Belle Glade, Florida – known to nearby detractors as Belle AIDS – is one of the poorest and most hopeless places in America. It first came to my attention watching a CBS documentary on migrant workers called “Harvest of Shame.”

That was back in 1960, when Edward R. Murrow showed how black farm workers were pratically auctioned off like slaves in Belle Glade.

More recently, the town’s HIV rate was so high that scientists were studying whether mosquitos from neighboring Lake Okeechobee might be spreading the disease.

‘Tone is loyal and proud of his old homies, and that’s fine. But he has to grow beyond them. He didn’t when he was stopped with the weed in his SUV. And he didn’t after the catch, either. That celebration was self-centered and stupid.

Of course, J. Skippy Reed and Mitchell Berger didn’t grow up in Belle Glade, Florida, yet their actions – on the field and off – have also damaged the team. So we’re not necessarily talking about being poor and black. We all have to grow up, sooner or later.

But I do worry about Holmes, and hope that the mentoring he gets from Hines and other members of the Steeler family provides him the guidance that each of us needs to become a responsible adult - both on the field and off. I haven’t written him off, not at all. But he is a work in progress. And I think, for that reason, the fine is a good thing.

It’s what some people call a teachable moment.