Opinion: Common sense seems lacking in school officials

Have high school administrators in our area lost all touch with reality? I realize the purpose of these "zero tolerance" policies is to prevent "another Columbine," and of course nobody wants to see that happen. But how many stories do we have to read about high school seniors being banned from graduation, suspended or punished in other ways because they had a kitchen knife in their car because they had just moved, or dared to show joy and wave or cheer while receiving their diploma?

These administrators are the people charged with educating our children and sending them out into the world with a sense of right and wrong? These are the people who think it is wrong to wave, cheer and be joyful when receiving their diploma? These are the people who cannot discern the difference between a kitchen knife falling out of a box and a truly dangerous situation?

Is anyone else besides me concerned that these administrators do not seem to have a lick of common sense?
-- Rick Watson, Palm Harbor

Zero tolerance, zero sense

Re: Lindsay Brown story.

I can't believe a student with the background National Merit Scholar Lindsay Brown has was banned from graduation and arrested on a felony weapons charge for accidentally having a small steak knife on the floorboard of her car. Will they next ban windshield wiper blades from all vehicles on campus?

I think the overriding factor in the Lee County school district's zero tolerance policy is a zero tolerance for common sense.
-- Avery M. Bailey, Brooksville

How we have gone astray

Don Wright's May 28 cartoon suggests that the country could be losing its soul when it decided to try children as adults.

Since social behavior is caught as well as taught, children learn much from their adult mentors as to the value, meaning and purpose of life. If children learn they are only a biological accident of random chance through an ages-long evolutionary process in which matter is all there is without any soul life accountable to its creator, they have no compunction about behaving as animals since they are told they are no different in kind.

Before the country decided to try children as adults, it had decided that there should be no more prayer or Bible reading in the public schools, thereby teaching children that to be educated is to be godless.

Before the country decided to try children as adults, it decided human life could legally be exterminated in the womb. From this, children learned they were disposable trash before birth, so what value do they have after birth!

If such ideas were socially acceptable to adults, why shouldn't children think and behave as adults. And if children behave as adults, committing crimes of adults, will they inevitably get treated as adults -- even tried as adults?

The soul of this nation is no better than its adults' attitude toward the author of all life and liberty, the God of the Bible, and if it has lost its soul it must be because it has lost its respect and love for him who invites children to come unto him and warns us to forbid them not.
-- John V. Koontz, St. Petersburg

Religion can't be boxed away

I read with interest the May 25 column by Howard Troxler titled Religion need not play part in this drama. My response is: Oh, if it were only that simple!

Troxler identifies a number of salient issues in the debate as to whether to expand the city code's ordinance regarding "human rights." At its most basic, as Troxler states, "Should this protection [also] cover sexual orientation?" He then proceeds to misidentify the question as "secular," as if life can be compartmentalized into various categories with none impinging upon the others. It simply cannot be done.

A person's beliefs, ethics, "moral compass" -- whatever you choose to name it -- cannot be turned on and turned off depending upon the subject matter. In regard to what Troxler identifies as the "job" of church ministers -- that of "applying religion to the secular world" -- many would take issue. Rather than separate the life of "religion" and the life of "civil law," ministers are equipped to assist people in that never-ending process and goal of allowing Jesus Christ to so pervade their lives that distinctions and "compartmentalization" are broken down.

Besides quoting Mark 12:17 out of context and applying the pejorative term "hard-liners" to those with whom he disagrees, Troxler does identify the first question: Should the human rights ordinance also cover sexual orientation? But the second question may be even more significant: Should the basis from which that decision is made be restricted to a single perspective or world view? And if so, whose? His?
-- Brad Estep, St. Petersburg

Phone competition is robust

The column published in the business section of the May 23 Times (FCC hung up on failing telecom deregulation effort) decries what the author sees as too little phone competition. This either results from a limited view of what is happening with the evolution of telecommunications today, or from listening only to the propaganda Verizon's largest competitors want consumers to believe. In either case, the premise is just plain wrong.

Today, according to the Florida Public Service Commission's 2000 report on competition, 362 competitors are certified to do business in Florida, and at least 35 of them are competing in Verizon's service region. These companies generate hundreds of millions of dollars in revenues, primarily in the fiercely competitive local telephone market for business customers in Florida.

And what about the competition for local phone service that comes from wireless phones? There are seven wireless phone companies in Tampa with hundreds of thousands of accounts -- customers who use their wireless phones every day for the same kinds of calls that once would have been carried on the traditional Verizon phone network.

Creating even more competition in Florida for the traditional residential telephone customer would require a more balanced application of the Telecommunications Act and the wisdom in Tallahassee to loosen old-fashioned regulatory impediments to competition. Robust competition that is governed by the marketplace, as exists in the current wireless telecommunications sector, is the only way to ensure that consumers enjoy the full benefits of competition that the Telecommunications Act intended to create.

Only the most simplistic analysis could possibly arrive at the conclusion that there is no competition. But that is just the simple-minded analysis Worldcom, AT&T and others are selling. Fortunately, we have something better -- the same Federal Communications Commission report cited in the column. Giving the issue a little more thought and analysis, the FCC found our competitors' market share growing rapidly.

The real headline is that the FCC found the greatest competition to be in states where the largest local telephone company has been permitted to offer long distance service. New York has the highest level -- 20 percent in the local market -- followed by Kansas, Texas, Massachusetts and Oklahoma. Competition for local residential phone service begins to get serious when AT&T and others are threatened with losing market share to competitors!

The FCC is right to give the Telecommunications Act more time, and Florida needs to let the market for telephone service work. Perhaps then, Robert Trigaux will be able to see the competition that is already robust and perfectly plain to scores of competitors, businesses and consumers in Florida.
-- John P. Blanchard, president, southeast region, Verizon Communications, Tampa

Companies didn't seem to care

I knew when I contacted both Firestone and Ford Motor Co. last year that eventually the 16-inch tires would be recalled in America as they had been in foreign countries... and both Firestone and Ford told me that was not so and that even though I was out $700 in tires and lost an additional $3,500 when I sold the car, neither company offered me any restitution or even a kind word. The gals on the phone from both companies just about said, "The company does not care about your losses."

I had purchased Firestone Wilderness 16-inch tires for the front of my '97 Explorer just before the "bad news hit the fan," so to speak, but reluctantly I kept them and replaced the two older ones shortly thereafter with a different brand. As more and more people were getting killed or maimed, I became afraid to even drive the car, so I sold it. I owed $17,000, and the dealer would give me only $13,500.

It is horrible what happened to so many people. All the money in the world can't bring back their losses, but I don't think it is fair that I, or others in the same boat, should absorb our losses. I am grateful that I was not killed or maimed, and that I was smart enough to sell the car before I might have been.
-- Diane Huizenga, Gulfport

Plan ahead for hurricanes

Your straightforward editorial, Heed Hurricane warning (May 30), wisely encouraged area residents to prepare for the 2001 Hurricane Season even though weather experts anticipate fewer storms this year. At the recent Governor's Hurricane Conference, Dr. William Gray said many folks see him as the designated messenger for Chicken Little, forecasting the sky is going to fall. In this case, however, it's not a question of whether it will fall, but when.

When Pinellas County Emergency Director David Bilodeau addressed the Florida Association of Insurance Agents' Catastrophe Claims Committee at our planning session in St. Petersburg last August, he provided much insight into the problems with local evacuations. Hopefully, area residents will consider Bilodeau's three-step evacuation strategy and discuss various departure routes with family members well before a storm is on the horizon.

Getting out of harm's way and safeguarding property that must be left behind are top priorities before a hurricane makes landfall. But after it passes, the focus turns to assessing losses and filing insurance claims. By taking a few minutes to plan ahead, property owners can help expedite the claims process. Simply make a list that includes the name of the insurance company, the policy number and the name and phone number of the insurance agent. Store this information in a safe, dry place where it will be easily accessible after a hurricane and send a copy to a friend or family member living in another area as a backup.

That being said, we can only hope our recent luck in avoiding major hurricanes will continue this year.
-- Carolyn Devonshire, director of public relations, Florida Association of Insurance Agents, Tallahassee

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