Bloomington Mayor Kerry Thomson said in a social media video that the city needs more tools to limit firearms at public events after another shooting on Kirkwood this weekend.

But in Indiana, towns are prohibited from regulating the ownership, possession or carrying of firearms. Second amendment groups campaign heavily for laws like this, including legislation passed in the most recent statehouse session.

Gun safety advocates refer to these as preemption laws. Lindsay Nichols, policy director at the Giffords Law Center, explained that Indiana is one of 43 states with broad prohibitions on local gun control.

“They do allow private property owners to prevent guns at events on their property, but they tie the hands of local governments,” she said. “They can't even prevent guns in public places, even when there's a large event going on.”

Thomson was quick to note that Bloomington had a safety plan in place, with more than 20 police officers stationed around Kirkwood in coordination with the Indiana State Police and IU Police Department.

“No public safety plan can eliminate every act of violence,” she said. “As we all know, Indiana has lax gun laws that prevent communities from developing safety measures at large public gatherings.”

Read more: Police arrest suspect in Little 500 shooting

Thomson said she wants cities like Bloomington to have the same latitude as private property owners. She said she’s working with state legislators to allow cities to use the same permitting process as private organizations when holding public events, allowing them to cordon areas and make visitors pass through metal detectors.

Her office did not respond to a request for an interview.

But Nichols said successful challenges to preemptive gun laws are rare.

“In Colorado in 2021, the general assembly actually became the first state in the nation to repeal most of its preemption law,” she said. “But other than that, there are so many different ways in which the gun laws in many states are weak, and this is just one of a whole host of policies where the laws need updating and strengthening.”

Installing metal detectors on Kirkwood could have perhaps helped police intercept a man arrested that night with an illegal firearm, although the BPD said it didn’t know yet whether he had fired that weapon.

Police said Kenneth Lamar Scott, 18, of Indianapolis was in unlawful possession of an AR-15 style handgun and already faces a felony weapon charge in Hendricks County. He was also charged with resisting law enforcement, but police did not name him or anyone else as a suspect in the shooting.

Read more: Bloomington City Council considers ways to improve public safety

This weekend wasn’t the first time a Bloomington mayor expressed frustration with Indiana’s preemption laws.

When protesters carrying firearms rallied at the Bloomington Community Farmers Market in 2019 to support a vendor associated with white nationalist groups, then-mayor John Hamilton suspended the market for two weeks instead.

“I noted the difficulty presented by the prevalence of firearms and the strictures of state laws that hamstring us from taking common-sense actions,” he said at the time.

But there are still some things towns can do to reduce gun violence. Bloomington is currently accepting applications for violence reduction grants up to $30,000.

“Those kinds of programs do work,” Nichols said. “There's plenty of evidence that they're very effective at reducing homicides and shootings in the local communities when they're active.”