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Thumbs Up, Thumbs Down

Thumbs up to the parents of a child who knew what to do when a stranger approached. Earlier this week, a Washington Middle School student was approached by a man in a large blue sport-utility vehicle with white stripes and dark tinted windows and asked to help find the man’s lost puppy. The child immediately went inside the school and reported the incident. As Capt. Robert Samuelson told The Post-Journal after the incident, the student did exactly what they were supposed to do — and that was no accident. Between the child’s parents, teachers and countless other messages, the lesson to be wary of strangers had obviously been learned. In the day and age in which we live, every parent should take the time to have a talk wtih their child about what to do if they are ever approached by a stranger.

Thumbs up to the reprieve given by a U.S. Bankruptcy Court to the purchase of Sears by Eddie Lampert, the company’s chairman and largest shareholder. The sale means the K-Mart store in West Ellicott is one of the 400 stores that will remain open. The deal is good news, though many analysts wonder if that good news is only temporary. “While there’s no doubt that a shrunken Sears will be more viable than the larger entity, which struggled to turn a profit, we remain extremely pessimistic about the chain’s future,” said Neil Saunders, managing director of GlobalData Retail. “In our view, Sears exits this process with almost as many problems as it had when it entered bankruptcy protection. In essence, its hand has not changed, and the cards it holds are not winning ones.” We hope Lampert is holding some ace up his sleeve — and if so, now would be a good time to pull use it. The last thing anyone in southern Chautauqua County needs to see is another vacant retail big box store.

Thumbs up to Bill Nelson, Carroll’s recently hired police chief, for discussing a couple of interesting ideas recently with the Carroll Town Board. The first is to spend $1,980 in STOP DWI funding to pay for four body cameras for the department, something Nelson said can provide records of arrests and evidence for court proceedings as well as a record of officers’ interactions with the publici. Nelson also discussed a warning ticket system for drivers in Carroll. He said officers currently issue universal traffic tickets for all infractions and that officers could choose to issue a warning ticket for a first offense. Nelson explained that he doesn’t want to penalize good drivers who might make one mistake. After drivers receive a warning ticket, they would be entered into the system and would therefore be ineligible to receive just a warning on repeat offenses. Kudos to Nelson for finding funding for the body cameras and for trying to come up wtih a way his officers can make the town safer without making town residents’ lighter with the warning ticket program.

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