All it took was one courageous citizen to speak out about the issue, and the problem got solved.
Supporters
bring you Rob Sherman Advocacy.
Click here to join them.
Nancy Phillips, star reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer and today's guest on my radio show, wrote a series of stories about the myriad severe injuries to paddy wagon passengers. The series was published this week on the front page of the Sunday, Monday and Tuesday editions. Nancy made such a compelling case that on Tuesday afternoon, Police Commissioner John F. Timoney ordered a stop to the use of all patrol wagons that do not have seat belts for rear compartment passengers. The Police Department, however, was so embarrassed about stalling so long to end the use of the unsafe vehicles that the Police Department Public Affairs Office refused to issue a press release about the dramatic change in policy.
In Nancy's outstanding series of stories, she detailed how guests of the Philadelphia Police Department have been slammed into the walls and how they have slid across the floors of the patrol wagons while being transported to the police station. Usually, the carnage was deliberately inflicted upon the victims by the officer who was driving the rig through intentionally erratic driving, just in case the court refused to inflict its own punishment on the defendant upon recognizing that the defendant was completely innocent of any wrong-doing. Philadelphia police officers, recognizing how unsafe the patrol wagons were, have refused, for years, to be transported in them when group deployment was called for, such as for the Democratic National Convention last year.
Nancy's series of stories included a graphic, entitled "Wagon Injuries: The Human and Fiscal Toll." The graphic detailed the millions of dollars that the taxpayers of Philadelphia have spent to compensate just some of the victims of the police brutality which had been inflicted accidentally on purpose.
In yesterday's follow-up story in the Inquirer, entitled, "Timoney bans vans without seat belts," Police Commissioner Timoney commented about why he abruptly changed the department policy. He said, "I did it because it was the right thing to do."
That's what we need people like Bud DesCarpentrie to do.
Bud is the superintendent of Community Consolidated School District 21, the elementary school district in which my seven-year-old daughter, Dawn, is enrolled. As reported in the March 29th edition of LN&C, Dawn refuses to ride District 21 school busses because the busses don't have seat belts. Dawn regularly reads Liberal News and Commentary from Daddy's computer, so she knows that countless students have been killed in very survivable school bus accidents and that thousands of others have needlessly suffered horrible injuries, not because the school busses have crashed, but rather because students have repeatedly been catapulted through or ejected from the school busses solely because the students were not restrained in their seats by seat belts. Dawn won't ride the school busses because those deaths and injuries were very preventable, if only people like Bud DesCarpentrie would stop stonewalling and start ensuring that there are three-point seat belts on our school busses.
As reported in the March 22nd edition of LN&C, the principal of Dawn's school ordered that all school busses used on field trips shall be equipped with seat belts. The principal said,
"A reminder following our building meeting on Thursday. It is now our school policy when ordering busses for field trips, to request that they be equipped with seat belts. Laidlaw will comply with your request at no cost differential and if the busses are available. We will also need to instruct students to use the seat belts if our busses are so equipped.
"We are seeking a safer environment for our students. Please make sure that these requests become second nature."
However, as soon as the mighty and powerful Superintendent of School District 21, Bud DesCarpentrie, heard about the new policy at Dawn's school, the superintendent ordered that the policy be reversed. Bud said that preserving the prerogative of the school board to make the decision about seat belts on school busses was far more important than protecting the safety of the students who ride on the school busses.
The last sentence of the September, 2000, letter to parents, entitled "Security in District 21 School Buildings," Superintendent DesCarpentrie states, "The education of all children in a safe environment will always be a number one priority for the entire District 21 community." Apparently, that statement is just a bunch of public relations BS by Bud. Bud has taken the position that saving just a very few dollars is far more important than saving my daughter's life. Besides, District 21 schools are overcrowded, so having fewer kids around after an unfortunate, tragic accident will make things much more comfortable for everyone. Everyone, that is, except the kids who die after being catapulted through the window and having the bus roll on top of them in the bus accident, or the kids who have their brains scrambled from slamming into the seat backs in front of them at 50 miles per hour. Isn't compartmentalization wonderful?
Of course, Dawn won't be one of the maimed or killed because Dawn won't ride on school busses without seat belts. God didn't make no dumb atheists.
Bud DesCarpentrie's contract expires next year at the end of June. I will do everything I can to ensure that this guy's contract is not renewed.
Rob Sherman P. O. Box
7410
Buffalo Grove, IL 60089-7410
A post office box is used
because
the street address uses a curb mail box,
which is not secure.
Telephone: (847) 870-0700
Fax: (847) 870-1156
E-mail: rob followed by the at symbol followed by robsherman dot com
