Lessons from Uvalde still not learned

It’s early morning, just as students and teachers are arriving at school. Lurking in the shadows, the predator patiently waits, stalking passersby while scoping out the best opportunity to breach the building. When his chance came, he moves swiftly and successfully enters the school. Roaming the hallways at will, he is now in his element, as potential victims remained blissfully unaware of his menacing presence. Thankfully, no one was hurt or killed, and the intruder is eventually discovered by a quick-thinking employee, who locks him in a classroom.

The culprit? A mountain lion, who surreptitiously entered a California high school last week. So let’s get this straight. Mere days after the Uvalde school massacre, in which the killer entered through an unlocked door, we have a large animal that made its way into a school undetected, with no clear explanation reported as to how it gained access. How is that possible? We’re not talking about a chipmunk that could have slipped in through a door, or a squirrel that might’ve squeezed through a small crevice, but a mountain lion. And if a creature like that can make it in without being seen, you damn well better assume that an intruder with far more sinister motives could also gain entry.

Granted, no building is 100 percent secure — as we have seen with multiple White House breaches — but allowing such access, especially in the wake of Uvalde, is bewildering.

Most baffling is that almost no one is drawing that parallel. In fact, the local sheriff’s department tried its hand at comedy with the following statement: “Word is that the mountain lion who entered the English classroom at Pescadero High School this meowrning was there to apaw-logize and paw-sibly ask for a paw-don to turn in its hiss-tory pay-purr a day late. Staff at the school tell us that the entry to the school was a very claw-ver way to ask for an extension on the assignment and the request has been denied.”

Hey, no one loves sarcasm and word plays more than this author, but really? That’s their response to a school breach, especially after Uvalde? Shouldn’t the sole focus be on the security failures that allowed the animal school access, instead of playing funny guy? This time we got a pass from Lady Luck because, had the intruder been a mass shooter — instead of “only” a cougar — then there would have been no jokes. Only tears.

To be clear, keeping perimeters secure is a tactic to help repel intruders — not a strategy to prevent people from attacking in the first place. It isn’t the be all-end all, as even locked doors can be breached, but we should be making entry as difficult as possible.

Every teacher, student, parent and staff member at that school, and around the country, has a right to be concerned with this situation. But the fact that damn near no one is talking about it in its proper context either means I’ve simply become a crotchety old writer, or this country’s ability to focus on what truly matters is near the point of extinction.

As time passes, we are learning more about the situation in Uvalde — the bad, the ugly, and the inexcusable. As part of an ongoing series, consider the following points, many of which, despite their critical importance, are not being discussed as much as they should be.

The fact that it took Uvalde police so long to confront the gunman is shocking, though not surprising. After all, it wasn’t the first time. During Columbine, officers took a slow approach in moving towards the gunmen. After the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., an investigation determined that officers did not enter the school for an inexcusably long time. And even though police arrived at the Pulse Nightclub in Orlando just minutes after the gunman began his rampage, it was a staggering three hours before a SWAT team breached the building.

Bottom line: protocol and common sense dictate that the shooter be approached without hesitation. And it should always, repeat always, be assumed that victims may still be alive.

If police are incapable of doing that, it doesn’t mean they are cowards. It simply means that they need to find another profession — before a mass shooting occurs on their watch. Failure to immediately confront the threat has consequences that are devastating beyond comprehension.

Defending our schools is absolutely necessary, but it’s not enough. We need to play offense in determining why these shootings are occurring, when they virtually never did back in the day. Unless that happens, all we can do is await the next tragedy.