SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Gov. Gary Herbert has signed into law a measure allowing Utah school districts to install barricade locks on classroom doors.
The measure Herbert signed Monday was passed by the Legislature shortly after a February a school shooting killed 17 people in Florida and touched off calls for increased gun control and school safety around the country.
The legislation had already been in the works in Utah prior to the Parkland, Florida shooting.
Republican Todd Weiler sponsored the bill after a man who wanted to donate the locks to an elementary school was told they weren’t allowed under fire codes.
Weiler says his bill would create an exception to those codes to allow the locks designed to prevent a school shooter from entering classrooms. It does not give funding for the locks or require schools to install them.
The Governor also signed 70 other bills into law, including restrictions on panhandling on certain roads in the name of pedestrian safety, protection for breastfeeding in public, and requiring Internet Service Providers to notify customers that they can block pornography.