3 months into the Florida open carry law sparks fear and confusion, tying up 911 lines

Nearly three months after Florida’s new open carry law took effect, 911 operators are hearing the same kind of call again and again.

Someone sees a person with a gun in public.

They panic.

They call for help.

In her detailed report for WESH 2 News, Summer Knowles says the change in state law has created “fear, confusion and uncertainty,” especially for parents whose children are now seeing people openly carrying guns on their way to school.

Knowles explains that since Sept. 25 – the first day Florida gun owners could legally carry their weapons openly in public – dispatchers in Lake County have been flooded with calls from residents who simply don’t know if what they’re seeing is a crime.

One 911 recording she played on air captures a driver’s alarmed voice:

“I just passed somebody walking toward that church there… he’s bald headed and he’s got an AR-15.”

The caller needed police, fire, or ambulance.

They also needed answers.

“It’s The New Law”: When Legality Collides With Fear

Summer Knowles notes that under Florida’s open carry law, gun owners can openly carry firearms on public roads.

But they cannot openly carry them in certain places, including schools, courthouses, polling places, or private property where the owner prohibits it.

That distinction might seem clear on paper.

In real life, it’s anything but.

In one call shared by Knowles, a Lake County Sheriff’s Office call taker calmly responds when a resident reports a man with a rifle:

“Is it the gentleman walking with the rifle?”

When the caller says yes, the dispatcher replies:

“We get calls on him… As long as he’s not pointing it at anyone or threatening anyone, then he has the right to do it. It’s the new law.”

From the dispatcher’s point of view, that’s a straightforward legal explanation.

From the caller’s point of view, it feels like being told there’s nothing between their kids and a long gun except hope and good intentions.

It’s a stark example of what Knowles describes: a law that changed quickly, while people’s instincts and fears did not.

Parents Watching Rifles Near School Bus Stops

Knowles focuses much of her reporting on one Lake County area where several 911 calls came in about the same man walking with what callers described as an AR-style rifle near a school bus stop on Abrams Road.

One caller told dispatchers there are “a lot of schools around here,” and she had just dropped off her child.

“It just makes me feel uncomfortable,” she said.

Another caller described a man with “an AR” walking while children stood on the other side of the road waiting for the bus.

“It really scares me,” one student later told WESH 2, in the clip Knowles aired.

The fact that the armed man wasn’t on school property mattered to the law.

To the parents, he was close enough to be a nightmare.

This is where you can feel the gap between legal theory and lived experience.

The law says the behavior is allowed.

But the parents think like moms and dads, not statute books.

They see a long gun and a line of kids.

And they reach for the phone.

Students Raised On Active Shooter Drills, Not Open Carry

Summer Knowles also spoke with a 10th grade student who was already riding the school bus when he saw the man with the rifle.

He told her the weapon looked “like 14 inches long, like a rifle… like when you’re hunting for deer and stuff,” and said it was “pretty thick too, like a military weapon.”

This student, Knowles points out, has grown up in a generation where active shooter drills are a normal part of school life.

He’s not unfamiliar with guns.

He’s unfamiliar with seeing one openly carried near a school bus while adults around him say it might be legal.

He told Knowles, “We never practice protocols on the bus about active shooters.”

When she asked if he thought those protocols should extend to buses, he answered without hesitation:

“They should. Absolutely.”

The Lake County School District told Knowles that it does not have a specific active shooter drill just for students while they are on buses.

Instead, a district spokesperson said the safety protocols used on campuses would also be used on bus routes, and that all employees, including bus drivers, are trained on emergency procedures through the Transportation Department.

On paper, that might sound like a reasonable approach.

But you can hear in the student’s words that whatever training exists hasn’t translated into a clear plan that kids actually feel.

In that moment on the bus, he didn’t know what to do.

And that uncertainty is part of the fear Knowles keeps coming back to.

“Our Hands Are Tied”: Deputies Adjust To A New Reality

In her report, Knowles shows that it’s not only parents and students who are trying to adapt.

Randy Nolen, a parent who lives near the bus stop, told her he had heard about the law change in passing, but didn’t expect to see it play out in front of his own home and around his child.

“It’s definitely a threat,” Nolen told Knowles, even if the law says the man can carry the rifle on a public road.

He said when he called his local police department, the answer he got was deeply frustrating:

“Basically, his answer was nothing we can do. Our hands are tied.”

Nolen remembers asking the question that many parents are probably thinking now:

“What do I do now? Have to go to the bus stop armed every morning to protect my child and other children?”

That’s a powerful line, and Knowles lets it speak for itself.

Later in the piece, she talks with Sgt. James Vachon of the Lake County Sheriff’s Office, who explains that officers’ responses have changed under the new law.

“Before it was a little more urgent because it was illegal,” Vachon told Knowles.

“You could not display a firearm.”

Now, he says, it is “more of a triage situation,” and deputies have to ask, what is the person actually doing with the firearm?

“If they’re simply carrying it on their person, that’s not illegal,” Vachon said.

That distinction matters for the law and for how 911 calls are prioritized.

But it does not automatically calm a parent’s nerves when they see a rifle near their kid’s bus stop.

Nolen put it simply:

“The intent is unseen. You don’t know what’s in that person’s mind. It only takes probably two seconds to point and pull the trigger.”

Summer Knowles leans on that quote to illustrate the core tension: legality can be measured, intent cannot.

When 911 Becomes A Pressure Valve

From the very first lines of her report, Knowles makes it clear that Florida’s open carry law is doing something unexpected to 911 systems.

They are being used – sometimes as emergency hotlines, sometimes as emotional pressure valves.

She notes that nearly three months into the new law, call takers are fielding a surge of calls from people who are alarmed but not always reporting an actual crime.

Dispatchers now have to sort those calls into categories:

Is someone pointing a gun?

Threatening another person?

Handling the weapon in a way that looks like it could turn into violence?

Or are they simply carrying it down a sidewalk, near a school or a neighborhood, in a way that is perfectly legal but deeply unsettling?

Summer Knowles shows how dispatchers are doing their best to explain the law while also encouraging people to stay vigilant.

Vachon told her the public can and should still call law enforcement if something “just doesn’t feel right,” even if the response will be different than it was before the law changed.

In practice, the 911 system is being used to navigate the gray space between a legal right to openly carry and the growing fear of gun violence in public spaces.

It’s a heavy burden for call takers, who must reassure worried parents at the same time they tell them that what they are seeing may be legal.

Schools, Safety, And A Law Still Settling In

Toward the end of her report, Summer Knowles notes that Lake County Schools say student safety is always a top priority and that they are “always open to reviewing safety procedures and protocols.”

After the armed-man incident, the district sent an email to school administrators, warning staff to be vigilant and including a photo of the man for reference.

Law enforcement, Knowles adds, wants everyone to “stay alert and stay vigilant,” and to call deputies directly or dial 911 if something feels wrong.

Her reporting doesn’t argue for or against the open carry law outright.

Instead, it documents what the first three months look like on the ground:

Parents standing at bus stops trying to calm their kids.

Students on buses who know how to shelter in place but not what to do when they see a rifle out the window.

Dispatchers juggling a flood of calls that blend fear, confusion, and real concern.

Deputies caught between new legal rules and old expectations from the communities they serve.

What stands out most in Knowles’ work is how quickly a legal change can ripple through everyday life.

A single sentence in state law – allowing firearms to be openly carried in public – has turned into dozens of extra 911 calls, new anxieties for parents, and new questions for schools that are already stretched by safety planning.

Whether Florida tightens training, clarifies rules, or simply lets communities adjust over time, the picture Summer Knowles paints is clear: the law may be settled on paper, but in neighborhoods and school bus lanes, people are still trying to figure out what it really means.