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SCI Rockview should remain open

In our increasingly polarized society, it is rare that we all agree on anything. Even topics that seem like they should be uncontroversial, like walking or biking instead of driving, frequently become politicized. In many places, choosing active or public transport is seen as a political statement instead of just a healthy and practical choice. Take paid parental leave, for example. Giving new parents time to care for their newborn and recover from childbirth seems like common sense, yet it’s frequently treated as a political flashpoint. That’s what makes the consensus on the ...

Love or hate him, attack on Shapiro’s home is a worrying sign for us all

Some things are so basic, so fundamental, that they can be difficult to write about. As of this writing, we don’t yet know why the accused man, Cody Balmer, allegedly set the Governor’s Residence on fire — with Josh Shapiro and his family inside. In our own personal travels on the internet, staff members have of course encountered a wide range of theories. One of the most classic responses we have to a major tragedy or crime is that: why? Our View is that, ultimately, it doesn’t matter. Our governor, who is Jewish, had his home set on fire in the middle of the night. On ...

Fear itself

Few things that endure today are as old and as constant as humanity’s relationship with fear. For as much as we dread the experience, we simultaneously crave it. Horror tales are a tradition as old as campfires, and today are a sprawling industry and aesthetic that many of us at The Express favor, if you can’t tell by our various October celebrations every year. Yet, a key element to horror is our ability to turn the lights on. The duality of horror is crucial: not just the spike of fear, but the calming wash of knowing that you are safe. Our society, in 2025, is wholly ...

KCSD faces challenges, but cutting librarians not a solution

The Express recently published comments from Keystone Central School District Superintendent Dr. Francis Redmon confirming the district’s intention to shed library staff — dropping from four librarians to just one. One librarian, for a district with a geographic footprint of just under 1,000 square miles. If it sounds like we’re winding up for a lengthy spiel about how important librarians are... Well, sort of. Redmon, in his comments, even acknowledged this: “We know that librarians are important to our students, our schools and our district, and in the best-case ...

When did we stop believing we could change our world?

Do you remember Y2K? For our younger readers (or anyone who is missing context), Y2K, or “year 2000” was an enormously-feared computer glitch for when the millennium ticked over. At the highest level — we are, shocker, not expert programmers or computer scientists — early programming languages considered dates to be a two-digit format (back in the year of ‘96, etc). This was expected to cause a global technological meltdown when 1999 became 2000, because computers would read that as the year “00,” which could wreak havoc on critical infrastructure such as bank systems, ...

Attracting industry, remote workers is crucial to region’s economic future

Have you driven around the area lately? While vacant industrial buildings and storefronts aren’t exactly a new sight in the area — Rust Belt adjacent as we are — we have been struck by the amount of opportunity that is just sitting around the region, waiting for someone to take advantage of it. This is particularly timely given the adoption of President Trump’s tariffs, the stated goal of which is to return manufacturing to American shores and return the “Made in America” stamp to one of prestige. The impacts of the tariffs is not the point of this Our View, however — ...