Exercising the 2nd Amendment

Bobby Guilbeau conducts concealed carry permit classes and stresses gun safety
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With the recent news of another school shooting in Florida last week and the news of similar threats here at home, proper gun safety, especially child access prevention, is a topic that is becoming more and more important in people’s lives.
This gun safety and prevention are just some of the matters that are taught as part of Bobby Guilbeau’s concealed carry permit classes that are held at the Mountain Bayou Boy Scout Camp in St. Landry.
“By law, we’re mandated to run a nine-hour class,” Guilbeau said. “There are certain things that we have to spend a certain amount of time on in each one of those classes. Some guys want to do some short cuts, and it just doesn’t work that way. It’s not that simple. The classes are purposefully designed so that someone who has never picked up any type of firearm can learn, by using a handgun, the proper safety, use, and nomenclature for guns.”
Guilbeau went over each mandated item that he covers in his classes. “The first thing we’re mandated to put in is an hour of instruction on handgun nomenclature like the parts of the gun and how they all work. Then, from there, we’re also mandated to teach an hour of different shooting positions. Not every position obviously will work for every person and every instance.”
“Then we go into three hours of the use of deadly force and conflict resolution,” he continued. “Just because you’re carrying a handgun, it may not be the best answer. None of us should feel that the best answer is to take someone’s life. That’s the worst answer.”
After going over conflict resolution, Guilbeau covers the child access prevention for one hour. He called it “a big problem especially in the parish that we live in, not only with the school issue that just took place, but we are hard pressed to find a home in this parish that does not have a firearm in it because we’re so rural and are a hunting community.” He added, “It’s extremely important that we teach children that guns are a dangerous tool and that there is a right time and a wrong time as well as a right way and a wrong way to use a firearm.”
The final two hours of the permit classes are spent in live fire training on the actual range. The cleaning of a handgun is also covered during this final period of instruction.
“It’s really designed for the novice,” said Guilbeau about his class program. “It’s not a self defense class. It’s purposefully put together for one that wants to apply for a permit and gets them up to speed if they’ve never picked up a gun.”
He has been giving these classes for the last five years and has done about 30 or 40 classes. “You’d be amazed at the range of people and backgrounds that come through these classes,” he expressed. “I’ve had public officials, doctors, and attorneys down to manual laborers. All walks of life have expressed an interest to further their education. Some have even applied for the actual permit once they’ve come to the class and learned the laws of our state and figured out where they can and can’t carry.”
Guilbeau explained how he first got involved with the teaching of the concealed carry permit classes. “Growing up in South Louisiana, I was always a firearms enthusiast,” he said. “We used firearms obviously on the farm, and it was a way of living that was a way of protecting ourselves against wild animals. I then did some time with the Lafayette Parish Sheriff’s Office in a reserved capacity in the early 1980s and got into actual handguns because of that capacity.”
“Then 15-years ago, I started working for the Boy Scouts of America, and as part of the things that we do with young men and women in scouting is teaching them proper firearm use and safety,” he continued. “Through that avenue, because of the interest, I wound up taking courses to become an actual instructor. I even applied to become a concealed carry permit holder.”
He also explained his thoughts on himself becoming a concealed carry permit holder. As he said, “My thought process behind it was that it is a right that we are afforded by our Constitution. It’s a right we’re afforded by the state. The more people that take advantage of that right and the privilege of being permitted to carry means the more difficult it will be for our government to take that right away from us.”
Guilbeau, as far as he knows, is the only concealed carry permit instructor in Evangeline Parish. He explained the process of becoming such an instructor. “The way the process actually starts is the first thing you have to become is a firearm instructor,” he said.
“There are many different avenues to become a firearm instructor, and the avenue that I chose was through the NRA (National Rifle Association). Through them, once you become an instructor, potential concealed carry instructors have to apply with state police to get permission and to get approved to put on the classes.”
He added, “We’re vetted by the state just like a permit holder to make sure that we’re going to follow the laws of the state and the statutes regarding the instruction of classes.”
The most rewarding part of the classes for Guilbeau is helping members of the community with a need of protecting themselves. “The reward that I get out of the entire process is that we get so many people through here, and a lot of them are women,” he stated. “A lot of their husbands, because of where we live, wind up working out of town or shift work, so a wife or a girlfriend doesn’t always necessarily have a way to protect herself when that husband or boyfriend is not there. It’s rewarding to see that these people are coming in and actually learning the nomenclature and learning the proper handling, safety, and proper storage.”
He concluded by encouraging parents to teach their children the importance of gun safety. He said, “Eventually, even though parents may not necessarily have a firearm in their homes, every child is going to come in contact with someone that does have a firearm in their home. Adults really need to stress with their children that guns are tools and guns can be a dangerous tool if they’re not used properly.”