School marshalls? What on earth is going on over there in the US? Why is it the rest of developed nations aren’t having this shooting issue, yet your children over your side of the pond have to learn how to take cover (sometimes in a crowd so others get hit instead) and run in a zig-zag. Sounds like a bleeding nightmare warzone.
in fairness to the main guy profiled in this story, his job is substantially more extensive than just school shootings and most of these are pretty important things to have contingencies for:
The proximity of the Porcupine Fire to Big Sky’s school campus speaks to a point easily obscured by the persistent shadow of national school tragedies like Sandy Hook and Uvalde: Active shooters aren’t the only threat Montana schools have to prepare for. Earthquakes, hazmat spills, propane explosions, fires on or off school property — much of the responsibility for anticipating and responding to such threats is now on Daugherty’s shoulders as he updates the district’s contingency plans for a variety of potential crises and works with local entities like the Big Sky Fire Department and Big Sky Medical Center to improve cross-agency communication.
Although shootings and the like are not a problem in the UK, when I went back into education this year at a “further education college” (which differs from college as it’s meant in the US - this is an institution that provides education for those aged 16+, so includes both minors and adults), we nevertheless had occasional drills for what to do in the event of a shooting or other attack. I think it’s not as comprehensive as the preparations students in American schools need to make, but it was still something the college prepared for with the same regularity as the potential for evacuation during a fire.
So even in non-US developed nations, the potential for this kind of violence is acknowledged as a risk.
This is absolutely horrifying to read about from so many angles. Perhaps most disgusting is the movie coming out. Props to the author for showing some insight and willingness to admit fault. So many people are seemingly unable to admit wrong doing.
“How dare my neighbor make six-figures from his land when I struggle to make ends meet!”
I don’t see any explanation in this article of why people oppose a farmer putting solar panels on his land. How can it possibly harm their land to have solar panels within 1/2 mile of their property line?
I mean, Kenobi Space Jesus has a pretty direct antecedent in Mormon art. They took the Medieval and Renaissance European tradition of making literally everybody white and brought it deep into the twentieth and even twenty-first centuries.
Wow, so two of those children were kidnapped specifically because of the demand generated by the sting and then they got dumped out a week later from the shelter presumably back onto the streets.
Haven’t heard of them until this article, but holy moly does the Ballard dude have a hero complex. Between the whole TV show idea, the movie, and that painting of himself, it seems to me that all he cares about is being the “chew bubblegum and kick ass” sort of action hero instead of legitimately trying to help the kids after they are “rescued”.
It sounds like to me this Operation Underground Railroad is really meant for tacticool dudebros and rich people to feel like something they’re not: a hero.
Exactly what I was thinking and planned to say here when I came to the comments. Well said. This is Meal Team Six stuff for kids who grew up watching too many bad action movies.
TransitCenter, a transit advocacy group, found in a 2018 survey of riders with household incomes below $35,000 in eight major cities that frequency, safety, crowding and reliability were higher priorities than bus fare.
Maybe I’m missing something, but if they’re surveying people who are already riders, then OF COURSE fare isn’t their biggest complaint. They’re not getting feedback from people who want to use public transit, but can’t afford to.
The information gathered from this survey is still valuable, but shouldn’t be used as an argument for or against free public transit.
I live in Tacoma, Washington, and we also just put into effect that no one under 18 needs to pay for public transit. It’s entirely free with a special Orca card. It seems like the whole state is on the path to making it free for everyone some day.
Defecto “free” ridership has really hurt the local public transport system in the SF Bay Area.
Quite a lot of people refuse to take public transit due to risks of being harassed or witnessing open drug use. Easy to dismiss that as a guy personally, but I definitely think that creates an environment that’s hostile to many people who need to use or would otherwise be using public transit.
On the other hand, Margerite bus at Stanford has been free for decades, and it’s never been a significant issue there.
So it’s very difficult to generalize across different systems that have their own unique issues.
We have free transit in Albuquerque. It’s basically turned into a rolling homeless shelter. They hired security to manage it. My dad was one of those. He was attacked by someone using drugs on the bus and had the back of his hand bit off in a brutal attack. The busses here are VERY dangerous and I’d never step foot on one again.
I ride the Albuquerque buses to and from work. The worst I’ve seen is an intoxicated guy being thrown off by the driver. I’ve also seen a couple people kicked off for riding a full route, which I guess is how they keep people from riding all day. For reference, I’m a smallish woman, usually carrying a messenger bag. I’ve never been bothered.
What happened to @Dandylion’s dad is horrifying, though. That is exactly the kind of stuff that keeps me off public transit as well. “It never happened to me” isn’t really a valid argument.
I was thinking more like that solving the homelessness problem needs to be a part of improving public transit, and cities in general. Nothing made me want a personal vehicle more than being forced to ride public transit. Every day I’d look at the people passing us by in cars and say to myself “One day, that is gonna be me!”
It’s true that you’ll probably see something unpleasant on public transit once in a while but most folks aren’t going to share the experience of someone who is literally tasked with engaging with and managing the people causing problems on the bus.
It’s unfortunate though because in my experience transit feels a lot more pleasant when there are at least a decent amount of people riding with you. When people start to feel unsafe and stop riding, it can drive further people away if they have other transportation options.
Eeh? I’m a woman, I don’t have this problem on transit at all, either in Chicagoland or in SF. First of all, witnessing open drug use isn’t, like, the end of the world; it might make you uncomfortable, but it’s not dangerous.
Being harassed is a real fear, but I find that I’m more often harassed while I’m just walking around than in a bus, train, or the muni, and when I’m on board transit there are cameras and an operator to potentially step in!
Public transit is a public good. If seeing poor people and drug users makes us uncomfortable, the solution is to address the root causes of poverty and addiction, not to force poor people off of public transit.
You might not, and neither do I have a problem with it. I grew up low income and rode plenty of “sketchy” bus lines where fights would break out. I know when to remove yourself from danger.
Plenty of people I know have, or at least have that perception. My S/Os parents visited from out of the country, and they were harassed by someone screaming racist epithets at them and got scared, and ended up taking Uber the rest of the time they were here. They are old, retired, and we didn’t want to risk them getting uncomfortable. Obviously we have the privilege of doing that, but not everyone does.
Again, it’s not about being poor, it’s about antisocial behavior that destroys the public spaces. That goes for rich assholes too.
I wonder why the WP bothered to call it “New England floods” when the article only talks about one state in New England. New York is not part of New England, but half the article focuses on that state.
That’s very much a regional view. Out west, no one bats an eye if you end New England at the Mason-Dixon line.
This sort of thing happens all the time. An Arizonan will never place Texas in the Southwest, but Virginians in my experience are a coin toss on South or Southwest. And then here we just split the difference and do SXSW.
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