All Episodes

February 28, 2025 13 mins

In this episode of the Cape CopCast 'Chief's Chat,' we explore the introduction of Red Speed cameras in school zones throughout Cape Coral. With safety as our main priority, this initiative aims to enhance protection for children during critical drop-off and pick-up times. We talk to Chief Sizemore about how these speed cameras function, capturing violations and issuing civil penalties to drivers who exceed speed limits, while freeing up our police department's resources to focus on other essential duties.

The conversation emphasizes the importance of education in successfully rolling out this program. With a month-long warning phase starting on March 1st, we share plans for engaging educational campaigns that include clear signage and public service announcements aimed at informing the community about the initiative's goals. The expectation is to reduce speeding incidents and instill a sense of responsibility among drivers as they navigate school zones.

As we explore the further implications of this program, we also reflect on the strong community involvement that has led to this project. It's a crucial issue that affects everyone, and we believe that collaborative efforts can lead to meaningful change. 

We also talk about the retirement of Deputy Chief Phil Van Landschoot after 27 years of service to the department. Chief Sizemore reflects on their long-spanning friendship and his service for our city.

We wrap up by talking about the upcoming gala benefitting the non-profit Blue Line Bears. The charity takes the uniforms of fallen officers and turns them into teddy bears for their families. This started in Cape Coral by a young girl whose father is a Lieutenant for the Cape Coral Police Department.

To learn more about Blue Line Bears: https://bluelinebears.org/

Mark as Played
Transcript

Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Happy Friday.
We got another episode of theChief's Chat on the Cape Copcast
.
I'm one of your hosts, Lisa.

Speaker 2 (00:10):
Greenberg and I'm Officer Mercedes Simons.
Together we make up the PublicAffairs Office.
Today, I think we're going totalk about something a little
bit different that we've beenlooking forward to the Red Speed
School Zone cameras.
We've got a lot of positivefeedback so far.
I think people are reallyexcited to have that extra layer
of protection around our schoolzone.

Speaker 3 (00:28):
Absolutely.
And just a quick civics lesson.
Right, we are a representativeform of government, so the
people of the city elect thecity council and they're to make
decisions for theirconstituents.
So this was a council driveninitiative, which, in the lesson
I just gave you, means thepeople want it.
So city council saw thisproduct and saw other

(00:52):
municipalities and other areasof the country and the state in
particular that are doing thisand they wanted to do it as well
.
So they tasked us the policedepartment, the public works
department and city managementto make it happen the police
department, the public worksdepartment and city management
to make it happen.

Speaker 1 (01:09):
And we've been working behind the scenes to get
that done and we are reallyclose for these to launch.
It's really exciting.
So, for people who don't know,it's called Red Speed.
It's a product that essentiallyis able to catch people who are
speeding through school zones.
This is something that's goingto be in effect during the
school day and 30 minutes before, 30 minutes after.
So it's something that is goingto be running and basically
catching anyone who's going morethan 10 miles per hour over the

(01:30):
speed limit.
And I think what's super uniqueand what is probably one of the
biggest benefits of this is,instead of having posted
officers at each of the schoolzones that are having to monitor
this, they can now be free todo other things.

Speaker 3 (01:44):
Right, it's a force multiplier and it's essentially
what you just said.
If you're driving, pick astreet in Cape Coral, we'll take
Trafalgar.
So you're driving downTrafalgar Parkway, near the
lights for the school zone theblinking yellow lights there's a
camera infrastructure thatmeasures speed and takes a

(02:06):
picture of a violator.
So if it's 20 miles an hour andyou're going more than 10 miles
an hour over the speed limitthrough that school zone, it's
going to take a photo and issuea civil violation and the civil
violation goes to the driver andthen there's an appeals process
.
You can do that at themunicipal level where you would

(02:26):
come to like a city court, so tospeak, and plead your case and
if you are successful then theticket would be voided.
If you were not, you would bedue the fine and administrative
costs If you do nothing.
If you get the violation and youblow it off or hope it goes
away after 30 days, that civilmunicipal violation gets turned

(02:50):
into a uniform traffic citationjust like any other traffic stop
.
You get a ticket, it goes tocounty court and then there's
penalties for failure to adhereor handle that.
So it's serious business.
You want to make sure you takecare of that.

(03:18):
It is serious, right.
So it's serious business, givenschool there's.
The minimum number of studentsin our schools is about a
thousand kids.
So if you take a percentage ofthat that are walking or riding
their bikes, that's a lot ofkids and it just takes one.
And we've been, knock on wood,very fortunate that we haven't
had any issues in a school zoneand we want to keep it that way.

Speaker 2 (03:40):
Absolutely Definitely .
So starting tomorrow.
Tomorrow we have our 30-daywarning period, so basically
throughout March, until March31st it's the warning period.
So you'll get a warning issuedin the mail to let you know that
you were violating the speed,just as a.
You know, get friendly with thesystem.

Speaker 3 (03:58):
It's part of the education period, so there's a
real formalized process to rollthis out.
We don't just turn it on andstart issuing citations to
people.
What the first part is is apublic awareness campaign, and
this podcast is part one of many.
There are flyers that are goingout to the schools, there's a
public service announcement thatwe filmed, that we're going to

(04:18):
broadcast and the actual systemis going to be live.
But all of the violations aregoing to be warnings for the
first 30 days.
That gives us a chance to getused to the system, get used to
the workflow internally and,more importantly, get our
drivers used to the fact thatthis is happening.
And all of those educationalcomponents combined we get a

(04:39):
month of it to really get usedto it and then it goes live in
30 days and then if there's aviolation, it's a real deal
violation and we'll run itthrough the end of school and
then everybody's got a chance toreally sink it in for the start
of next school year.

Speaker 1 (04:56):
Right, and I think another thing to point out is,
in addition to the publicservice announcements and the
podcasts and the news releasesand the social media posts and
all of that, there's also veryclear signs posted that and I'm
going to go ahead and do thatit's very clear.

(05:23):
There are posted signs, inaddition to all of the other
messaging that we're putting out.

Speaker 3 (05:27):
Right, you hit the nail on the head.
It's not a gotcha.
We are telling everybody andlisten.
The goal would be to not make$1 off this thing If nobody sped
through a school zone.
That's a win, that's what wewant.
So this isn't something wherewe're hiding in the bushes with
a radar gun.
It's out there.
There's signage, it's publiclyadvertised, Like please don't do

(05:49):
this.
Unfortunately some will andhopefully the word will get out
and then people will be a littlebit more safe in these
vulnerable areas.

Speaker 2 (05:59):
Definitely We'll probably see.
You know you'll see a peak inthe beginning, like anything,
and then hopefully the goal isfor everything to dwindle down
because people don't want toface those penalties and they
recognize that they will be heldaccountable for their actions.
And you know you couldpotentially be saving a life by
putting these speed cameras inthese school zones.

Speaker 3 (06:19):
A hundred percent.
You know, pick your motivation.
Hopefully the motivation issafety of the children.
But a secondary motivation is,you know, your pocketbook.

Speaker 1 (06:27):
Absolutely.
I mean, no one wants to get hitwith a hundred dollar, fine.
And I think the other importantpart, as you kind of touched on
, is, if you don't address it,it could end up costing you even
more money.

Speaker 3 (06:37):
Right.
I say this phrase all the timein policing, and it applies here
that doing nothing is not anoption, Right.

Speaker 2 (06:44):
So another maybe not exciting thing, something less
exciting we have one of ourfavorite people here at the
department and I've known him.
You know we we went through thebackground process together.

Speaker 3 (07:09):
We got sworn in together and our careers have
kind of navigated together tohere the very end, where he's
right up in the chief suite withme, is one of my deputy chiefs.
Just a tremendous, tremendousman, a great husband, father, an
awesome cop made it to the toppercentile of his profession and
I'm sad that he's leaving butI'm happy that he's going to go

(07:31):
get the most out of life.

Speaker 1 (07:33):
Absolutely, and get to spend time with his family.
He talks so much about hisdaughter and all of her soccer
tournaments and all that, soit'll be nice, I think, for him
to be able to be fully presentin that part of his life as well
.

Speaker 3 (07:43):
Yes, that's not some weekend soccer and have orange
slices at the end.

Speaker 2 (07:48):
She's good.

Speaker 3 (07:48):
She's elite.
She's in the Olympicdevelopment program, which means
a lot of travel and a lot ofbig, important eyeballs on on
those girls playing soccer.
So I'm happy for him that hegets to really be fully immersed
in it.

Speaker 1 (08:01):
So awesome and I know tomorrow we also have something
pretty cool coming up.
We have the Blue Line BearsGala, and while it's not
necessarily our event, it'ssomething that's very close to
us.

Speaker 3 (08:13):
Absolutely, lieutenant O'Grady, who works in
our community services bureau.
I think he's been on thepodcast Santa Hat a couple of
months ago.
Yep, his daughter, megan yearsago, was.
She was anxious, scared,unnerved when she saw several
Dallas police officers werekilled in the line of duty, just

(08:35):
going back several years whenshe was a little girl.
And she took that angst and putit into positive action and
came up with a really uniqueidea and reached out to the
department and got a uniformshirt the actual polyester
uniform shirt and took thatmaterial and made a teddy bear

(08:57):
out of the uniform shirt fromthe officers not the one that
they were wearing but one thatthe family was able to provide
and then arranged to give thatteddy bear, very unique, to the
families of the survivingofficers.
And from there it's taken off.
It's a national charity, it's abig deal and Blue Line Bears is

(09:19):
the name of the charity andthey're based here in Cape Coral
but they go all over thecountry.
Sadly, there's a need for it,but they do a gala at the Westin
.
It's a big fundraiser, it's thebiggest fundraiser of the year
and I'm blessed enough to beinvited and you served as MC in
the past.

Speaker 1 (09:38):
I'm doing that again this year, so I'll see you
tomorrow.
Excellent, it's always a goodtime.
When I was a news reporteractually, it was kind of funny
because Lieutenant O'Grady and Ihad known each other, I had
done a DUI ride along with himand he had texted me, you know,
probably a few months later, andwas like I don't know if this

(09:58):
is newsworthy, but my daughteris starting this nonprofit.
It's called Blue Line Bears.
He explained the whole thingand he's like do you think this
is, you know, a news story?
And I'm like of course it is.
Are you kidding me?
This is amazing.
First of all, she was 14 yearsold when she came up with all
this.
You know a child doingsomething like this.
And, second of all, you knowthat was especially around the
time where I felt like we wereseeing more of these you know

(10:21):
line of duty deaths,unfortunately, and so it was
very timely that she had come upwith something like this and
that there was this outletavailable for families and for
her.
I remember her telling me everytime my dad walks out the door,
there's that fear.
So it was awesome to see thebeginning of it, which was just
her sewing these bears, thelittle sewing machine in her

(10:43):
house to now what it's become.
And this gal is incredible.
They raise so much money.
They have families there whohave been through losing a loved
one in the line of duty.
It's just a very emotional butalso uplifting evening.
It's just such a great event,so I'm really looking forward to
it.

Speaker 3 (11:01):
It's so much more than teddy bears at this point.
It's families that have a veryunique kinship coming together
with support for them and justto let everybody know that their
loved one and they the family,the survivors are not forgotten.
And I had a wonderfulconversation and time with a
couple from Colorado last year.

(11:22):
Officer Gum was the officer whowas tragically killed in the
line of duty in Colorado andthey were at the gala and my
wife and I were sitting next tothem and we struck up a
conversation and we just had a areally, really beautiful
evening talking about their,their son and and all of the
survivors there and it's a, it'sa a good mood event.

(11:44):
It's it's not a soup.
There's a somber time in theevent, but the event itself is
uplifting and networking andnetworking and just so much good
that came from one littlecrudely sewn teddy bear that
turned into something that'sreally beautiful.

Speaker 1 (11:59):
It's amazing.
It really is incredible.
So looking forward to that, andwe can post some information
too about Blue Line Bears in thenotes of the podcast, so if
people want to check it out, forsure Cool, anything else Chief.

Speaker 3 (12:11):
That's it.
That's a full plate.

Speaker 2 (12:12):
On Monday we have the Stuff your Stanley event at the
Sweet Spot.
It's from six to eight, so ifyou bring not just your Stanley
cup, you can bring any cup youwant.
We might even have extra cups,but you can get up to four
scoops of ice cream in your cupfor $10 and the proceeds go to
benefit the Do the Right Thingprogram.
So we're really excited aboutthat.
You'll have officers therescooping your ice cream.

(12:33):
It'll be awesome.

Speaker 1 (12:35):
I love ice cream.

Speaker 2 (12:36):
I know who wouldn't want four scoops of ice cream in
their Stanley Cup.

Speaker 3 (12:40):
I have a bit of a lactose issue now.
I'm hoping that that event's aspectator sport.

Speaker 2 (12:46):
They probably have dairy-free Okay.

Speaker 3 (12:49):
They probably do?

Speaker 2 (12:50):
I don't look into those options so I wouldn't know
.
But they probably havedairy-free.

Speaker 1 (12:53):
I'm sure they have something for you to enjoy,
chief Sorbet, exactly Well.
Thank you so much for listeningand joining us this week, and
we will catch you next time.

Speaker 2 (13:02):
Stay safe.
Advertise With Us

Popular Podcasts

Dateline NBC

Dateline NBC

Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Special Summer Offer: Exclusively on Apple Podcasts, try our Dateline Premium subscription completely free for one month! With Dateline Premium, you get every episode ad-free plus exclusive bonus content.

The Breakfast Club

The Breakfast Club

The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy, Jess Hilarious, And Charlamagne Tha God!

Crime Junkie

Crime Junkie

Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.

Music, radio and podcasts, all free. Listen online or download the iHeart App.

Connect

© 2025 iHeartMedia, Inc.