Last week marked three years since the carnage at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida but the pain of that day has barely faded.

Maybe that's because when survivors marched, petitioned, wrote letters, and made calls demanding common-sense gun safety legislation, they were mocked and threatened.

Maybe it's because the profiteering gun industry and the politicians walking in lockstep with them offered their usual hollow thoughts and empty prayers before redoubling their efforts to block any gun safety reform.

Maybe it's because this generation is the first to grow up hearing the phrase "school shooting" regularly and can recite a list of them as easily as their home address.

Our kids deserve better. These tragedies are completely preventable. But we have to have the will to act now, not in the wake of the next tragedy.

That's why this year, I'm supporting two critical bills in the Oregon Senate:

• A safe storage bill to ensure that firearms are securely stored. Every year, we hear tragic stories of families shattered when a child finds an unsecured gun. This has to stop.
• Allowing local communities to keep guns out of public buildings. Over a dozen years ago, I came to the Oregon State Legislature to testify on Senator Ginny Burdick's legislation that would allow school districts the ability to have gun-free schools. These spaces belong to all of us, and we all deserve to be safe when we're there. Watch my testimony from yesterday in support of the bill.

The vast majority of Oregonians support both of these bills; they encourage responsible gun ownership, respectful and safe use of our public buildings, and together will prevent untold deaths every year.

I will keep you posted on the progress of these bills. We must keep our communities safe from the horrors of gun violence.

Rob