Billy Lassiter, deputy secretary with the Division of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, will talk about firearm safety with anyone willing to listen.
On Tuesday, Lassiter was back before a committee of the N.C. Child Fatality Task Force to discuss the impact of the Secure All Firearms Effectively (S.A.F.E.) campaign, which provides gun locks and targeted messaging to remind gun owners how to safely store their firearms.
The two-year-old campaign has been funded using lapsed salaries and leftover federal funds. In the upcoming short legislative session Lassiter is hopeful that lawmakers will earmark $2.26 million in recurring funds to keep the messaging front and center. Support from task force members could help secure that funding.
“We had almost 11,000 guns in the state of North Carolina stolen from gun owners last year and that’s been a trend for the last 10 years in our state,” Lassiter said.
Put another way, nearly 100,000 guns have been stolen in the past decade, often ending up in the hands of children or criminals.
Lassiter said some gun owners mistakenly think they are safer if they don’t lock up their firearms for quick access.
“The reality is that if you’re not locking up your gun in your home, then it makes it an easy target for someone that breaks in,” he cautioned. “It’s one of those easy items to sell on the street.”
Deputy Secretary of the Division of Juvenile Justice Delinquency and Prevention William Lassiter (File Photo/NC Newsline)Since May 2023 the NC S.A.F.E. campaign has handed out 150,000 gun locks at PTA meetings, community gatherings, gun stores, and the N.C. State Fair.
“We’re really proud of those numbers, and I can tell you when we host events in local communities there’s definitely a desire from the public to have these gun locks,” Lassiter said.
The Department of Public Safety recently partnered with RTI International to evaluate NC S.A.F.E.’s effectiveness.
Lassiter said the RTI study found the non-partisan campaign resulted in a 22% change in gun owners acknowledging guns are increasingly being stolen from vehicles and homes, and that they have a responsibility to make sure their own firearm is locked up.
The campaign has also led to two-thirds of gun owners surveyed understanding that half of North Carolina’s gun deaths are suicides. Lassiter said that shift in understanding is critically important.
“A lot of gun owners thought that most of the gun deaths were homicides,” Lassiter explained. “This is also a suicide problem, and it may be someone in your own household that may use that gun to harm themselves.”
Lassiter said the NC S.A.F.E. campaign is helping combat the misperception that it’s only important to lock up firearms when children are around.
In 2019, 53% of North Carolina’s gun owners surveyed acknowledged keeping their firearms loaded and unlocked. In 2024, that number had fallen 8% to just under 44%.
“I really feel like the message is getting through about the importance of safe storage,” Lassiter said. “But we still got a lot of work to do.”
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