School Shootings Are Far Too Common: What Solutions Do Our Leaders Offer?

There is still a great deal yet to be known about today’s active shooter incident at Timberview High School in Arlington, Texas. The Dallas Morning News is reporting that the shooting occurred during a classroom fight. Four people were injured and the suspect is now in custody.

But one thing has become painfully, agonizingly clear: What our leaders are doing to address gun violence is not working. We have almost become numb to the regularity of wanton gun violence, even in our schools. Yet Texas leaders continue down the same, worn path of deregulation and “permitless carry,” as if more guns, easier access, and less training will improve the situation.

Following the 2018 Santa Fe High School shooting that left 10 dead, Senators Ted Cruz and John Cornyn, Gov. Greg Abbott, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, and then-House speaker state Rep. Dennis Bonnen all converged on the small town and promised action. Their solution? The Texas Legislature passed several bills to address mental health care for students. These are worthy initiatives that merit funding, but today’s event underscores the fact that their actions haven’t made students safer.

In the days to come, we’ll be watching to see what solutions Texas’ GOP leadership offers to this gun violence epidemic.

Nick Anderson

Writer, editor, photographer and editorial cartoonist Nick Anderson has joined the Reform Austin newsroom, where he will employ the artistic skill and political insights that earned a Pulitzer Prize to drive coverage of Texas government. As managing editor, Anderson is responsible for guiding Reform Austin’s efforts to give readers the unfiltered facts they need to hold Texas leaders accountable. Anderson’s original cartoons will be a regular feature on RA News. “Reform Austin readers understand the consequences of electing politicians who use ideological agendas to divide us, when they should be doing the hard work necessary to make our state government work for everyone,” Anderson said. “As a veteran journalist, I’m excited about Reform Austin’s potential to re-focus conversations on the issues that matter to common-sense Texans – like protecting our neighborhoods from increasingly common disasters, healthcare, just to name a few.” Anderson worked for the Houston Chronicle, the largest newspaper in Texas, from 2006 until 2017. In addition to the Pulitzer, Anderson earned the Society of Professional Journalists’ Sigma Delta Chi Award. He’s also a two-time winner of Columbia College’s Fischetti Award, and the National Press Foundation’s Berryman Award. Anderson’s cartoons have been published in Newsweek, the New York Times, the Washington Post, USA Today, the Chicago Tribune and other papers. In 2005, Anderson won the Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Cartooning while working for the Courier-Journal in Louisville, Kentucky. The judges complimented his “unusual graphic style that produced extraordinarily thoughtful and powerful messages.”