Letters: ‘Reconceptualizing’ police; Many contributed to smooth primary election

‘Reconceptualizing’ police

I would like to second Beverly Hunter’s June 24 CDT letter to the editor, thanking local police for shutting down illegal drug activities. I’m also 100 percent with Ms. Hunter on not defunding police departments. To me that’s just a crazy idea. But restructuring and reorienting police departments — reconceptualizing, maybe, is another matter.

To frame this, here’s a real-life situation and some thoughts on alternative approaches. My car was rear-ended at a stop light and the miscreant took off. A police department representative came to my home to interview me about the incident. He was packing. Why? I’m not too paranoid around trained police officers carrying guns, but, then, I’m not representative of a group with good reason to be concerned. But maybe someone with a different skill set and no gun would eliminate anyone’s concerns and maybe even improve community relations. Couldn’t the person who came to interview me have been, say, a P.D. representative trained specifically in interviewing techniques but not in the use of deadly force? Could he or she have been a Penn State graduate student in criminology or journalism (media studies) acting as an on-call intern? Why not? To take it further, is a gun necessary to answer a call and respond to a traffic accident? In Centre County?

This is just one idea, I’m sure there are many more and many better ones out there. Maybe we should expect our local governments to do some reconceptualizing.

Many contributed to smooth primary election

Thank you to the Centre County Board of Elections, director Joyce McKinley and her staff, the dozens of borough and township elections board workers and the voters of Centre County for a very successful and well executed primary election on June 2. Due to the COVID-19 crisis, the original date was changed to Tuesday, June 2, which resulted in many challenges for those associated with the election process.

Several voting places had to be changed and or consolidated.

Many additional poll workers needed to be recruited to replace those who were not able to work for health reasons. Added to the above was the processing of over 20,000 mail applications, a first for Centre County. The new voting machines functioned very well and provided us with a voter-friendly voting procedure which provided a secure paper trail. Again, thanks for the dedicated work of many, many folks associated with the election process. Looking ahead to the November election, please take time to register to vote if you are not already on the county voting rolls.

College Township in the wrong on chicken issue

This letter is in reference to the “College Township to 10-year-old: Give up your pet chickens ...” article.

To zoning enforcement officer Mark Gabrovsek, shame on you for doing what so many bureaucrats with “officer” in their title do — misinterpreting regulations due to a lack of critical thinking, compassion and awareness. I read and interpret vague regulations daily for work and section 200-7 of the ordinance is obviously referring to farming operations rather than the keeping of pets. Chickens are not exclusively livestock and to view them as such is to unfaithfully interpret the text of the ordinance by granting consideration to non-textual sources. If the ordinance was followed as interpreted by Mr. Gabrovsek, no one in College Township with less than 10 acres would be allowed to have a tomato plant on their land. In an interview with the Daily Collegian in 1998 as a police officer you stated that “... you don’t have to be a robot and deal with people like they’re not human beings.” It’s time for you to take your own advice, sir. Stop digging in and threatening a child.

I believe it’s the responsibility of Gabrovsek’s superiors to understand the rules as they are written. It’s not acceptable to avoid the issue by blindly supporting the misinterpretation of an ordinance being applied incorrectly. College Township should be serving their community, not playing a technicality game when there are so many more important things to focus on. College Township: Why are you letting this go on for so long when you are so clearly wrong?