I have four kids, eldest is 12 and youngest is a toddler. My three older ones, starting at age five, have free-run of our neighborhood--along with the host of other, similar aged children here. They're often out until the street light comes on. All the parents are in a group chat and we keep tabs on what's going on. Additionally, my 12 y/o rides the city bus home from middle school every day (along with a ton of his classmates) and it's not uncommon for us to allow our 10 y/o to ride the city bus with his friends to the mall like five miles away.

But this is Hawai'i. It's how things are here. Kids are given a lot more independence and we tend to have closer relationships with our neighbors (it also doesn't hurt that we live in a kind of tucked-away community). I used to live in Florida and none of this would have ever flown. Even when I lived on a private school campus (as a faculty member), there was a clear understanding that kids were not allowed outside without some form of supervision. We were gated in and had multiple security guards!