THE DAY AFTER: Narcan Vending Machines and April Fools
If you can’t take a joke…
NEW ROCHELLE, NY (April 2, 2023) — Longtime readers know that I enjoy posting an April’s Fools Day article come April 1st.
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My favorite until this year was more than a decade ago when I ran a story in 2011 and then did a “War of the Worlds” inspired radio broadcast on WVOX (long before I was banned for speaking truth to power).
During the day I received a desperate call from City Hall begging me to delete the story. When I asked why, I was told they had people showing up to get amnesty on their parking tickets. I said “why would you complain about that? Tell them there is no amnesty and tell them to pay their parking tickets!”
If you go back and read that article, it’s got some funny lines:
According to New Rochelle Mayor Noam Bramson, the Amnesty Program will provide the City with a “net benefit” of $7.5mm. As a result all police, fire and sanitation workers will be terminated effective immediately.
Residents are advised to fend for themselves.
But the article was making a serious point:
- New Rochelle was owed millions of dollars in back taxes
- There were three thousand open building permits
- There were potholes all over the City
- There were a large number of unpaid parking tickets
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My new favorite is:
New Rochelle High School Introduces Innovative Narcan Vending Machines
The article had got some funny lines but it too is making a serious point:
- Superintendent Raymond did fabricate a story about a “suspected” Fentanyl overdose
- Raymond did do this on the same day he told the board he was quitting, halfway through his contract
- The nurses were honored at a New Rochelle Board of Education meeting for “saving” a student they did not save
- Westchester County Executive George Latimer did give proclamations to the nurses for “saving” a student they did not save
- The school board has for years failed to address students vaping drugs in the high school hallways and bathrooms (suspending students for vaping would be deemed racist)
- The district is putting naloxone spray in every school including elementary schools with Kindergartners
I wrote about all the lies and deceptions here: No Opioids Found in Vaping Student Given Narcan at New Rochelle High School, Police Say
I did a deep dive into fentanyl overdoses which make it crystal clear that it was obvious that the student given Narcan on January 9, 2023 had not ingested fentanyl (and school officials knew that or otherwise they would have put the school on lockdown/lockout).
A Primer on Fentanyl Overdoses and Related Toxicology - Introduction
As I typically do, on the day after April 1, I let those who took it seriously in on the joke; that the story was published on April 1... April Fool’s Day.
**BONUS COVERAGE:** WVOX RADIO reports the Narcan Vending Machine article as real. Caller Anthony Galletta explains to hosts Dennis Nardone and Miss Tonny.
I went on to explain that my tongue-in-cheek story on 4/1/23, my serious but hopefully humorous-to-most take on a very deliberate real fake fentanyl story on 1/9/23 put out by the New Rochelle Schools Superintendent Jonathan P. Raymond, is about as good a satire of Raymond’s fake fentanyl narrative as I could imagine: a fake narcan narrative of my own.
I explained, for those joining us from around the country courtesy of a tweet by Rasmussen Reports or those otherwise new to the story, that the New Rochelle Superintendent, in a disgraceful and ongoing fraud, whipped up a frenzy over a supposed vaping/fentanyl story to distract the public from a simultaneous announcement to the school board that he was walking out on his 3-year contract after just 18 months leading to the hiring last month of the District’s record-shattering 8th Superintendent in 9 years.
Despite knowing within hours that there was no fentanyl involved, and a police investigation he requested had concluded the same thing leas than 18 hours later, Raymond actively and aggressively pushed his fake fentanyl narrative, appearing twice on national TV (Fox & Friends, Inside Edition), giving numerous interviews and allowing television news crews into the high school to interview the nurses involved and roam the corridors and nurses offices — even weeks later.
The guy is utterly shameless.
The low point was a press conference held by Westchester County Executive George Latimer to give the school’s medical staff proclamations for “saving” a student’s life by administering Narcan even though everyone in the room, including the press, knew there were no opioids involved (Narcan only works on opioids) and the entire tale was a big, fat fraud. To this day, new versions of the Superintendent’s fake fentanyl narrative continue to be published.
An exchange (below) on a local Facebook Group (Concerned Parents of New Rochelle) aptly sums up the attitude of school officials and community members. A member of the group posted a link to this story moments after it was published, clearly indicating the obvious, it was an April’s Fools gag. William Ianuzzi, the New Rochelle Board of Education President, the same guy lampooned in my April Fool’s Day article, felt compelled to declare: “this is fake”.
Two thoughts on that.
First, “duh!”
Second, this is the first time he has ever publicly commented on the fake fentanyl narrative that he and other school officials have been perpetrating for months but rather than address his lies he declares as “fake” an April Fool’s article satirizing those lies.
Try looking in the mirror Mr. Board President.
If Ianuzzi’s Facebook comment comes across as a bit annoyed, perhaps it is because my widely-circulated satirical article prompted numerous angry phone calls from outraged parents and other residents to school board members. As the comment below his suggests, the reason so many people believed the headline is because for many, given the track record of the school board over the years, it seemed entirely plausible that they very well might have approved Narcan vending machines in the schools. Some have even suggested that this April Fool’s article might — in a case of life imitating art — give the board the idea that maybe they should install Narcan vending machines in the schools.
Instead of doubling-down on their fake fentanyl narrative perhaps school officials in New Rochelle might consider coming clean and just admit what is now widely known and accepted as fact: that they lied when they claimed a student overdosed at New Rochelle High School on January 9, 2023 by vaping marijuana laced with fentanyl.
It never happened.
Maybe on next April 1, I will have a new headline:
NEW ROCHELLE SCHOOL OFFICIALS APOLOGIZE FOR FAKE FENTANYL NARRATIVE
On second thought, strike that. For an April Fool’s headline to work, it has to have a patina of believability. No reader is going to believe the New Rochelle Board of Education would ever admit they lied.
REAX:
Here are a few of our favorite reactions to readers who took this article at face value. Names removed to protect the guilty.
...if your kid's school needs it, maybe you need a new school?
WTF! That is just weird and demented.
I am dying anyone got a dollar. Na, sorry man spent it on Cheez-its.
For God’s sakes. These people are sick.
wow. just wow.
They should put a condom dispensing machine next to it.
When did they announce the vending machine? Yesterday?
April fools? Or is this real. I can't imagine selling this to a kindergartener!
This doesn't represent a solution but a problem.
OMG… what the actual F!!
That is the most ridiculous thing I've seen since the crack pipe kits
Until a bunch of kids go around stabbing each other with narcan injectors.
What if you don’t have $1?
Are you kidding me SMFH so that's like telling your kids it's ok if you want to do drugs you have a vending machine of narcan.
Wow! I don't even know what to say!
The dumpster fire in NR continues.
WOW!
Ridiculous, giving kids a easy way out so they can just get high again. How about Getting them the help they really need. This city is a disgrace!
Is this real or an April Fools joke in incredibly poor taste?
How absurd. This BOE is insane.
The machines should probably send an alarm to the Nurse's office.
Selling something that is given for free, along with the wrong message.
This is literally an April fools joke. This is not true or valid. How anvone could believe this is beyond me.
Yes, let's encourage our kids to do drugs
Why not a bulletproof vest machine?
Innovative government. Flood our environment with a disease, charge for the cure.
So if someone is overdosing, are we looking for our debit card or breaking the glass ? 🤔
Do kindergarteners carry cash these days? Or do they do Zelle?
What the hell is this?
You are a real jerk.
Don't worry kids, do your drugs just be sure you have a dollar on you.
Can you imagine inserting your card and having continuous chip malfunctions ?!
The amount of people that will fall for this is the real story here.
This is more of a promotion to for drug use rather then a deterrent.
This better be a April Fools Joke and if so u need to grow up Robert Cox 😡😡
