A legislative panel on Thursday endorsed proposed procedures for the Legislative Council’s Game and Fish/State Police Subcommittee to conduct a study of the state’s firearms and concealed-carry laws and recommend potential legislation needed to clarify the rights and restrictions of Arkansans with regard to these laws for the General Assembly to consider during the 2025 regular session.
The Legislative Council’s Executive Subcommittee recommended that the Legislative Council, which meets Friday, approve the proposed procedures for the study.
Under this proposal, the Game and Fish/State Police Subcommittee will be required to file with the Executive Subcommittee a final written report of their activities, findings and recommendations, including any draft legislation, on or before Oct. 1, 2024.
The Executive Subcommittee will review and consider the findings and recommendations of the report and make a final recommendation to the Legislative Council no later than the December 2024 meeting of the Legislative Council under this proposal.
This study is a response to firearms instructors and law enforcement officers’ calls July 17 for state officials to assemble a task force to address long-standing confusion surrounding Arkansas gun laws. They suggested state officials form a panel composed of Arkansans from various backgrounds to consider clarifying where and under what conditions gun owners are permitted to carry firearms.
The Executive Subcommittee on Thursday endorsed the proposed study two days after Attorney General Tim Griffin announced he is working with Legislative Council co-chairman state Sen. Terry Rice of Waldron, state Senate Republican whip Ricky Hill of Cabot and state Rep. Howard Beaty Jr. of Crossett to make recommendations to simplify the state’s overcomplicated gun laws.
Griffin’s announcement Tuesday surprised Legislative Council Co-Chairman Rep. Jeff Wardlaw, R-Hermitage.
“I don’t know what Griffin is doing,” Wardlaw said Tuesday.
But Griffin said Tuesday Rice and Hill, co-chair of the Game and Fish/State Police Subcommittee, requested “our assistance, and we are excited to work with them and other legislators.”
Afterward, Wardlaw said Thursday that “I think it is all going to work out well.”
“We are planning on not hiring a consultant at all,” he said. “The Bureau [of Legislative Research] cannot tell us to do something or not to do something. They can only give us straight legal fact advice, so we are going to be leaning on the AG’s office really hard and steady on actual advice on what to do with these gun laws to make them easier for Arkansans, so they will particularly act as our consultants going through this process.
“We look for it to be a team and to get along,” Wardlaw said.