The Baltimore Sun’s Michael Dresser asks when it’s OK to cut through a funeral procession.

George and Cassie Bailey live near Dulaney Valley Memorial Gardens, where police officers and firefighters are often buried. Funerals for active-duty public safety deaths are often miles long, involving hundreds of vehicles. It can easily take well over two hours for the procession to clear any given point.

George Bailey requires dialysis; his kidneys don’t work. He gets treatment every week, and it’s a live-saving issue. If he doesn’t get the toxins cleaned out of his body properly, he’ll get sicker, and die. Several times in the past, the Baileys have been held up in their apartment complex by funeral processions. Even when they’ve left early, they’ve gotten caught at other intersections. On one occasion, when she explained the situation and asked a traffic officer if they could get through, he refused. On another, the desk officer told her anyone she asked would laugh at her.

A department spokesman was concerned over that response, and suggested the Baileys contact the precinct captain. Dresser closes with this comment:

It’s time for a wide-ranging - and respectful - discussion between local police chiefs and the public about how to continue these motorcades while preserving public health, safety and mobility. Because if the two goals can’t be reconciled, it’s time for a new tradition.

The comments following the article are interesting, and wide-ranging. Some are pro-police, and some are anti-police. Many are anti-funeral, or at least anti-procession. How about it? Is it time to re-think the idea of processions, especially in larger cities?