Mark Henson oversees a small school system in gun-friendly Fannin County.

The district of about 2,800 students, in a conservative community in the north Georgia mountains, seems like a natural candidate for a provision of the state’s controversial gun law that allowed school staff to carry firearms.

But more than a year after the so-called “Guns Everywhere” law took effect, there are no gun-toting educators or administrators walking the halls in Fannin County.

Even Henson, who has a license to carry, isn’t interested in bringing his firearms to school.

“When you’re shooting across a roomful of a children, that’s a whole different ballgame,” said Henson, the district’s superintendent. “That’s just something I would hate to burden somebody with.”

Henson isn’t alone in his thinking.

“We haven’t come across anyone who’s even expressed real interest in it,” said Justin Pauly, director of communications for the Georgia School Boards Association.

“There’s just too many things that could go wrong,” he added.

Legislation passed last year expanded where licensed gun owners can carry, including previously off-limits places like churches, bars and government buildings.

The law also gave local school boards the option of arming chosen staff members.

Lawmakers attached several stipulations, such as training requirements and rules against keeping a firearm in a purse or briefcase.

But local officials so far have decided against allowing guns.

The liability associated with arming educators is a major reason, Pauly said.

Acquiring insurance is a significant issue. Providers in other states have already threatened to raise premiums or decline coverage for systems that permit staff to carry, according to news reports.

And while Pauly said no one has determined what the cost of insurance coverage would be here, such a policy is expected to come at great expense even if a district finds a willing provider.

That sounds like an excuse to Jerry Henry, executive director of the advocacy group Georgia Carry.

He said he would need to see numbers to believe that’s a valid reason not to arm school staff.

“How liable are you if you allow somebody to come into the school and shoot 20 kids?” Henry said, referring to the 2012 shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.

Most Georgia schools have turned to other strategies to increase safety after a string of high-profile school shootings.

Many hired school resource officers – who are armed – or coordinated with local law enforcement agencies, Pauly said.

In Fannin County, the system has an armed officer at each of its five schools. It also has a growing network of security cameras throughout its campuses.

Locally, Henson said there is no push for arming educators.

“Right now, our community is not clamoring for that at all,” he said.

For all the talk about arming school staff, relatively few schools across the country have actually done so, says Kenneth S. Trump, who heads a national consulting firm in Cleveland called National School Safety and Security Services.

And, to him, there is no scenario where an armed educator makes sense.

“If schools want to have an armed presence then, hands down, it should be having a trained, certified, commissioned police officer,” he said.

Trump advocates for a renewed focus on comprehensive security strategies in schools.

Recent shootings – Sandy Hook, in particular – have led to a “tunnel-vision focus” on active shooters, he said. That has caused people to lose sight of daily threats such as non-custodial parents, natural disasters and gang violence.

“We’re taking one narrow piece and going off the deep end for something that’s highly unlikely to occur,” Trump said.

Jill Nolin covers the Georgia Statehouse for CNHI’s newspapers and websites. Reach her at jnolin@cnhi.com.