I live on the shores of Lake Michigan and in an area with a lot of inland lakes. Every year, we experience some drownings in our area. But this year in particular, we’ve had quite a few drownings. At the beginning of the summer, a local high school student drowned in shallow water in a local inland lake. As you might expect, the tragedy rocked our small town. According to his friends and family, he was not a strong swimmer.

After the drowning, our local press and politicians repeatedly called for better water safety and swimming education in our town. This is not a new initiative. We are currently building a YMCA facility with a swimming pool for just that reason. In response to the community outcry, several organizations have donated money for swim lessons scholarships at the new Y. As a community, we realized that our swimming education opportunities were lacking. We were not giving our children the tools they needed to be safe in the water.

Through this recent tragedy and in all the other drownings in our area, no one has ever suggested that we ban water sports or closed down the Great Lakes. We haven’t formed community action groups to create swim-free zones. Instead, we’ve done the responsible thing: We’ve invested time, money and energy into equipping our children to safely handle the water. And why not? Water sports can be great fun. Swimming is great exercise and our abundance of water in Michigan is one of the things that makes our state great.

Watch Billy Johnson outline society’s disconnect when it comes to gun sense: