Replacement car seat covers that aren’t compatible with the specific vehicle could be dangerous, especially if the covers block the opening for the side air bags.

“It literally could break your back,” explained Marv Schulz in a recent call to me. “I don’t want to see anybody get hurt.”

Schulz is owner of Pit Road Racing Collectibles on Geyser Road. It’s also a Budget truck rental business. In addition, Schulz is a licensed inspector of vehicles for insurance companies; state law requires a visual inspection when owners are switching carriers.

As part of that inspection, the insurance companies want to know if there are air bags; they aren’t concerned about seat covers. But Schulz is.

“A lot of people don’t even realize there is a side bag,” he said. That includes countless people who aren’t switching insurance carriers but are just buying replacement seat covers.

Schulz estimates that he performs the insurance inspection on more than 200 vehicles a month and that about 10 percent come in with covers that were not meant for the car.

“It’s a very dangerous situation,” he said.

It’s been bothering him for a while, and he finally asked me to help spread the word. So here we are. There’s no law governing replacement seat covers, and maybe we don’t need yet another law. But that places the burden on the vehicle owner to make the safe choice when buying replacement seat covers.

Thanks, Mr. Schulz.

Journalists take pride in giving a voice to people in need, with hopes of inspiring readers to action. But some stories are so private that they can be told only in generic terms — such as those involving children who are victims of abuse or neglect.

The Ballston Avenue building in Saratoga Springs
served some 400 children and their families in 2012.
Photo by Erica Miller/emiller@saratogian.com

That’s one of the challenges in raising awareness and encouraging donations for groups like the Saratoga Center for the Family, a nonprofit, countywide organization that last year provided therapy and healing to 400 children and their families in the building you’ve passed a million times on Ballston Avenue, between SPAC and Price Chopper.

As reporter Jennie Grey explains, “the Center for the Family focuses on building healthier families in Saratoga County and beyond, helping those struggling with trauma, depression, anxiety and disruptive behavior disorders who have experienced physical, sexual and emotional abuse. Victims of assault, human trafficking, domestic violence, divorce and bullying come for healing.”

There can be no so-called poster child for the organization. Yet the need is there, and the services can be provided only with the generosity of people who will never know the children and families they are helping. So I’m trying to help spread the word.

The Saratoga Center for the Family
offers a welcoming environment to children and families.
Photo by Erica Miller/emiller@saratogian.com

Next Wednesday is the Saratoga Center for the Family’s annual Celebrating the Power of Hope event, a cocktail party with food and entertainment and the silent and live auction that are components of so many worthy fund-raisers. Auction items include a one-year downtown Saratoga Springs parking space, two Southwest airlines tickets, and box seats for a day at Saratoga Race Course during the 2013 season. 

The event will recognize Raymond O’Conor, former president of Saratoga National Bank and Trust Company, for his continued support of the center and the community. It will take place from 6 to 9 p.m. April 24 at Longfellows Restaurant. Cost is $75 per person for age 36 and older, and $50 for 35 and younger.

Learn more about the organization and the Celebrating Hope and Power event at www.saratogacff.org or by calling 587-8008.

Students in grades 2 through 8 in Saratoga County are invited this month to tell The Saratogian about what makes summer special.

The contest is part of Saratoga 150, celebrating a milestone anniversary of horse racing in Saratoga.

Select essays will be published in The Saratogian and winning writers will receive Stewart’s ice cream certificates.

To enter, students should ask an adult to share a special memory or experience of Saratoga in the summer and describe what they had to say in 150 or less. Email your essay to 150contest@saratogian.com by April 30. At the top of the entry, writers should include their name, grade, school, teacher’s and parent’s names, and a contact phone number.

The contest is designed as an exercise in interviewing and writing.

Entries will be considered in three categories — grades 2 and 3, 4 and 5, and 6 to 8. Winners in each category will be awarded ice cream certificates of $25 for first place, $15 for second and $5 for third.

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The Saratogian’s online and front-page centerpiece story this morning pulls together piecemeal reporting that had been done since December about local drug arrests.

The story is not over. But it was time for reporter Lucian McCarty to put into context the otherwise disparate stories of what police are doing to pick off drug traffickers in and around Saratoga Springs.

The first piece broke in last December as a more or less routine story. A 47-year-old Milton man was arrested on a warrant that Saratoga Springs police said was part of an ongoing investigation into cocaine and other drug trafficking. He was charged with four felonies — two counts of third-degree criminal sale of a controlled substance and two counts of third-degree criminal possession of a controlled substance —and two counts of seventh-degree criminal possession of a controlled substance, misdemeanors.

Over the next three months, a total of 18 people were arrested in six raids in connection with drug trafficking as part of an investigation that includes the Saratoga Springs police, neighboring law enforcement entities, and the federal Drug Enforcement Agency.

What’s been seized, police say, includes an undisclosed amount of cash, 245 bags of heroin, 4.5 ounces of cocaine, two ounces of crack cocaine, three pounds of marijuana, and hydrocodone, oxycodone, suboxone and liquid PCP worth between $30,000 and $40,000 on the street.

Serious quantities of drugs are passing through the city, and some of it is staying right here. Police Lt. John Catone says drug addicts drove a 33 percent increase in burglaries and 10 percent increase in larcenies reported last year. To their credit, police are clearly trying to go after the bigger fish. Members of the Saratoga Springs Police Department and the Saratoga County District Attorney’s Office have the credentials of DEA agents, enabling them to follow the trail of drugs and money, as McCarty reports. People with information about drug dealing should call the SSPD’s anonymous line at 584-TIPS.

The use and sale of illegal drugs in Saratoga Springs and surrounding locales could be the basis for a whole special report, which we’ve discussed in the newsroom as a project to tackle. For now, The Saratogian had the responsibility to begin to tell the bigger story by acknowledging the efforts of police and tying together the arrests thus far.

Prayer and the support of community provide comfort when a loved one has been lost, as was evident yesterday at Temple Sinai in Saratoga Springs, where people gathered for the evening service led by Rabbis Linda Motzkin and Jonathan Rubenstein to honor the memory of Gloria Mandelbaum, the mother of Rhoda Pickus.

Two readings from the book used for the service touched me for their poetic reminder of the circle of life. They are relevant, regardless of one’s religious beliefs. These are the excerpts:

From the prayer book: “All that we prize is but lent to us; and the time comes when we must surrender it.”

And, adapted from “Touching Peace,” by Thich Nhat Hanh: “One day as I was about to step on a dry leaf, I saw … that it was not really dead, but it was merging with the moist soil and preparing to appear on the tree the following spring in another form.”