VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (WAVY) – Wednesday marks the first day of summer and it serves as a reminder for parents to ask an important question.
June 21 is also known as ‘Ask Day’ and a question advocates want you to ask is, “Is there a gun in the home where my child will play?”
With kids out of school for the summer, many will spend more time at a friend or family member’s house. However, before your child heads out the door, advocates say asking about gun ownership is imperative.
According to the Brady United nonprofit, millions of children live in homes where firearms are not locked away. Every year thousands of kids are injured or killed as a result.
The Dix family lost their son, Kenzo. Kenzo’s father, Griffin Dix remembers the moment after getting a call from Oakland Children’s Hospital.
“We sat in that waiting room. And finally, a doctor came in and said, ‘our son has been shot apparently by a friend of his, and there’s nothing we could do,” Dix said. “We couldn’t save his life and we just couldn’t believe it. And then we knew the boy who had shot him, and we knew it was unintentional. So, we went over there, and we hugged the boy and he was totally devastated.”
Colleen Creighton from the Brady End Family Fire Program says that families should be normalizing locking up their guns the way they would lock up other chemicals or medications in their home.
“We didn’t blink and I always said, keep your medication, or your cleaning products locked into the under the cabinets or high up behind, you know, the mirrors and things like that in your bathroom, we just need to normalize the same thing for guns,” Creighton said.
On June 21st advocates want parents and loved one end ‘family fire’ by asking about firearms in homes and ensuring firearm is properly stored and locked away.