{"id":265731,"date":"2025-09-30T05:43:15","date_gmt":"2025-09-30T05:43:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/265731\/"},"modified":"2025-09-30T05:43:15","modified_gmt":"2025-09-30T05:43:15","slug":"florida-lawmakers-to-consider-bill-making-it-easier-for-places-of-worship-to-hire-armed-security-action-news-jax","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/265731\/","title":{"rendered":"Florida lawmakers to consider bill making it easier for places of worship to hire armed security \u2013 Action News Jax"},"content":{"rendered":"

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2014 After the deadly mass shooting and arson<\/a> at a church in Michigan, safety at places of worship is top of mind, and Florida lawmakers will soon consider a bill that aims to make it easier for them to have armed security. <\/p>\n

The current proposal, sponsored by State Senator Don Gaetz (R-Pensacola), would waive several licensing and training requirements for armed security volunteers to serve at places of worship.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnfortunately, hate is no respecter of denominational differences,\u201d said Gaetz. \u201dAnd so we\u2019re seeing whether it\u2019s Mormons, whether it\u2019s Catholics, whether it\u2019s Jews, whether it\u2019s Muslims, no matter who it is, there is now in this country, sadly, a feeling among people of faith that they have to be prepared to defend themselves and my bill makes that possible.\u201d<\/p>\n

>>> STREAM ACTION NEWS JAX LIVE <\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

Action News Jax spoke with Pastor Chris Tomlinson of Destiny Church<\/a> in Jacksonville over the phone as he was in between appointments.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is sad that we even have to be thinking about these types of things,\u201d said Tomlinson.<\/p>\n

Tomlinson said while his church hasn\u2019t implemented armed security, he has employed training for members of his congregation on how to spot threats and respond in the event of an attack.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo that we could even help to try to stop the bleeding and to try to administer first aid until an EMT would get there,\u201d said Tomlinson.<\/p>\n

[DOWNLOAD: <\/b>Free Action News Jax app for alerts as news breaks<\/b><\/a>]<\/b><\/p>\n

The bill would still require churches to get their security plans approved by their local sheriff\u2019s office, and armed volunteers would have to pass a background check and obtain a concealed carry permit.<\/p>\n

Gaetz told Action News Jax his goal is to make security more accessible and affordable, especially for smaller congregations.<\/p>\n

\u201cI hope my bill is never necessary and I\u2019m really sorry that we had to file it, but the fact is that congregations need to have some way to provide area security for themselves if they can\u2019t afford to buy or arrange for an armed security patrol,\u201d said Gaetz.<\/p>\n

And Tomlinson said he\u2019d like to see the bill go a step further, and possibly free up some funds to help churches either hire security or offer crisis response training.<\/p>\n

\u201cBecause those are things that do cost money and a lot of churches don\u2019t have the money to be able to afford that type of training,\u201d said Tomlinson.<\/p>\n

Gaetz\u2019s bill still has a long way to go. <\/p>\n

Committee weeks kick off next month, and session officially begins in January.<\/p>\n

[SIGN UP: <\/b>Action News Jax Daily Headlines Newsletter<\/b><\/a>] <\/b><\/p>\n

Action News Jax Top Stories<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2014 After the deadly mass shooting and arson at a church in Michigan, safety at places…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":265732,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5136],"tags":[138646,11030,5229,138648,138649,138647,7716,3188,723,65976,11561,7310,48908,425,214,61479,86405,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-265731","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jacksonville","8":"tag-_florida","9":"tag-action","10":"tag-america","11":"tag-chris_tomlinson","12":"tag-destiny_church","13":"tag-don_gates","14":"tag-emt","15":"tag-fl","16":"tag-florida","17":"tag-gates","18":"tag-jack","19":"tag-jacksonville","20":"tag-jake_stoan","21":"tag-local","22":"tag-michigan","23":"tag-pastor","24":"tag-senator","25":"tag-united-states","26":"tag-united-states-of-america","27":"tag-unitedstates","28":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","29":"tag-us","30":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115291658893211857","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/265731","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=265731"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/265731\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/265732"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=265731"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=265731"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=265731"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}