Hits and Misses
HIT: Anyone who is of a certain age can remember the thrill of a snow day – when school would be called off due to a snowstorm, and you would have the day to yourself to loaf or, if you were feeling industrious, study a little bit more for a test or catch up on homework. Thanks to technology, though, snow days are no longer guaranteed, since many districts opt for remote instruction when the roads are dangerous to navigate. Following COVID-19 and its months of homebound teachers and students, school districts across the country have scotched snow days altogether, forcing students to fire up their laptops rather than getting into snowball fights. However, a story that appeared this week in the Observer-Reporter and the Herald-Standard noted that many districts in the region are taking a flexible approach, leaving open the option of using a snow day here or there, but not taking so many that it would disrupt the school calendar, which mandates 180 days of instruction per year. Flexible instruction days, which the Legislature approved almost five years ago, allow districts to decide whether to allow a day off when the weather is bad or go remote. Brandon W. Robinson, superintendent of the Jefferson-Morgan School District in Greene County, explained, “Most people seem to like it because they don’t want to go into the second week of June or have a one-day spring break. Kids need a break.”
MISS: Chick-fil-A is known for being closed on Sundays, a long-held tradition for the fast-food chain. The day off was implemented so its employees could either rest or attend religious services. However, a New York assemblyman has introduced a measure that would force eateries at rest areas on the New York State Thruway to be open seven days a week if they want to open new locations. The bill seems to be specifically targeted at Chick-fil-A. Assemblyman Tony Simone, the bill’s sponsor, explained that “if you want to eat fried chicken while traveling on the holidays, then Chick-fil-A should be open on Sundays.” But if someone has such a hankering for fried chicken on a Sunday, can’t they get off the highway? There are other fast-food chains that sell it. And the rest stops have other restaurants, too. New York lawmakers would be wiser to not interfere when one fast-food chain is open or closed.
MISS: Much hay has been made in the last couple of years about marauding bands of retail thieves who have been terrorizing retail outlets and carting away millions of dollars in merchandise. Thanks to videos of incidents that have turned up online, it’s helped fuel the perception that crime is skyrocketing in the United States. The only problem, though, is that the hysteria over organized retail crime seems to have been based on myths. The National Retail Federation recently took back a claim it made earlier this year that almost half of the $94 billion in merchandise that vanished from stores in 2021 was taken by groups of thieves. The actual number? About 5%. The trade group blamed faulty data. Some states, including Pennsylvania, have toughened laws surrounding organized retail theft because of the brouhaha, and there’s nothing wrong with that, but were they actually necessary? And shouldn’t we be crafting laws grounded in fact?