Overview
- SB-4 would let health care and behavioral health facilities, K–12 schools, and colleges file Extreme Risk Protection Order petitions, and would authorize mental-health co-responders to petition directly.
- The committee approved the measure 3–2 along party lines, sending it from the Senate State, Veterans & Military Affairs Committee to the full Senate for debate before possible House consideration.
- Backers, led by Sen. Tom Sullivan, cite suicide and domestic violence prevention and say institutional filing would ease burdens on individual clinicians and educators while speeding interventions.
- Opponents, including gun-rights groups and GOP senators, argue the expansion threatens due-process and Second Amendment rights and could chill trust in therapy or be abused, though the law has withstood court challenges.
- State data show 692 ERPO requests from 2020–2024, including 478 temporary orders and 371 final orders; the bill carries no state cost according to its fiscal note.