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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsSpotted on Campus: Up-Armored Mine-Resistant Monster Trucks
With the cost of tuition skyrocketing, you may be wondering why universities are getting mine-resistant ambush-protected vehicles or MRAPs which are designed for the battlefield and cost $700,000.
The answer is simple: They don't pay for them. We do.
Through a federal program, Ohio State University received a 19-ton armored truck called a "MaxxPro" last year. It's built to withstand ballistic arms fire and mine fields. And, unfortunately, it isn't the only campus Uncle Sam is helping to militarize. The University of Central Florida got a modified grenade launcher. And the University of Michigan's campus police are attempting to use federal funds to buy military-grade body armor.
Like other police departments, campus security can purchase military equipment through grants from the Department of Homeland Security or Department of Justice, or they simply get the equipment for free straight from the Department of Defense. These federal agencies provide the wartime weaponry and equipment with no training and little oversight, while federal taxpayers pick up the tab worth billions of dollars."
*Not surprisingly, the results of this excessive militarization are both tragic and absurd: militarized police aiming rifles at peaceful protestors on the streets of Ferguson, Missouri; a paramilitary SWAT team raiding a house in the middle of the night just to search for drugs; campus police armed with M-14 rifles and full riot gear. Incidents such as these demonstrate that arming police like soldiers makes us less safe by encouraging a policing culture in which law enforcement treats people like the enemy rather than like those they are supposed to serve and protect."
*Students across the country should contact their administrations and tell them they don't need a militarized police force. Getting MRAPs off our campuses would be a great start. But building a movement that gets them off our streets entirely would be better still."
https://www.aclu.org/blog/criminal-law-reform-national-security/spotted-campus-armored-mine-resistant-monster-trucks
NBachers
(16,964 posts)Not that I'm advocating throwing eggs or tomatoes or paint balloons or ketchup condoms or silly string or rolls of toilet paper at these things . . .
coldbeer
(306 posts)appal_jack
(3,813 posts)19 tons = 38,000 lbs. Any vehicle over 26,000 lbs. requires a Commercial Drivers' Licence. There was a recent case where a Deputy (without a CDL) drove one of these home from a base where he picked it up, exceded the safe speed limit (I think around 55 mph, absolute maximum for these) and rolled the thing.
I can understand the appeal of these vehicles. How else can you get an armored vehicle for free? And if you are a local PD, you will wish you had one during any sort of active shooter situation. That said, maybe a Sheriff's office is a better locus to park one than a campus police force. Just make sure that the Deputy behind the wheel knows what s/he's doing...
-app
OilemFirchen
(7,143 posts)I can see why U of M requested body armor.
I'll be interested to see the changes to their fight songs.
NYC_SKP
(68,644 posts)they got theirs. UC chancellors are paid vulgar salaries in the high six figure ranges.