School crisis measures need to stress local input

Submitted by Bill St. Clair on Mon, 28 May 2001 10:03:26 GMT

FROM MOUNTAIN MEDIA
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE DATED APRIL 11, 2001
THE LIBERTARIAN, By Vin Suprynowicz
School crisis measures need to stress local input

As the second anniversary of the murder of 12 students and a teacher at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo. draws near, the Nevada state Legislature is considering a bill intended to make sure local schools have a response plan in place to deal with similar crises, should one ever occur here.

Senate Bill 289 -- introduced on behalf of the state Commission on School Safety and Juvenile Violence -- is intended to make sure school districts have contingency plans in place to deal with a wide range of potential emergencies, whether they arise on school buses, during off-site activities, or on the school campuses themselves.

In a recent FBI report on the subject, Supervisory Special Agent Mary Ellen O'Toole wrote that "In today's climate, some schools tend to adopt a one-size-fits-all approach to any mention of violence," but that it's far better to be prepared to respond flexibly to the wide range of threats that can occur.

"We were focused on keeping the decision-making as local as we could, because these are local concerns and the people who are closest to the issues should be the ones making the decisions," agrees state Sen. Valerie Wiener, D-Las Vegas, who chaired the state School Safety commission.

Unfortunately, it's not at all clear that's what will really end up happening, as SB 289 is currently drafted.

Yes, the bill requires local schools to create site committees with the power to "suggest" deviations from the district-wide master plan. But any such deviations must be approved by the school district's central committee.

And while the bill stipulates that the "local law enforcement agency" will be involved in such contingency planning, Ms. Wiener makes it clear that term is meant to refer to "primary police agencies" like the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police, rather than the district school police.

"We have no voice here and we're the pulse of that school," protests Phil Gervasi, president of the Police Officers Association for the Clark County School District Police Department.

Furthermore, the current bill would exempt drafters of such crisis plans from the state open meeting law, meaning the very folks who would be expected to eventually put such plans into effect, and who would thus be most likely to spot flaws (local school police or custodians, for instance) will be shut out of the process.

Ms. Wiener replies that the emergency plans must be kept secret lest some perpetrator get hold of the emergency plan and "work around the plan."

But our schools are not armed military compounds, designed to withstand penetration by professional special forces -- and let's hope they never are. Teachers, parents, and school trustees will take part in compiling these plans, which will then have to be widely circulated to staff, discussed, and even acted out in practice drills. Would the airlines keep secret from their passengers the procedures for evacuating an aircraft, in hopes of keeping potential hijackers from figuring out where the doors are?

In addition to this excess of secrecy, the flaw in the kind of emergency planning envisioned in SB 289 is precisely its top-down nature. The path of least resistance will be to generate nearly identical plans for schools of different sizes and with different floorplans -- schools with or without windows or isolated classrooms, schools filled with seven-year-olds or with 17-year-olds.

The emphasis should be shifted to give the main authority to each local school, subject only to general, overall guidance from the district. Local employees and particularly local school police -- familiar with each building's layout, problems and population -- should play far more substantial roles.

Local principals might even be encouraged to consider the violence prevention/cessation measure which has proved most effective in places like Pearl, Miss., as well as in a locale where school violence used to be most prevalent and tragic: Israel.

Responsible, trained Israeli teachers and parent volunteers reduced violence practically to zero in that embattled nation when they began go armed. The Legislature should make it clear in SB 289 that school principals are free to encourage willing teachers to apply for and use state concealed weapon permits, if they do desire.

Vin Suprynowicz is assistant editorial page editor of the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Subscribe to his monthly newsletter by sending $72 to Privacy Alert, 1475 Terminal Way, Suite E for Easy, Reno, NV 89502. His book, "Send in the Waco Killers: Essays on the Freedom Movement, 1993-1998," is available at 1-800-244-2224, or via web site www.thespiritof76.com/wacokillers.html.

Vin Suprynowicz, vin@lvrj.com

"When great changes occur in history, when great principles are involved, as a rule the majority are wrong. The minority are right." -- Eugene V. Debs (1855-1926)

"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed -- and thus clamorous to be led to safety -- by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary." -- H.L. Mencken

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Quotes

Government doesn't work. Never did. Never will. Can't. But there are lots of good people. Love them.

-- Bill St. Clair

The Atlanta Declaration

Every man, woman, and responsible child has an unalienable individual, civil, Constitutional, and human right to obtain, own, and carry, openly or concealed, any weapon -- rifle, shotgun, handgun, machinegun, anything -- any time, any place, without asking anyone's permission.

-- L. Neil Smith

Reread that pesky first clause of the Second Amendment. It doesn't say what any of us thought it said. What it says is that infringing the right of the people to keep and bear arms is treason. What else do you call an act that endangers "the security of a free state"? And if it's treason, then it's punishable by death. I suggest due process, speedy trials, and public hangings.

-- L. Neil Smith

A Penalty Clause for the Bill of Rights

Any official, appointed or elected, at any level of government, who attempts, through legislative act or other means, to nullify, evade, or avoid the provisions of the first ten amendments to this Constitution, or of the Thirteenth Amendment, shall be summarily removed from office, and, upon conviction, deprived of all pay and benefits including pension, and sentenced to imprisonment for life.

-- L. Neil Smith

Based on 253 journal articles, 99 books, 43 government publications, and some of its own empirical work, the panel couldn't identify a single gun control regulation that reduced violent crime, suicide or accidents.

-- John Lott, commenting on the National Academy of Sciences report on gun control laws.

Who is a libertarian?

Zero Aggression Principle ("Zap")

"A libertarian is a person who believes that no one has the right, under any circumstances, to initiate force against another human being, or to advocate or delegate its initiation. Those who act consistently with this principle are libertarians, whether they realize it or not. Those who fail to act consistently with it are not libertarians, regardless of what they may claim."

-- L. Neil Smith

(Formerly called the "Non-Aggression Principle", or "NAP")

Why Did It Have to be... Guns?

Make no mistake: all politicians -- even those ostensibly on the side of guns and gun ownership -- hate the issue and anyone, like me, who insists on bringing it up. They hate it because it's an X-ray machine. It's a Vulcan mind-meld. It's the ultimate test to which any politician -- or political philosophy -- can be put.

If a politician isn't perfectly comfortable with the idea of his average constituent, any man, woman, or responsible child, walking into a hardware store and paying cash -- for any rifle, shotgun, handgun, machinegun, anything -- without producing ID or signing one scrap of paper, he isn't your friend no matter what he tells you.

If he isn't genuinely enthusiastic about his average constituent stuffing that weapon into a purse or pocket or tucking it under a coat and walking home without asking anybody's permission, he's a four-flusher, no matter what he claims.

What his attitude -- toward your ownership and use of weapons -- conveys is his real attitude about you. And if he doesn't trust you, then why in the name of John Moses Browning should you trust him?

-- L. Neil Smith

Concise

"Tell me," I was once asked, "What do you think about gun control? Give me the short answer." To which I replied, "If you try to take our firearms we will kill you."

-- Mike Vanderboegh

Also from The Atlanta Declaration:

... like going to the bathroom, breathing, eating, sleeping, or making love, it turns out that self-defense is a bodily function one cannot safely or effectively delegate to a second party.

-- L. Neil Smith

This does not mean that "Marijuana should be available by prescription." It means that morphine sulfate should be available in five pound bags at the supermarket for a couple of bucks, like sugar... but probably in a different aisle, to avoid confusion.

-- Vin Suprynowicz

If you refuse to pay unjust taxes, your property will be confiscated. If you attempt to defend your property, you will be arrested. If you resist arrest, you will be clubbed. If you defend yourself against clubbing, you will be shot dead. These procedures are known as the Rule of Law.

-- Edward Abbey

The state can only survive as long as a majority is programmed to believe that theft isn't wrong if it's called taxation or asset forfeiture or eminent domain, that assault and kidnapping isn't wrong if it's called arrest, that mass murder isn't wrong if it's called war.

-- Bill St. Clair

End the War on Freedom

School crisis measures need to stress local input