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First Posted: 6/16/2014 Handguns are fast becoming standard workplace gear for certain area residents, including college security guards and Luzerne County&#8217;s probation officers, which should cause you to ask plenty of questions.
For starters, will putting weapons in the hands of more people &#8211; presumably responsible, well-trained people &#8211; contribute to greater public safety? Or might bullets fly in situations for which deadly force isn&#8217;t warranted?
How &#8220;protected&#8221; can we make our public spaces, our school campuses, ourselves?
In short, how many guns are enough?
Fifty or more people in the area recently got the go-ahead to strap on a holster and sidearm to perform their job duties; the Luzerne County Court this spring authorized 40-plus probation workers to carry guns, belatedly following in the footsteps of similar agencies across Pennsylvania and the nation. By next summer, about eight Wilkes University security guards who undergo Act 120 training for firearms use are expected to patrol the downtown Wilkes-Barre campus while packing heat. And at Luzerne County Community College, based in Nanticoke, certain experienced guards last year were issued guns after meeting requirements of the state&#8217;s less stringent Act 235 training.
Which area employer will be next to look at this trend and, dare we say, pull the trigger?
Will King&#8217;s College administrators be compelled to enter the small-arms race? Will every shopping center owner and grocer feel the pressure to post a gun-toting sentry in the parking lot?
The Times Leader in early April printed an editorial titled &#8220;Guns becoming tools of trade.&#8221; &#8220;Sadly,&#8221; it stated, &#8220;the county&#8217;s probation officers needed to receive guns to stay on par with their professional peers elsewhere. We hope while on the job they never need to pull a weapon from its holster, never need to squeeze the trigger.&#8221;
In Tuesday&#8217;s edition, our Opinion Board weighed in on Wilkes University&#8217;s decision to arm some of its security workers. Our group initially didn&#8217;t think it a wise move, discussing possibilities such as poorly trained employees being overpowered and their weapons taken or, separately, college pranksters innocently becoming victims of an overzealous guard.
Ultimately, upon learning the university would require its guards to undergo the same training as municipal police officers, and that Wilkes in fact employs three former members of the Wilkes-Barre Police Department, we endorsed the notion.
Yet we, as with the rest of American society, need to continue to grapple with the larger questions.
Will more guns toted by &#8220;professionals&#8221; actually equate to safer environments? Do the relatively rare acts of violence on university campuses justify a response on par with what Wilkes has done?
What happens as handguns become routine career garb, strapped to the hip like cellphones? What is gained by people&#8217;s hyper-vigilance for the next mass shooting? What is sacrificed?
For students and academicians returning this fall to colleges in Luzerne County, and campuses far beyond, more consideration also should be given to what pushes certain people to become so distraught, so disconnected, that they&#8217;d strike out at humanity via a shooting spree? How can we identify and help those individuals prior to new tragedies? How can we stop the nation&#8217;s horrific killings?
Those are the questions &#8211; and the conversation &#8211; that the gun proliferation seen locally this year should prompt.

OUR OPINION: AREA’S ARMED EMPLOYEES Have handguns got us covered?