A Wake-Up Call for Los Angeles? : Gunfire in a drive-by rakes school bus near City of Industry

It’s true that the right of a child to ride on a school bus and not be raked by gunfire is not embedded in the state Constitution.

But after Thursday’s shocking, apparently gang-related drive-by shooting of a loaded school bus near the City of Industry, maybe it should be.

Indeed, if some Californians were now to attempt such a constitutional initiative, at least somebody would be trying to do something.

For the deeper tragedy of this new horror is that when all the expressions of shock and outrage have passed into the smog-filled atmosphere of Los Angeles, it’s possible that nothing really meaningful will in fact be done to stem the gang terrorism that’s eating the insides of our communities.

For years now Los Angeles’ sunny streets have been turned into mean streets brimming with gang violence and dogged, desperate but ultimately unavailing counterattacks by police.

The neighborhoods most impacted have been those in the less fortunate sections. Upper-income areas have largely escaped the plague. But for how long?

One hopes this latest shot in the region’s losing battle against gangs will be heard far and wide.

Thursday’s shooting occurred shortly after noon at the intersection of Faxina Avenue and Highcastle Street in an unincorporated area of Los Angeles County near Industry. Gunfire raked a school bus filled with children.

It was only through an act of God that no one was killed by the drive-by shooting--and that somehow only two teen-agers were injured, and only slightly.

Still, the thought that Los Angeles has allowed conditions to fester to this point--that even kids going to school in a school bus can become targets of gunfire--is unacceptable.

The gang--and gun--problem here has for too long been poorly addressed. At some point this region has got to shake itself from its slumber and say: No more.

But it has lived with this poison for so long that the question arises: Will anything ever wake Los Angeles up? When a school bus full of children comes under gunfire is that not the incident that will cause Los Angeles to demand an all-out attack on this dangerous, corrosive and spiritually debilitating poison?

When will this region regain control of its streets?