Correction posted 6/14/2005: An anti-violence policy that was under consideration by the Virginia Tech Board of Visitors would prohibit students and all university employees except for law enforcement officers from carrying firearms on campus. However, visitors with concealed weapons permits could bring guns on campus, but not into campus facilities. This story as posted in Monday’s editions was incorrect on this point.

ALEXANDRIA - Virginia Tech officials are sticking to their ban on guns and asking the university's governing board to endorse an anti-violence policy that threatens to arrest anyone who refuses to disarm or leave campus.

But while the gun ban would clearly prohibit holders of concealed weapons permits from carrying firearms on campus, university officials said they have no intention of searching visitors unless police believe they pose a safety threat. "We still think we need a safe campus," said Kurt Krause, Tech's vice president for business affairs and administration. "But someone carrying a weapon concealed doesn't become an issue until they show [the gun]. We're not going to go searching cars or patting people down."

Earlier this spring, Tech came under heavy criticism from gun owners' rights groups for disciplining a student who carried a concealed handgun to class.

The student, never identified by the university, had a state-issued permit to carry a concealed weapon. However, university officials argued that the school's decades-old gun ban supersedes the permit.

In the ensuing debate, some gun owners questioned whether Tech could legally prohibit anyone from carrying firearms on a public university campus as long as they were complying with state laws.

Turns out, Tech's policies were silent on whether faculty or campus visitors could bring guns to campus. Tech's student life policies and state policies for state employees prohibit students and classified employees from coming to campus armed.

Members of the Tech Board of Visitors are expected to vote today on a Campus and Workplace Violence Prevention Policy that deals with everything from stalking to assault and outlines university resources committed to helping prevent violence. Virginia requires all state agencies to adopt such a policy.

Included in the policy is language prohibiting everyone except law enforcement from "carrying, maintaining or storing a firearm or weapon on any university facility, even if the owner has a valid permit."

Students and employees who want to keep guns on campus must store them at the Virginia Tech Police Department. Anyone caught carrying a firearm onto campus, the policy continues, will be asked to remove it immediately. Failure to comply could result in university disciplinary action or arrest against students and employees and trespassing charges against anyone else.

But Tech's new policy is bound to encounter opposition from the same groups and individuals that criticized the university for disciplining the unnamed student.

Philip Van Cleave, president of the Virginia Citizens Defense League, said his group will be prepared to fight the issue, likely through the legislative process.