Preposterous idea — or is it?
In Parkland, Florida, 17 were killed and 14 more were injured at yet another school shooting on Feb. 14. The shooter was yet another troubled student armed with a semi-automatic assault rifle and multiple clips of ammo. What can we do to minimize the chances of more killings at our schools? Surely, there must be a way to protect our children.
Since efforts at control of gun sales and background checks have proved impossible, for whatever reasons, I propose a new solution.
Names like Columbine, Sandy Hook, Virginia Tech and, now, Parkland are seared into our memories for the senseless slaughter that occurred there. The U.S. has suffered 18 school shootings in the first six weeks of 2018. As long as guns are so readily available and easily transferable in our country — and it appears this will never change — we must find another way to solve this scourge. If we cannot control the distribution of guns —and our history shows we cannot — we are left with only one way to stop the killing. Harden the targets.
Our military routinely wear body armor and helmets. The new school uniforms must be bullet-proof vests and head protection. This is how ridiculous our predicament has become. We must suit out our children as if they are soldiers in combat. If we somehow do this, the deranged attacks at our schools will not stop, but at least the death toll will drop.
And perhaps when we all see our armored school children, our kids looking like platoons of soldiers, the shock and dismay will bring us to our senses.
Of course, it is preposterous to cover children in armor just so they can be safe at school. But, face it, there is no other evident answer. Either our society must change radically its permissive attitude toward weapons or we must all live in fear that our children are sitting ducks at our schools.
Some might point out that the odds of any one child being shot to death at their school are very small, but so are the odds of being killed by a terrorist, and we are spending billions of dollars to protect us in spite of the odds. Do our children deserve less?
John Sucke
Waimea
Road boundaries not that simple to draw
In Anchorage, we solved the subdivision road maintenance problems by creating LRSAs (Limited Road Service Area).
Only a handful of property owners were paying for needed snow removal and maintenance so a LRSA was created so all property owners in our subdivision were charged a fee with their property tax and we elected residents in our area to be on the board to decide what needed to be done to the roads.
Originally the boundaries were roads and it had residents on one side of the road paying and the other side didn’t. So be careful how you draw the boundaries!
For information on how these LRSAs work, Google “limited road service areas anchorage.”
Annette Kittleson
Anchorage, Alaska
Budgets set before income known
Seems like it’s all backwards to me.
The business that I ran would figure out income first and then set expenses on that number. In other words, income dictated expenses.
Having worked for the county for eight years as legislative assistant, I always reviewed the budget for my council member. I can tell you that’s not how it’s done. Its expenses dictate income. So here come the taxes.
David Hirt
Waikoloa Village