Bulletproof schools and climate change suits

Defending schools against mass shootings and a climate change lawsuit filed by students are topics from The Buzz that had South Florida talking this week.

Let’s talk safety

Bulletin boards, book shelves and bulletproof windows.

The Parkland massacre may forever change what’s considered normal in Florida’s classrooms.

A gunman killing 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School on Valentine’s Day has school districts across the state looking for ways to avoid more mass shootings — or at least minimize the body count.

Likely up for discussion, adding windows gunmen can’t shoot through, installing better classroom locks and even using metal detectors to check students for weapons.

The looming changes are a sad consequence of a nation unwilling to put down its guns — not even the assault weapons.

America opts for armoring its schools over disarming Americans.

We aren’t willing to ban military-style rifles, but we are willing to treat all children as would-be shooters, requiring them to use see-through backpacks and pass through metal detectors on the way to first period.

We are so numb to the frequency of mass shootings in America that after Parkland some people demanded to know why there wasn’t already bulletproof glass at Marjory Stoneman Douglas — as if gunfire is just another risk schools should be ready to face.

Yes, of course we should learn from the Parkland tragedy and make schools safer for students and teachers alike.

Requiring single-points of entry at all schools, to better control who is coming and going, is long overdue.

Likewise, teachers should be able to lock classroom doors from the inside, instead of having to open the door and risk facing danger on the other side.

And adding more school resource officers, trained to bolster security without making students feel like inmates, makes sense.

But we can’t expect to protect schools from a national gun violence epidemic without also going after the guns that make mass killings so easy.

So concerned parents gathering to brainstorm school safety improvements should add one more thing to the to-do list: start electing people willing to outlaw assault rifles and high-capacity ammunition magazines.

These are the tools of choice in mass shootings across the country. They were designed for war, not self-defense, hunting or sport shooting. It shouldn’t be so easy for killers to get them and take aim at our schools.

America needs to finally acknowledge that the right to bear arms doesn’t mean you get to have any kind of gun you want.

The deadly consequences of our anything-goes interpretation of the Second Amendment — from Columbine to Sandy Hook and now Marjory Stoneman Douglas — is something that bulletproof windows alone can’t fix.

Lawsuit turns up the heat

If rising seas can’t persuade Florida’s leaders to take action on climate change, maybe a legal fight started by students will.

Gov. Rick Scott, Agriculture Secretary Adam Putnam and other state leaders face a lawsuit filed Monday by eight Florida students, and their legal allies, demanding action on climate change.

Scott and many of his fellow Republicans in charge of Tallahassee have balked at acknowledging the existence of climate change — even as South Florida communities already face more frequent flooding and are adding pumps and raising sea walls.

Now some of the state’s youth hope the courts will change that. The students, ranging from age 10 to 20, are teaming with Our Children’s Trust, an Oregon-based advocacy group filing lawsuits across the country to force reluctant politicians to enact climate recovery policies.

The lawsuit seeks to reduce Florida’s use of fossil fuels, which add to the air pollution that worsens climate change threats such as sea level rise.

Decades ago, it took a court fight to get Florida serious about saving the Everglades. Maybe this climate change lawsuit can get state leaders to stop ignoring rising seas and other threats that require action.

And don’t doubt the power of student advocates.

After the school shooting in Parkland, we have seen how student activists can get things done. They rallied a call for action that helped pass Florida’s first new gun regulations in decades.

Those survivors-turned-activists also led hundreds of thousands of demonstrators to march on Washington, demanding more gun control.