The Board of Orange County Commissioners has approved eight members of the community to make up the newly-formed Orange County Firearm Safety Committee.

Close to 50 applied for the committee that will advise the board on possible firearm regulations.

“We hardly ever get applications,” said board chairman Earl McKee. “And they were good applications.”

The commissioners requested the creation of the committee after receiving public backlash towards a regulation that was proposed in February.

Commissioner Renee Price nominated one applicant with Native American heritage, saying he was the only non-white applicant.

Chairman Earl McKee said that while racial diversity is important, he had objections to Price’s nomination because the applicant shined a laser at board members during a meeting in February.

“We do need ethnic diversity on all of our boards,” he said. “But in this case that was the only person who applied that was not Caucasian and that would be my objection.”

McKee, along with county staff, Sherriff Charles Blackwood and a representative from the North Carolina Wildlife commission will advise the committee.

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