Hail to the chief
Like many, I was delighted to learn of Commander Jennifer Michaux’s historic promotion to police chief of St. Augustine Police Department.
It was disappointing that The Record chose to put this announcement on page 11A, bypassing the front page. For a city obsessed with history, it’s a contradiction.
In its place was more good news about Flagler College’s basketball team that would have been more appropriate on the sports page, given that the first female chief of police was just announced in the oldest city in the nation during Women’s History Month, no less.
Carolyn Mudgette,
St. Augustine
Stop the violence
No other developed country in the world has anywhere near the rate of gun violence as the United States. This situation exists mainly because the U.S. has by far the highest number of privately-owned guns in the world, and our elected officials who receive large political donations from the gun lobby have not enacted effective gun control legislation. Consequently, tens of thousands of U. S. citizens are killed every year by guns.
Everyone of us should write to our elected representatives (both federal and state) and tell them not to accept any donations from gun lobbyists, and to take immediate action to introduce and support laws that:
- Raise the minimum age for the purchase of guns;
- Require background checks for all gun sales;
- Require gun owners to keep their firearms in a locked safe, cabinet or case, or use other tools such as trigger locks to safely secure their weapons;
- Ban automatic and semi-automatic rifles, and confiscate these weapons through a mandatory buyback program;
- Establish a registry of all guns owned in the country; and
- Require a permit for all firearm purchases.
Unless such laws are fully implemented, the senseless slaughter of our citizens will continue.
Read More: Historic pick for St. Augustine police chief, get control of guns