by here today and ask all school districts to adopt this. Please, please consider this technology to protect your students and your staff and your administrators. It will save lives.
And this law is named after a 14 year old - I'm sure she didn't think she was a little girl, but she's a little girl to all of us. Grandma and grandpa are here. She was born in Queens, so she's a New Yorker. She may have been educated down in Parkland, but once a Queens girl, always a Queens girl and she was killed at Marjory Stoneman Douglas in Parkland, along with our beloved teacher, Scott, but following the tragedy, her parents, Lori and Dr. Ilan Alhadeff, founded a foundation in her memory and they've tirelessly advocated for the adoption of a silent panic alarm system in schools, because they believe that that could save lives.
So, I want to thank the parents for what you've done and your dedication to ensuring that our kids are safe in schools. I'm so in awe of how you could channel that pain and is something so powerful, just like Linda and Michael did. You're the ones we look up to. You're the ones we look up to because you're at this day after day, turning your personal tragedy in actions so it doesn't happen to anyone else. And because of your hard work, states like New York are taking serious action to make sure that as many schools are covered as possible because no child should ever have to be in fear going to school to learn.
They're not that expensive, these panic alarms. They're not that expensive. The cost for a school district could be anywhere from two to four thousand. And what that does is literally on an app, you touch that app on your phone. I don't have a phone with me. Pretend this is a phone. You push the button, you push the button and that'll save lives.
I'm signing this bill with Alyssa and her family in mind. They shouldn't have died. They don't have to die. I want leave with a message for our kids who've been under such stress. The fears that I never had to worry about growing up, generations before them didn't have this fear. And now they do. They're looking to adults to protect them and I want them to know we'll protect you. We're going to do everything we can, so you can just lead the lives of normal children. Just be kids. Get your education. Teachers just want to teach. Teachers just want to do what they have a passion about sharing their talents with other kids. They just look into us to protect them.
This is not the end of what we're going to do. As you heard about at the opening, we have a lot of work before us, but we're ready, because here in New York, when there's a crisis, we stand up and take action. We don't tolerate inaction. We won't be content. We will not grow numb. We'll not become desensitized to the shock every time this happens and the news goes on to another story of the day or the story of the hour. That'll never happen here in the State of New York. And I will not rest until we have done everything we can to protect our kids, our teachers, our schools, and make our communities safe again.
At this point, I'd like to introduce Alyssa's mother and father to share some words
That is beautiful. Thank you so much. Really appreciate you being part of this, even virtually. This is for your daughter and we will never forget Alyssa. Thank you. You mentioned the grandparents, I did want to recognize who we have here. We have Terry and David Rabinowitz, grandparents, New Jersey residents. That is all right. Florida? Okay. Today you are New Yorkers. Today you're New Yorkers. And I'm sorry for what your family's had to go through. I really am. I really am. It is incomprehensible. But you standing up, Alyssa's parents standing up, Linda, Michael. Others who stood up.
Again, I've said I'm so proud of what you do. But I also want to recognize some other champions, as I mentioned. We have Michael Mulgrew, who will be speaking in a couple moments, the President of the United Federation of Teachers. I thank him for what he does every day, protect our kids and our teachers. And also be hearing from our sponsors Senator Melnick, and also Assemblymember Ken Zebrowski. So at this point, I would like to introduce Senator Melnick to give a few words. Thank you.
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