A bill adding Porter and LaPorte counties to the Indiana Crime Guns Task Force passed unanimously out of the House Courts and Criminal Code committee Wednesday without amendments.
Senate Bill 148, authored by State Senators Rodney Pol Jr., D-Chesterton, and Aaron Freeman, R-Indianapolis, would add Porter and LaPorte counties to the Indiana Crime Guns Task Force beginning July 1, 2027.
The task force was created during the 2021 legislative session and there are currently 10 counties on the task force. Lake County was added to the task force during the 2025 legislative session.
Pol testified before the House Courts and Criminal Code committee that the task force has been “providing the coordination and collaboration between the different counties and the different levels of federal law enforcement (that) has really worked gangbusters.”
“Hundreds and hundreds of guns have been taken off the streets. Hundreds of people have been arrested and charged with crimes that have been interconnected with other crimes that they have committed in the past because of the great collaboration there,” Pol said.
Pol said he wants to include Porter and LaPorte counties to the task force because last year the counties saw “a rash” of murders and “a number” of retaliatory shootings that took place, Pol said.
“With the help of this task force, these are the types of proactive measures that we would take that we could avoid the unnecessary loss of life in my district and throughout the rest of the state,” Pol said.
Porter County Sheriff Jeffrey Balon testified before the committee in support of joining the task force.
“Guns have no borders. They go across the state. It makes sense for us to be a part of it based on the locality of Porter County,” Balon said.
State Rep. Gregory Steuerwald, R-Avon, who wrote the 2021 bill, created the task force to bring local, state and federal law enforcement officials together to remove guns from the street.
In its first year in Marion County, the task force confiscated 367 guns and arrested 390 people, Steuerwald said.
“This may be one of the most unknown things we’ve done in law enforcement that has done amazing stuff, and I’m all for taking it across the state,” Steuerwald said.
State Rep. Matt Pierce, D-Bloomington, said the legislature typically likes to address a criminal matter by enhancing a penalty and “hope that there’s more deterrence and crime will go down.”
“We should be doing more bills like this, which actually get at how do you stop the crime, solve the crimes and get more time on task,” Pierce said.
The bill passed the committee 13-0. It heads to the House for further consideration.
