North Carolina editorial roundup

Recent editorials from North Carolina newspapers:

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Oct. 28

StarNews of Wilmington on addressing hurricanes:

Since 1954’s Hazel, the state had weathered storms fairly well. That luck has run out over the past few decades.

The people of North Carolina need to answer two big questions:

1. Do we think that experiencing three major-flood-producing hurricanes in 20 years is a “new normal”?

2. If yes, based on what we’ve seen since 1999, should we try to mitigate potential destruction and loss of life?

Folks near the coast have always lived with the threat of hurricanes. Certain steps were taken to reduce the impact should one strike. But we felt that the odds were on our side, and that the risk was manageable.

Since Hazel in 1954, each hurricane season - for the most part - would end up dealing us a good hand. Sure, there were a few times we didn’t win, but our losses were minimal. The odds were working nicely in our favor. Then we started drawing bad cards - specifically Fran, Floyd, Matthew and Florence. We did have a few aces up our sleeves - some beefed-up building codes; better storm forecasting, which allowed for better and earlier preparation; and counties and municipalities that had become more proactive in both hurricane preparation and response.

But those trump cards were not enough. We’ve been losing badly.

Try as we might, we can’t predict the future. But we still plan for it, making at least an educated guess and weighing risks. For a while now, scientists have warned that stronger, wetter and slower-moving hurricanes would be more common and cause more flooding. Plenty of people - politicians included - have responded with a big “phooey”.

And that’s really at the heart of the first big question: Scientists say our odds are steadily worsening, but the doubters aren’t buying it. They see no need to do the things that the experts say could improve our odds. They are reluctant to change where and how we build things like houses, roads and sewer systems.

So who to believe? We would suggest that we can’t move forward proactively and effectively until we answer that question.

And even if there is a consensus that our hurricane odds are worsening, that doesn’t guarantee N.C. residents and political leaders will act. Furthermore, if there is a willingness to act to mitigate storm damage, what should we do and how will we pay for it?

…

Online: https://www.starnewsonline.com/

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Oct. 30

The Charlotte Observer on the deadly Butler High School shooting:

It’s natural to think of worst case scenarios when such a scenario is right before your eyes. So it was Monday when authorities said a Butler High School student was shot and killed by another student during a dispute in a school hallway. The death appeared to be the first fatal shooting inside a CMS school, but it revived a debate in the CMS school community about the use of metal detectors to protect our children.

That’s an understandable consideration - and not just because of Monday’s tragic death. CMS has a gun problem. The district has accounted for 20 percent of the guns reported on school grounds in North Carolina despite having just 10 percent of the state’s total enrollment, the Observer’s Ann Doss Helms reported. That likely contributed to Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Chief Kerr Putney recommending last year that CMS start “wanding” everyone who enters any school.

CMS Superintendent Clayton Wilcox resisted that measure, in part because of legitimate logistical concerns that include having thousands of students wanded each morning at each high school, as well as students and others who move between buildings on all CMS campuses throughout each day. (CMS has, in the past, randomly used metal detectors at schools, although it’s unclear if and how much that happens now.)

There are other reasons to be wary of the regular use of metal detectors on campus. Several studies have shown that metal detectors at schools have a negative impact on students’ perception of safety and increase their sense of disorder at the school. Research shows such measures also can have a negative impact on student performance, especially at already struggling schools. Plus, money for metal detectors might have to come from other school resources.

Also, there is this reality: Wanding students might improve the chances of keeping guns from being brought into CMS schools, but it won’t stop the student in a parking lot with a gun and a dispute to settle. It won’t stop someone with mental illness who might have a weapon outside a school entrance. It won’t stop the worst case scenario.

This is among the most difficult decisions Wilcox and the CMS Board of Education must consider, because it comes with the weight of students’ lives, a burden Wilcox clearly showed as he stood outside Butler on Monday morning. The superintendent said he and the district will review safety plans and procedures, and the district is already embarking on a $9 million safety initiative that includes giving all faculty “panic alert cards” that would let them notify administrators and police about urgently dangerous situations. It should be noted that the school system also has been attentive to bullying issues that can lead to violence and appeared to be linked to Monday’s shooting.

“Perhaps we need to do some things, get a little more aggressive,” Wilcox said.

That’s a natural response to a tragedy, and it’s a calculation many of us similarly make in other parts of our lives. How much are we willing to sacrifice to protect ourselves, and how much will that shield us from the worst that can happen? CMS should continue to look for ways to improve safety, but we believe the cost of metal detectors each day at each school is not worth the incomplete protection they would provide.

Online: https://www.charlotteobserver.com/

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Oct. 29

Winston-Salem Journal on violent acts:

Last week’s prominent bouts of violence and threats of violence, seemingly motivated by political and racial animosity, were troubling to most Americans.

On Wednesday, police arrested a Florida (and one-time Charlotte) resident for allegedly mailing more than a dozen packages containing dangerous explosives to prominent critics of President Trump.

On Thursday a man was arrested in Louisville, Kentucky, after allegedly failing to break into a predominantly African-American church, then shooting and killing two black people in a supermarket.

On Saturday morning, 11 people were gunned down inside the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh. Six were also wounded, including four armed police officers.

These acts sadden us and shake us to our core. “This is not America,” we say, but too often it is.

And they were followed by our national pastime, finger-pointing.

Nobody wants their political alignment to be associated with violence. And none of us are responsible for the acts of an extreme few. The people responsible for these crimes were the people who built the devices and pulled the triggers.

Nevertheless, it’s absurd to think that heated, hateful rhetoric would have no influence. It’s intended to have influence. The perpetrators of those acts allowed themselves to be radicalized by the venom they swallowed.

… It falls on each of us, president or pauper, to examine the stories we read, the voices we listen to, the influences we let into our lives. If they’re hateful, if they condemn a whole group of people because of the perceived actions of a few, if they urge us to respond to disagreement with violence and rage, we have a responsibility to reject them with every fiber of our beings.

Online: https://www.journalnow.com/