Needles, Class, Science & PR – Wednesday’s Roundup

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Last fall we did a story on the problem of discarded hypodermic needles across the Tourism District, and now one City Councilman says he has considered a proposal to pull the rules allowing the needle exchange on Tennessee Avenue.

For the record, it’s the editorial position of Route 40 that well-run needle exchanges are humane, save lives and save money. But we also think if the state uses “unsafe” and “unclean” conditions as an occasion to take over local government functions, it should
acknowledge the needle exchange is in the Tourism District that it administers.

Flashover
An Atlantic City firefighter’s out of the hospital after the vacant house he was in experienced a “flashover.” Read Erin Serpico’s evocative story on it. Frankie Walsh, the injured member of the ACFD, has a ten-month-old baby.

Less Class
An “increasing number” of New Jersey school districts (including Vineland) are eliminating class rank in an effort to reduce the toxic competition that comes from excessive bean-counting at the high-school level. In other news, the meritocracy is a myth.

Trees
Did you know you can get five free trees from the Forest Service? Elinor knew. She’ll also tell you to pick them up here. Where you stick them’s up to you.

Exchelon Eschcaton
The End Times could be coming for the famous mall with the name I never understood but liked anyway.

‘Guided By Science’
Payton Guion and Susan Livio at NJ.com have the list of new medical conditions for which you can be prescribed medical marijuana under the expansion of the program announced yesterday by Phil Murphy.

“We will be guided by science,” Murphy reportedly said. Super. When has that ever not worked out well.

Judge Russo in Ocean County sounds delightful. If you don’t think justice is administered in our society by some real charmers, ask Elinor to show you highlights from her immigration-court database sometime.

Mayor Gilliam–who seems to have shaved his beard–said new CRDA head Matt Doherty understands Millennials and has had success attracting them to Belmar, where he’s soon stepping down as mayor. In an appearance at the Public Relations Council of Greater Atlantic City, Doherty said, “We will push out nothing but positive news.”

For the record, we at Route 40 are all for good news, but we’re also old enough to remember the $30 million per year they used to get to “push out” a positive spin. If they spent some of that fixing the city, they’d need less PR.

It’s the Circle of Life!
Elsewhere in news literacy, here are two stories (one and two) about the Atlantic City Mayor and the legal problems he seems to be facing, stemming from accusations made against him by the city Democratic Committee that just got him elected a few months ago. See if you can wade through the morass of laundered information to note the actual new facts.

For more feats of journalism from across your region, see below:

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