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Missoula’s ban on carrying firearms in some public buildings could be expanded under an emergency amendment to a city ordinance that will be discussed by the council Oct. 15.

The emergency amendment is needed if the city wants to prohibit people from bringing weapons into polling places during the Nov. 6 midterm election, and was created at the request of the Missoula County Attorney’s Office, the Missoula Public Library and the Missoula Art Museum, according to Marty Rehbein, the city clerk and legislative services director.

“There has been some concern about open and concealed carry at polling places,” Rehbein told the city council on Wednesday. “So the county attorney’s office has kind of found a gray area in the laws with respect to whether that’s allowed or not.

“A lot of the polling places are in schools, and there’s no open carry or concealed carry allowed in public schools. But there are a considerable amount of polling locations that are not in schools and so this was kind of a gray area of the city’s law.”