Hello LMJ Neighborhood Watch Residents,
Sorry it’s taken me a few days to get a meeting recap out to you. I have had meetings and events each night and the kids are now out of school – just another reason to PLEASE drive with extra care!
We had a good turnout of about 35-40 people attending.
Susan Makowski (Aide to Commissioner Thompson) started our meeting with a discussion of speed humps and other “traffic calming devices”. She explained the different options, but what many residents don’t know is that those living on the street with the humps will have to pay for them.
I got a price from residents in the Hart Whippoorwill Rural Settlement of $3000 per speed hump. They were able to get the county to help pay about ½ with a special grant – but their speeding issue on Kirby Smith was due to the high school traffic using their neighborhood as a cut through – so it was external traffic speeding through and the humps have stopped people from driving through.
In our case, this is our own residents speeding – not cut through traffic so a grant would probably not apply. Side streets with dead ends are not considered since there is not enough traffic, and speed limits would also have to be reduced to 25 mph on LMJ rd to have speed humps.
To start the process you must first request a petition for the specific rd. Then you need to do the footwork going door to door to collect signatures of residents living on that road that will have to pay for the humps to be willing to support this.
If there is enough interest, then the County will hold a community meeting to review the traffic calming device options available and ask the residents if they want to proceed. If they do, then an official ballot is sent out to each resident on the road that will be paying for the speed humps. (no one else can vote since they will not pay for them.) Of the returned ballots, there must be 67% in favor for it to pass. The process can take about 6 months once a petition is received.
If any individuals are interested in pursuing this process – I can send you more information.
Next we had Deputy Belmonte answer other questions. We talked about other ways to slow traffic with signs, flyers, painting on the road, etc. I am requesting a review by the Road Dept to review the area for improvements. We talked about creating signs for our own yards with the speed limit or ones that say “Children at Play”. We also asked about reporting incidents. You can send me details that I will send on the our Deputy, but she will use it as a log to look for patterns of speeding and then send out an officer to try to radar the area. If you see a car speeding on a regular basis – or just want to report individual incidents you need to do 2 things:
1st – Contact Non-Emergency at 407-836-HELP (4357) and you must have a Tag # in addition to make, model & color of car, time of day and location.
2nd – After calling in the incident – you can email me the info (please do not call) so I can forward it to our Deputy for the log.
Since January – we have only had 2 complaints called in which is a very low number so officers will not come out here for that. They will also take your information – so if you are the only one calling over and over again – they will lump together all the incidents. In other words – don’t sit in your driveway all day making calls – that won’t help. It needs to be residents from all over our community complaining. If there are enough incidents – we will have officers randomly use radar out here.
BEWARE – speeding fines are $204 for going 15 miles over the limit, $254 for going 20 over the limit, and on up. If I have a lot of repeat tag numbers – I can add this info to an email and include the car description, make, model, dates and times (but not the tag) so this may alert someone (or a parent) that may not be aware. *
** WARNING – GOLF CART OWNERS – please note that we are NOT a recognized golf cart community! (We tried to get this status for the Isle of Pines a few yrs ago but the county is not adding any more official golf cart communities. Even if we could get this status – only golf carts that are officially registered would be allowed on the road – and to pass that test they must have tops, lights, rear view mirrors, etc to be “street legal” and able to keep up with traffic speeds.)
So, if a cop is out in the neighborhood ticketing speeders – they can also ticket golf carts since they are not legal – and if the driver of the golf cart is a minor – the parents of the golf cart can be charged with a CRIMINAL OFFENSE! 4 wheelers can also be charged if they are driving on the streets (yes – that means crossing the street.) And driving in a golf cart with alcohol is another ticket you don’t want to get. So please weigh the risk if you are driving a golf cart – I have a feeling that with the complaints heard at the meeting that there will be officers with radar out here randomly.
We also discussed other ways to report someone speeding – but there really are not many options at this time other than radar. I would love to say that this is an outside problem – but it’s not. The majority of speeders are our own neighbors. However - if you see a business vehicle speeding – you may want to consider calling that company and giving them the tag #, time, location and vehicle description. This can really call attention to a problem! If you see a school bus speeding – please call it in with the tag # or bus # & the date and time. Then email me the info. I have a contact that works for the school transportation department – and all busses now have GPS on them so they can review the incident!
Another thing I’m looking into is grant money to widen the road for a bike lane. Since rural settlements do not include sidewalks – we were hoping to find some other way to keep our bikers, roller bladders, and walkers a little safer on our narrow roads. I will keep you posted if there is something we can look into.
I also had a neighbor contact me this week saying she would be glad to stand out by the road holding signs to remind drivers to slow down. If there are others that would want to team up with her – please let me know & I’ll put you in contact with each other.
Last option is the Citizens on Patrol program.
We can have a volunteer from our community go through the process of becoming a Citizen on Patrol officer and they could help randomly patrol our neighborhood in a car that looks almost the same as a regular police car. This presence has been shown to dramatically reduce both crime and speeding!
If you are interesting in learning more about this program, let me know and I will send you info.
The best way to stop speeding is to take responsibility yourself not to speed through any of our neighborhoods. I know we all run late – and sometimes on our long quiet roads you may not even realize how fast you are going. I know I have been using my cruise control lately to make sure I don’t start speeding up without realizing it.
Parents – if you have young drivers – please sit down and talk with them about the consequences – both financial and legal. We are hearing about a lot about different teens constantly speeding through the neighborhoods.
I sincerely hope we can turn things around together as a community that cares about each other!
Suzanne Arnold
LMJ Neighborhood Watch Coordinator
LMJ Neighborhood Watch
