MIDDLEBORO — After contentious debate, Middleboro voters narrowly decided to continue allowing firearms in municipal buildings at the Monday, April 28 Town Meeting.

The restriction which voters struck down was part of a state law named “An Act Modernizing Firearms” which included numerous other gun regulations. The law took effect in August 2024 with a provision allowing towns to opt out of the specific municipal building restriction.

The Select Board will have to vote separately to decide what qualifies as a municipal building. Other towns that have opted out have designated town halls, police stations and libraries as firearm permissible. Schools are excluded from the opt-out provision.

Middleboro decided to opt out on Monday by a small margin, voting 171 to 139 to approve the proposed article.

Natalie Orrall opened the public comment in opposition to the proposal and urged a “stand against gun violence.”

Orrall addressed a commonly heard argument in favor of the proposal: Middleboro has had the same gun laws for 100 years “and nothing bad has ever happened.”

“But we don’t live 100 years ago, we live now,” Orrall said. She went on to quote Centers for Disease control statistics on gun violence that show a significant increase over the last century.

Many who supported allowing guns in municipal buildings called “An Act Modernizing Firearms” an overreach and labeled the municipal building restriction a Second Amendment infringement.

“This law does not deter anyone who is acting with ill-intent from carrying firearms,” said Thomas Roshars.

Town officials on the stage also voiced their opinions with Select Board member Brian Giovanoni enthusiastically supporting the proposal as well as Finance Committee member Matthew Phillips.

“I think it's important to realize, everybody that’s opposed to this bylaw, you’ve been around people that have been carrying concealed for years,” Phillips said.

In contrast, Lakeville Assistant to the Town Administrator Tracie Craig-McGee opposed the proposal and told the assembled voters that while at work she had been threatened with a gun by an angry resident.

“I have to worry about someone that’s really angry and my personal safety,” Craig-McGee, a Middleboro resident, said.

John Costa, who said he is also known as the “gunrunner,” supported the proposal because of what he described as “an invasion of undocumented aliens.”

“They’re drug dealers, they’re murderers, they're rapists. Only the crazies will not abide by this law. You people have been so brainwashed,” Costa said.

Boos from voters drowned out many of Costa’s other comments.