The KEEP ‘EM SAFE, TEXAS initiative will consist of public education, outreach, and public involvement activities to promote gun storage safety statewide.

AUSTIN – The Department of Public Safety recently launched KEEP ‘EM SAFE, TEXAS, a $1 million, statewide two-year campaign encouraging safe gun storage.

According to the CDC, nationally, more than half of all gun owners store at least one gun unsafely, so this new campaign will educate gun owners about the 1-2-3’s of Safe Gun Storage. Gun safety isn’t just knowing how to handle a gun properly, it’s also about keeping it from getting into the wrong hands. Whether you keep a gun in your car, home or somewhere else, safely storing it 24/7 is a must in order to protect our children, prevent avoidable injury, and keep our weapons out of the hands of criminals. Together, we can keep our fellow Texans safe!

The initiative will consist of the following tactics: radio, television, social media, display advertising, videos, billboards and includes a website where the public can go for further information on safe gun storage- safegunstoragetexas.com.  Additionally, the campaign assets will be made available to partners including statewide local and county law enforcement and other groups who would like to use the materials to promote safe storage.

In the legislative mandate, Gov. Greg Abbott stated the purpose of this campaign is “to encourage the millions of law-abiding, gun-owning Texans to embrace their personal responsibility for gun safety.”

“Texans continue the purchase of firearms for personal safety,” said Steven McCraw, Director of the Texas Department of Public Safety. “This campaign highlights the importance of storing guns safely at all times to keep them out of the hands of unauthorized users.  Whether your firearm is in your home or a vehicle or another location, it needs to be safely secured at all times.”

For more information about the campaign, please contact Jennifer Hernandez at 512-354-1148 or [email protected]