On any given day, the people you see walking into City Hall to argue their tax bill or visit the city prosecutor's office could legally be carrying a gun.
You know who isn't packing? The security guard.
Deputy city manager Heather Handyside said that's going to change this year.
The city's three-year security contract comes to an end May 31, and the new contract will call for an armed guard at City Hall and an armed guard at the Assembly meetings.
City officials weren't the only ones thinking about giving guns to guards. Assemblyman Dick Traini has proposed a resolution that calls on the city to provide armed security at Assembly meetings.
He said his intention is to arm guards at City Hall too. The Assembly could vote on that resolution as early as tonight.
Traini said he's tried unsuccessfully to arm city security guards in the past and that a city council shooting earlier this month in Kirkwood, Mo., shows it's necessary.
In the past, critics said arming guards would send the wrong message, said Traini, who disagrees. "What this does is realize that we live in a dangerous world."
Traini is running for re-election. His opponent, Elvi Gray-Jackson, said only that the Kirkwood shootings were awful, and the idea of armed guards isn't a new one.
The city is paying a firm called Securitas Security Services USA about $2 million for a three-year contract to protect various public places, such as City Hall, the Loussac Library and the cemetery, according to the purchasing department.
The new contract described by Handyside would add a daytime guard in the City Hall building. Currently, there's only one.
In the mornings that's Lt. Otis Wright - a muscular man who's intimidating even without a firearm. Wright said it's his job to calm angry visitors.
"They come in pretty hot, or they figure they shouldn't pay as much as the city is charging them," he said.
Wright doesn't know who might bring a weapon into the building, he said. "We can't ask them or search them or anything."
New state laws have forced cities to loosen gun rules over the past two years.
The city can no longer keep people from carrying a concealed weapon into the public areas of many buildings, said Anchorage Police spokesman Lt. Paul Honeman. The exceptions are schools, bars, domestic-violence shelters and certain other structures, he said.
Julie Hasquet, spokeswoman for Mayor Mark Begich, said she couldn't immediately recall any violence at the City Hall building, though people sometimes leave phone messages threatening to hurt specific employees.
"There's definitely folks who come up here with colorful history and in some cases somewhat frightening backgrounds," she said.
In Kirkwood, a city of about 27,000, a contractor angry at City Hall shot two police officers and three city officials before he was killed himself.
There was one guard at the meeting, said Latasha Hulsey, a Kirkwood city employee.
He was not armed, she said.
But at least one of the police officers was. The shooter took the officer's gun during his rampage, the St. Louis Post Dispatch reported.
Still, Traini argues arming a guard or guards could be a deterrent for people who want to hurt somebody at a meeting.
Traini is a gun collector. "Some people would tell you that I have the largest collection of full automatics and destructive devices there is in the state of Alaska," he said.
Asked if he's armed when he comes to Assembly meetings, Traini wouldn't say yes or no, exactly.
"I would suspect that I am," he said.
Find Kyle Hopkins' political blog online at adn.com/alaskapolitics or call him at 257-4334.
By KYLE HOPKINS
Anchorage Daily News