August 21, 2025 • 22 mins
Chief Ceccarelli catches us up on the construction at the police department, how back-to-school traffic is going and possible plans to install school zone cameras.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, Joel Malcoln for WJ and O dot com and
it's time for protecting the Palm Beaches with our friend
Police Chief Tom Checkarelli from the village of Palm Springs
here in Palm Beach County.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Thanks for making the rounds again.
Speaker 3 (00:15):
Hey, thanks Cherle, thanks for having me again.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
So it's back to school time. We're a couple of
weeks in, heading into the third week of school. And
I know we've talked pretty much every year round back
to school.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
You and I chat and I.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
Forget the exact number of schools, but you do have
several two or three public schools and then some charter schools,
and you could give the rundown again, but you know,
you talk about how that first week is always crazy,
maybe first couple of weeks. How are things at this
point again, we're talking here at the end of the
second week.
Speaker 3 (00:48):
It's definitely settling down. Like we said, we talk about
this every year. It's the first week or two, it's
like it's groundhogs Day. Nobody knows, no one's ever been
through this before, and it's just the newest thing that
ever happened. But it's a mess. I mean, you get
people with new kids in school, changing schools and new schools.
They don't know the routes. It's it's just it's bad.
(01:10):
But we do. We do have a lot of schools here.
We have for a small town. We have the largest
elementary school in Pomage County. We have the largest middle
school in Pomage County. We have a second elementary school.
Plus we have charter high school g Stars in Palm Springs,
and we also have there's like another charter high school
(01:31):
on Congress both on Congress Avenue, which which messes up
traffic on those two on that road also. And then
we have other schools dispersed, you know, throughout the.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
Area, right, so you get some of the traffic from
the schools that are in you know, say Lake Worth
and other areas close by.
Speaker 3 (01:50):
And even we have John Leonard which is on the
other side of Military Trail, so we pick up a
little traffic from that sometimes too.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
So there are off the top of my I want
to say Delray Beach, Wellington and a few other municipalities
that with the I believe it was a twenty twenty
three state law, they are taking advantage of that and
setting up school's own cameras. Now, these are these are
(02:17):
cameras that are set up in these school zones, and
again it's up to the municipalities if they want to
do them. It's not actually the school district that's doing these.
I believe it's the municipalities, and some of those have
have done them, and some of them are not doing
them at every single school zone either. I guess they're
looking at the ones that are usually the problem, and
I understand, are you guys do not have them at
(02:39):
this point?
Speaker 2 (02:40):
Is there a thought that maybe in the future.
Speaker 3 (02:43):
Yeah, we're I know a few cities. I think Boca's
at top to them, and I think Delray might be.
But we're looking at them that there was that change
in the law that allows it, sort of like when
red light cameras came about, it was all a statute
that allowed or permitted the cameras. So we're looking at
it now are I guess our biggest school zones would
(03:03):
be probably the one by Pump Springs Middle is off
of Forest Hill and Kirk Road. That's that's a busy
area that would probably be a good area to watch.
And then the other one would be Palm Springs Elementary,
which is tenth Avenue, which we got a lot of
traffic on tenth Avenue right right by the school, and
that's one of our schools that has a flashing sign in.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
Kirk Lane is the other elementary.
Speaker 3 (03:29):
Right correct and correct. Kirklane is off of It's Alameda. Yeah,
that's only a two lane road and it just backs
up there. I mean, like I said, with school back
to school that road. And what I have advice to
tell everybody is just if you don't have a kid,
stay away from these areas because if you go to
(03:51):
Kirk Lane, you can't speed down that road because it's
just so locked up with traffic anyway that it would
be really difficult to exceed exceed the spin limit school zone.
Not that it doesn't happen, but it's it would be
very It's a lot less of an occurrence than it
is when you have it off tenth Avenue of Forest Hill.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
So is this the school zone cameras?
Speaker 1 (04:11):
Is this something that the village commission or village council
has been discussing.
Speaker 3 (04:17):
They haven't really discussed it too much because I think
they'll leave it up to staff first to make the recommendation.
But yeah, I mean this is one of those things,
and it's up to the town. It's you know, if
it's on a state road, you have to have DOT approval,
but I think there's protocols in place for that. But
you pretty much have to have a right away to
enact this. But you set up a system. And what
(04:38):
this statute allows is that you can run the cameras
thirty minutes before the session and I think thirty minutes
after the session of school. So I know a lot
of cities are going to be doing it, you know,
thirty minutes prior to the thirty minutes after. But the
statute also allows you, as far as I know, to
use the cameras during the entire school day, So even
(05:01):
though the school zones aren't flashing, you can still monitor
traffic and speed there and then issue tickets and anyone
exceeding ten miles an hour over the speed limit.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
Right, I think I understand, If I understand correctly, I
believe it's Wellington if no one else that is actually
using them during the entire school day. And it should
be noted all of the believe all of the municipalities
that are using the school zone camps currently, they're giving
that first month of warnings and them kind of an.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
Education that.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
Yeah, that's part of the statute is that prior to
prior to doing that, you have to enact actually a
city or a village ordinance to allow the placement and
installation of the speed cameras, and you have to do
a traffic study to say, you know, this warrants, so
you can't just place them anywhere you know that you want.
You have to really do a traffic study to say, okay,
(05:56):
we do have an issue with speeding here. This is
our justification to place them. And then as far as that,
then you have to actually create an ordinance that allows
the placement and operation. And as part of that ordinance
you have to you have to do public you know,
have meetings to let the public know that these are
(06:16):
going to be placed and if there's any public comment,
and then you have to for the first thirty days
prior to commencing enforcement, you have to notify the public
of specific dates which will occur and what you're going
to do, and you have to do this public awareness campaign.
And for those first thirty days, you're only allowed to
(06:37):
issue warnings to everyone that's violating.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
It, So that would expend also you have to post sorry,
that would explain why they're all doing that exactly.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
Okay, yeah, that's mandated by statute. And then you also
statute says you have to you know, just like red
light cameras, you have to post prominent signs out there
saying this is you know, this is speed camera you
know area, just like red light cameras, and even I've
seen now with like GPS or I think some of
the maps programs that it actually warned you when you're
(07:08):
go into a speed uh red light camerahead So I'm
sure they'll do the same thing for speed zone cameras.
Then's it's good just to warn everybody, So just get
them to have its just slowing down those areas.
Speaker 1 (07:19):
So to your knowledge, is staff village staff looking into
this or is it or is it something that you're
recommending as police chief or or where are we with it?
Speaker 3 (07:29):
We are, We're in the initial stages of it. We're
just like talking about it. Now. What I kind of
like doing is I like to see how it plays
out with other cities a little bit first when it occurs,
because I know my experience with red light cameras, there
was a it was a lot of a lot of
issues of the courts with the with the tickets, how
they were being processed. There were lawsuits about the red
(07:50):
light cameras. So sometimes you don't want to be that
first person that pops up on these things. You'll let it,
let someone else take that first shot, and then you
you kind of jump in and once once you see
that you know the mistakes other places have made or
the issues that are there that you kind of kind
of learn from other people's mistakes.
Speaker 1 (08:05):
Yeah, I do that with iPhones. I never buy the
brand new one.
Speaker 3 (08:10):
I know. I don't ever upgrade your update to iOS
systems until too Yeah find out.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
I wait till everybody else's so.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
So clearly it doesn't seem like this is something that
would be in place during this school year at all.
It because it sounds like you're waiting, uh and then
after it's okay, well now we're going to look. There's
a lot of work that goes into before you can
do it.
Speaker 2 (08:32):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (08:33):
Safe to say if it is done in Palm Springs,
it would be next school year.
Speaker 3 (08:38):
It could be the end of the school year, because
like you said, you once you decide you want to
do this, then this there's a lot of companies out
there that offer this product. So that's the other thing too.
You want to find out which vendors are better than others.
There were some better vendors than others for red light cameras,
so you kind of find out which which one provides
the best product. But yeah, that's part of you. You know,
(09:00):
you have to pick your vendor, and sometimes you have
to go through a process such as a that's called
an RFP or request for proposal or requests for quote,
and you kind of put it out there and have
these companies submit their quote and then then you kind
of pick one and then you have to do a
traffic study to warrant the location or warrant the placement,
and then once that's in place, they place the cameras
(09:21):
and then you do your thirty day public awareness campaign.
So it's a couple of months away, but it's possible
to get this at the end of the year. Didn't
even add one.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
What's that go ahead? No ahead?
Speaker 3 (09:34):
No even that one? The you know, the ticket for
each one of these it's if I remember right, it's
one hundred dollars for ticket. And uh, it's a non
there's no points involved, no portion goes to the state
for their revenue fund. I think sixty goes to the town.
But part of that is paying for the cameras and
all the processing and all the what's involved in the system.
(09:58):
And there's money that goes to the Criminal Justice Standards
Training Commission, money to the school district gets part of it.
There's also money that goes to a Crossing Guard Recruitment
and retention fund. So it gets divvied up into different areas.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
Let's assume that you know, you say you want to
watch these other municipalities and how things go. Let's assume
everything goes smoothly, and you know, is this something that you,
as police chief would like to see the village doing.
Speaker 3 (10:27):
Yeah, if it makes the village a safer place. Yeah,
anything that you know, especially protecting kids, protecting those areas.
That's that's always it's it's hard to say the negative there.
I guess I just want to make sure that this
is all done. You know, it's not it's tested. It's
tested out through the courts because we have a lot
of issues. Originally with bread light cameras, a lot of
(10:47):
the judges were throwing them out, and then there was
there was things in the law that needed to be tweaked.
And then we just kept writing these tickets and they
were thrown them out. It's like got to the point
it's like, you know why. But then it got tested
in the court system. The lot got tweaked, procedures got
tweaked to the point that I got better. And now
I think there's not a lot of cities still using
(11:09):
red like cameras.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
I think I believe in Palm Beach County.
Speaker 1 (11:11):
I believe in Palm Beach County it is only Boyton
Beach unless there's been an update I wasn't aware of.
It's just Point and Beach that's using them in Palm
Beach County.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
Yeah, and somebot Boyton has embraced them. I mean they've
added cameras from what I know, so they've done They've
done a lot more, I think they said. I think
they are the only ones in Pompage County they are
still using them.
Speaker 2 (11:31):
All right, Let's move on to another another topic. And
last time we spoke, this was.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
An issue e bike thefts, and now I understand these
are continuing, but also people selling motorized scooters talk about that.
Speaker 3 (11:44):
Well, the e bikes, I don't know what it is.
But right now we're getting probably like once a week,
we're getting ebex all the and they're not cheap. Also,
I know there's a lot of complaints about these electric bikes,
electric scooters and roadways and on sidewalks and and golf
carts some extent. So I know we're looking at creating
ordinances or at least, you know, looking at a statutes
(12:06):
and ordinances try to regulate them better. But yeah, the evikes,
some people just don't lock them up. They treat them
like a regular bicycle. They leave it in front of
a seven to eleven or convenience store and it gets
stolen because they don't lock it up, just like anything else.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
Now, you mentioned the h you mentioned golf carts, and
I believe that the law in the state for golf
carts is if they're street legal first.
Speaker 2 (12:30):
Of all, which they have that little tag.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
If that is the case, then they are able to
drive on streets with speed limits of up to thirty
five miles per hour, but they're supposed to stay at
twenty or less. Is that is that correct?
Speaker 3 (12:47):
Yeah, I have to look at the statue, but I
think that's that's pretty much it. Yeah, s to be
street legal, which you know some golf carts aren't, but
they have to have you know, they have to have
a tag, and they have to have certain equipment that
allows them to be on the street, not just like
your regular or golfing carts.
Speaker 1 (13:03):
And now, if and and if assuming that is the case,
because I've heard about this where you know that, well
you could be on a thirty five mile per hour
limit road, but you can't go over twenty. Doesn't to
me that sounds unsafe. It seems like if it can
get up to thirty thirty, you know, wouldn't that be safer?
Speaker 3 (13:25):
Yeah, no, I have to look at the statute again.
I hate to be wrong on that one, but yeah,
it does sound odd.
Speaker 2 (13:31):
Why you wouldn't Well, I'm pretty sure that those folks
do faster folks that I know that that sell them.
That's what they said. The law is.
Speaker 1 (13:38):
We had and we had a conversation about that, and
I said, you know, twenty miles an hour, they make
you stay at you know, at ad or below twenty,
but they let you drive on a thirty five mile
per hour zone. That seems like that would cause more issues.
Speaker 3 (13:56):
It's like some of these scooters that you know, they
don't go that fast, and they get in these these
lanes on like a forty five road and they take
lanes up. But I think they can go a little
bit fast. I mean they can get up to those speeds,
but they still block traffic to you know, you get
some of these, you get these odd vehicles on the road,
and sometimes I don't not the best the ones to
be out there. In fact, I've seen people take their
(14:17):
kids to school and some golf carts on main roadways,
and I'm like, that doesn't seem that safe to me.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
You're talking about roadways that maybe go to forty five.
Speaker 3 (14:29):
Yeah, I mean, well not so much golf carts. I
see them like cross streets to get to school, but
not so much forty five to have a golf cart
on there.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
How's construction going. I don't hear any I don't hear
any drills or or hammers in the in the background.
Speaker 2 (14:48):
And they must, I know. You let's just kind of
go back.
Speaker 1 (14:51):
For people that don't know what I'm talking about. You
are having a makeover. Essentially, a new building is being built.
It's going to be able double the size of the
current building. I forget the square footage, but you'll remind
us you're right, but you know the office is there
and you're you're going to have double the space that
(15:11):
you have currently.
Speaker 3 (15:13):
Yes, I'm surprised you can't hear it. It's well maybe
you know I don't, but yeah, just as you were
saying that, there's some drawing going on the other side
of my wall. But funny, yes, we're really looking forward
to it. You are correct or doubling the size. We're
going from fourteen thousand square foot facility to twenty eight thousand.
One of the biggest things for me is that we're
(15:34):
hardening the building. We'll like originally this building was probably
built for like a three plus for a hurricane, and
that been you know, when it is a hurricane, we
hunkered down in the building. So I've set to sleep
my office. And you you don't feel as easy when
you you know the building you have is only a
three plus as you're watching that storm car. So our
(15:56):
new building it's being hardened, it'll be for a five plus,
so be uh much better because we you know, unfortunately
we don't have the liberty of you know, leaving the
state or getting out of town when there's a hurricane.
You know, we we we go to the storm, so
we have to be available here when it happens. And
I've been through plenty of them that have had to
sleep in the building and be ready to deploy right
(16:18):
after the storm passes. So keeping us safe and keeping
the officers here safe through a storm is really one
of my one of my biggest priorities.
Speaker 2 (16:26):
Now one thing. And they're going to have this done
November still the date.
Speaker 3 (16:31):
Yeah, right after hurricane season, but yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:35):
But that's still still it's like it's still on still
on track for November because you know, we always hear
about that November and then they move it anytime, not
specifically for you guys, but in general.
Speaker 3 (16:45):
Yeah, No, we're still good. They you know, we have
updates every week with the builder or every other week sometimes.
But everything looks good. The building itself is up, the
windows are in, they extold the drywall. Infact, we're got
to take a walk through tomorrow to see the progress.
But it's been difficult because they're working in the old
building at the same time too, trying to innovate renovate here.
(17:07):
We double the size of our evidence room, you know,
we're adding a gym, facility for the officers to work out.
We made a bigger briefing room.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
Are you getting like that? Are you getting?
Speaker 1 (17:18):
And I don't know if maybe you already have it,
but you know, we hear about West Palm Beach and
some of these other larger police agencies with the real
time traffic center. Do you have something like that? And
if not, are you getting that with this new building?
Speaker 3 (17:33):
No? I mean in real time traffic center or crime
crime center?
Speaker 2 (17:36):
Yeah, yeah, real time crimes. Yeah, I'm sorry.
Speaker 3 (17:39):
That is we're not getting with that with this, but
we do have space to accommodate that. We have some
space on the second floor actually to add something like that.
So we're kind of like we're like wiring it up
for like something similar to that, so it can be
adapta to that some day. But I'm assuming media plants
from that, but I'm assuming that.
Speaker 1 (17:58):
Would be something that the that the Commission or the
Council would have to approve spending for.
Speaker 3 (18:04):
Yeah, I mean it spends up what you do. I
mean it is. I mean, you can you can go
crazy on those things. You could spend a little money
and you know, do something decent, or you could spend
a million dollars and you know, really, I know the
Sheriff's office has a great center. I know West Palm.
I think they I think they're upgrading their center now.
I heard that the Shriff's Office had given them some
(18:25):
equipment too to help upgrade their center.
Speaker 1 (18:29):
I saw there the West Palm Beach one years ago
and I was pretty impressive. Then they're going to upgrade it.
That's pretty cool. And they're the shot spotter technology that
they used there when it was first new. We were
toured around that building, so.
Speaker 3 (18:44):
We had years ago, I remember we had a a
shot smarts be still being used as a bunch of
them out there. But we had tried one time a
graffiti censor, which is supposed to you know, we had
one area with a lot of graffiti, so it was
supposed to pick up the sound of a spray can.
But it got a lot of false false readings on
(19:05):
that one.
Speaker 1 (19:05):
Now you run out and it was just oh, it's
just somebody with their asthma thing.
Speaker 3 (19:11):
Yeah, the shot spotters have really front I've heard they've
The technology is much better. They can you know, almost
triangulate areas where you know, they pick out what the
type of gun was. I mean, I've heard these stories,
I've been seen in practice, but I have been told
that technology is so much better with them.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
Just going back to the construction one more time, I
think you had told me the old building, which is
it's still going to stand, You're still going to use
that once the new one's built for certain things. They're
hardening that as well, because you said that it was
built for a Cat three? Is that what are they
making that? Are they going to make that they're going
to be able to make that to be good or
(19:49):
you know, hopefully good for a Cat five or what
are they able to Oh?
Speaker 3 (19:52):
Yeah, yeah, the biggest things of the roof. They had
to tear the old roof off, which wasn't the best
time during rainy season because we out flooded in one section,
so that wasn't great. But yeah, they they're ripping the roof,
making that are much there's ways of making stronger. They're
replacing all the windows, even though we have impact glass
(20:13):
on our windows, that are replacing them to a much
higher standard glass. And our all our bay doors and
our other doors are being replaced with higher grade you know,
equipment to upgrade our the whole building to a five plus.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
I got some events coming.
Speaker 3 (20:31):
Up, right, Yeah, we do. We know, summer we get
a little bit slow. We had some stuff, but we
have a Hispanic Heritage Vestival that's going to be a
village event. That's going to be on September nineteenth, which
is a Friday, from six to nine pm on the
Village complex.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
And what happens then these have.
Speaker 3 (20:51):
Vendors come out, this food, is music. It's just a
way for the community to come out and it's everyone
to get together. And then October first, we're doing National
well it's a National Coffee with a cop Day, so
we're going to be participating in that, and we will
(21:11):
be at the Starbucks. It's at Forest Hill Boulevard and
Military Trail. I don't have the exact address, but it's
in that plaza on the southeast corner where the Walmart
grocery stores, but there the Starbucks there will be there
between nate thirty and ten thirty if anyone wants to
stop by.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
Okay, aren't anything else for we wrap up?
Speaker 3 (21:34):
No, I think we know we have some movie nights
coming up, but I'll probably talk to you again before then,
you know, end of October. Yeah, we were just trying
to get out in the community more, doing more community outrage.
You know, we do a lot of like we do
ice cream patrols in the summer where we go out
to the neighborhoods and hand out ice cream to the kids.
And I'm trying to think we do other events, just
(21:55):
just trying to keep in touch with the community, but no,
I think I think that's about it.
Speaker 1 (22:00):
All right, Well, appreciate you joining me again. It's a
Palm Springs Police Chief Tom check Arelli right here for
protecting the Palm Beaches. We'll talk to you in a
couple few months
Speaker 3 (22:11):
All right, Thanks Joe, good talking to you.
Hey, Joel Malcoln for WJ and O dot com and
it's time for protecting the Palm Beaches with our friend
Police Chief Tom Checkarelli from the village of Palm Springs
here in Palm Beach County.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Thanks for making the rounds again.
Speaker 3 (00:15):
Hey, thanks Cherle, thanks for having me again.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
So it's back to school time. We're a couple of
weeks in, heading into the third week of school. And
I know we've talked pretty much every year round back
to school.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
You and I chat and I.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
Forget the exact number of schools, but you do have
several two or three public schools and then some charter schools,
and you could give the rundown again, but you know,
you talk about how that first week is always crazy,
maybe first couple of weeks. How are things at this
point again, we're talking here at the end of the
second week.
Speaker 3 (00:48):
It's definitely settling down. Like we said, we talk about
this every year. It's the first week or two, it's
like it's groundhogs Day. Nobody knows, no one's ever been
through this before, and it's just the newest thing that
ever happened. But it's a mess. I mean, you get
people with new kids in school, changing schools and new schools.
They don't know the routes. It's it's just it's bad.
(01:10):
But we do. We do have a lot of schools here.
We have for a small town. We have the largest
elementary school in Pomage County. We have the largest middle
school in Pomage County. We have a second elementary school.
Plus we have charter high school g Stars in Palm Springs,
and we also have there's like another charter high school
(01:31):
on Congress both on Congress Avenue, which which messes up
traffic on those two on that road also. And then
we have other schools dispersed, you know, throughout the.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
Area, right, so you get some of the traffic from
the schools that are in you know, say Lake Worth
and other areas close by.
Speaker 3 (01:50):
And even we have John Leonard which is on the
other side of Military Trail, so we pick up a
little traffic from that sometimes too.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
So there are off the top of my I want
to say Delray Beach, Wellington and a few other municipalities
that with the I believe it was a twenty twenty
three state law, they are taking advantage of that and
setting up school's own cameras. Now, these are these are
(02:17):
cameras that are set up in these school zones, and
again it's up to the municipalities if they want to
do them. It's not actually the school district that's doing these.
I believe it's the municipalities, and some of those have
have done them, and some of them are not doing
them at every single school zone either. I guess they're
looking at the ones that are usually the problem, and
I understand, are you guys do not have them at
(02:39):
this point?
Speaker 2 (02:40):
Is there a thought that maybe in the future.
Speaker 3 (02:43):
Yeah, we're I know a few cities. I think Boca's
at top to them, and I think Delray might be.
But we're looking at them that there was that change
in the law that allows it, sort of like when
red light cameras came about, it was all a statute
that allowed or permitted the cameras. So we're looking at
it now are I guess our biggest school zones would
(03:03):
be probably the one by Pump Springs Middle is off
of Forest Hill and Kirk Road. That's that's a busy
area that would probably be a good area to watch.
And then the other one would be Palm Springs Elementary,
which is tenth Avenue, which we got a lot of
traffic on tenth Avenue right right by the school, and
that's one of our schools that has a flashing sign in.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
Kirk Lane is the other elementary.
Speaker 3 (03:29):
Right correct and correct. Kirklane is off of It's Alameda. Yeah,
that's only a two lane road and it just backs
up there. I mean, like I said, with school back
to school that road. And what I have advice to
tell everybody is just if you don't have a kid,
stay away from these areas because if you go to
(03:51):
Kirk Lane, you can't speed down that road because it's
just so locked up with traffic anyway that it would
be really difficult to exceed exceed the spin limit school zone.
Not that it doesn't happen, but it's it would be
very It's a lot less of an occurrence than it
is when you have it off tenth Avenue of Forest Hill.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
So is this the school zone cameras?
Speaker 1 (04:11):
Is this something that the village commission or village council
has been discussing.
Speaker 3 (04:17):
They haven't really discussed it too much because I think
they'll leave it up to staff first to make the recommendation.
But yeah, I mean this is one of those things,
and it's up to the town. It's you know, if
it's on a state road, you have to have DOT approval,
but I think there's protocols in place for that. But
you pretty much have to have a right away to
enact this. But you set up a system. And what
(04:38):
this statute allows is that you can run the cameras
thirty minutes before the session and I think thirty minutes
after the session of school. So I know a lot
of cities are going to be doing it, you know,
thirty minutes prior to the thirty minutes after. But the
statute also allows you, as far as I know, to
use the cameras during the entire school day, So even
(05:01):
though the school zones aren't flashing, you can still monitor
traffic and speed there and then issue tickets and anyone
exceeding ten miles an hour over the speed limit.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
Right, I think I understand, If I understand correctly, I
believe it's Wellington if no one else that is actually
using them during the entire school day. And it should
be noted all of the believe all of the municipalities
that are using the school zone camps currently, they're giving
that first month of warnings and them kind of an.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
Education that.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
Yeah, that's part of the statute is that prior to
prior to doing that, you have to enact actually a
city or a village ordinance to allow the placement and
installation of the speed cameras, and you have to do
a traffic study to say, you know, this warrants, so
you can't just place them anywhere you know that you want.
You have to really do a traffic study to say, okay,
(05:56):
we do have an issue with speeding here. This is
our justification to place them. And then as far as that,
then you have to actually create an ordinance that allows
the placement and operation. And as part of that ordinance
you have to you have to do public you know,
have meetings to let the public know that these are
(06:16):
going to be placed and if there's any public comment,
and then you have to for the first thirty days
prior to commencing enforcement, you have to notify the public
of specific dates which will occur and what you're going
to do, and you have to do this public awareness campaign.
And for those first thirty days, you're only allowed to
(06:37):
issue warnings to everyone that's violating.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
It, So that would expend also you have to post sorry,
that would explain why they're all doing that exactly.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
Okay, yeah, that's mandated by statute. And then you also
statute says you have to you know, just like red
light cameras, you have to post prominent signs out there
saying this is you know, this is speed camera you
know area, just like red light cameras, and even I've
seen now with like GPS or I think some of
the maps programs that it actually warned you when you're
(07:08):
go into a speed uh red light camerahead So I'm
sure they'll do the same thing for speed zone cameras.
Then's it's good just to warn everybody, So just get
them to have its just slowing down those areas.
Speaker 1 (07:19):
So to your knowledge, is staff village staff looking into
this or is it or is it something that you're
recommending as police chief or or where are we with it?
Speaker 3 (07:29):
We are, We're in the initial stages of it. We're
just like talking about it. Now. What I kind of
like doing is I like to see how it plays
out with other cities a little bit first when it occurs,
because I know my experience with red light cameras, there
was a it was a lot of a lot of
issues of the courts with the with the tickets, how
they were being processed. There were lawsuits about the red
(07:50):
light cameras. So sometimes you don't want to be that
first person that pops up on these things. You'll let it,
let someone else take that first shot, and then you
you kind of jump in and once once you see
that you know the mistakes other places have made or
the issues that are there that you kind of kind
of learn from other people's mistakes.
Speaker 1 (08:05):
Yeah, I do that with iPhones. I never buy the
brand new one.
Speaker 3 (08:10):
I know. I don't ever upgrade your update to iOS
systems until too Yeah find out.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
I wait till everybody else's so.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
So clearly it doesn't seem like this is something that
would be in place during this school year at all.
It because it sounds like you're waiting, uh and then
after it's okay, well now we're going to look. There's
a lot of work that goes into before you can
do it.
Speaker 2 (08:32):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (08:33):
Safe to say if it is done in Palm Springs,
it would be next school year.
Speaker 3 (08:38):
It could be the end of the school year, because
like you said, you once you decide you want to
do this, then this there's a lot of companies out
there that offer this product. So that's the other thing too.
You want to find out which vendors are better than others.
There were some better vendors than others for red light cameras,
so you kind of find out which which one provides
the best product. But yeah, that's part of you. You know,
(09:00):
you have to pick your vendor, and sometimes you have
to go through a process such as a that's called
an RFP or request for proposal or requests for quote,
and you kind of put it out there and have
these companies submit their quote and then then you kind
of pick one and then you have to do a
traffic study to warrant the location or warrant the placement,
and then once that's in place, they place the cameras
(09:21):
and then you do your thirty day public awareness campaign.
So it's a couple of months away, but it's possible
to get this at the end of the year. Didn't
even add one.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
What's that go ahead? No ahead?
Speaker 3 (09:34):
No even that one? The you know, the ticket for
each one of these it's if I remember right, it's
one hundred dollars for ticket. And uh, it's a non
there's no points involved, no portion goes to the state
for their revenue fund. I think sixty goes to the town.
But part of that is paying for the cameras and
all the processing and all the what's involved in the system.
(09:58):
And there's money that goes to the Criminal Justice Standards
Training Commission, money to the school district gets part of it.
There's also money that goes to a Crossing Guard Recruitment
and retention fund. So it gets divvied up into different areas.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
Let's assume that you know, you say you want to
watch these other municipalities and how things go. Let's assume
everything goes smoothly, and you know, is this something that you,
as police chief would like to see the village doing.
Speaker 3 (10:27):
Yeah, if it makes the village a safer place. Yeah,
anything that you know, especially protecting kids, protecting those areas.
That's that's always it's it's hard to say the negative there.
I guess I just want to make sure that this
is all done. You know, it's not it's tested. It's
tested out through the courts because we have a lot
of issues. Originally with bread light cameras, a lot of
(10:47):
the judges were throwing them out, and then there was
there was things in the law that needed to be tweaked.
And then we just kept writing these tickets and they
were thrown them out. It's like got to the point
it's like, you know why. But then it got tested
in the court system. The lot got tweaked, procedures got
tweaked to the point that I got better. And now
I think there's not a lot of cities still using
(11:09):
red like cameras.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
I think I believe in Palm Beach County.
Speaker 1 (11:11):
I believe in Palm Beach County it is only Boyton
Beach unless there's been an update I wasn't aware of.
It's just Point and Beach that's using them in Palm
Beach County.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
Yeah, and somebot Boyton has embraced them. I mean they've
added cameras from what I know, so they've done They've
done a lot more, I think they said. I think
they are the only ones in Pompage County they are
still using them.
Speaker 2 (11:31):
All right, Let's move on to another another topic. And
last time we spoke, this was.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
An issue e bike thefts, and now I understand these
are continuing, but also people selling motorized scooters talk about that.
Speaker 3 (11:44):
Well, the e bikes, I don't know what it is.
But right now we're getting probably like once a week,
we're getting ebex all the and they're not cheap. Also,
I know there's a lot of complaints about these electric bikes,
electric scooters and roadways and on sidewalks and and golf
carts some extent. So I know we're looking at creating
ordinances or at least, you know, looking at a statutes
(12:06):
and ordinances try to regulate them better. But yeah, the evikes,
some people just don't lock them up. They treat them
like a regular bicycle. They leave it in front of
a seven to eleven or convenience store and it gets
stolen because they don't lock it up, just like anything else.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
Now, you mentioned the h you mentioned golf carts, and
I believe that the law in the state for golf
carts is if they're street legal first.
Speaker 2 (12:30):
Of all, which they have that little tag.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
If that is the case, then they are able to
drive on streets with speed limits of up to thirty
five miles per hour, but they're supposed to stay at
twenty or less. Is that is that correct?
Speaker 3 (12:47):
Yeah, I have to look at the statue, but I
think that's that's pretty much it. Yeah, s to be
street legal, which you know some golf carts aren't, but
they have to have you know, they have to have
a tag, and they have to have certain equipment that
allows them to be on the street, not just like
your regular or golfing carts.
Speaker 1 (13:03):
And now, if and and if assuming that is the case,
because I've heard about this where you know that, well
you could be on a thirty five mile per hour
limit road, but you can't go over twenty. Doesn't to
me that sounds unsafe. It seems like if it can
get up to thirty thirty, you know, wouldn't that be safer?
Speaker 3 (13:25):
Yeah, no, I have to look at the statute again.
I hate to be wrong on that one, but yeah,
it does sound odd.
Speaker 2 (13:31):
Why you wouldn't Well, I'm pretty sure that those folks
do faster folks that I know that that sell them.
That's what they said. The law is.
Speaker 1 (13:38):
We had and we had a conversation about that, and
I said, you know, twenty miles an hour, they make
you stay at you know, at ad or below twenty,
but they let you drive on a thirty five mile
per hour zone. That seems like that would cause more issues.
Speaker 3 (13:56):
It's like some of these scooters that you know, they
don't go that fast, and they get in these these
lanes on like a forty five road and they take
lanes up. But I think they can go a little
bit fast. I mean they can get up to those speeds,
but they still block traffic to you know, you get
some of these, you get these odd vehicles on the road,
and sometimes I don't not the best the ones to
be out there. In fact, I've seen people take their
(14:17):
kids to school and some golf carts on main roadways,
and I'm like, that doesn't seem that safe to me.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
You're talking about roadways that maybe go to forty five.
Speaker 3 (14:29):
Yeah, I mean, well not so much golf carts. I
see them like cross streets to get to school, but
not so much forty five to have a golf cart
on there.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
How's construction going. I don't hear any I don't hear
any drills or or hammers in the in the background.
Speaker 2 (14:48):
And they must, I know. You let's just kind of
go back.
Speaker 1 (14:51):
For people that don't know what I'm talking about. You
are having a makeover. Essentially, a new building is being built.
It's going to be able double the size of the
current building. I forget the square footage, but you'll remind
us you're right, but you know the office is there
and you're you're going to have double the space that
(15:11):
you have currently.
Speaker 3 (15:13):
Yes, I'm surprised you can't hear it. It's well maybe
you know I don't, but yeah, just as you were
saying that, there's some drawing going on the other side
of my wall. But funny, yes, we're really looking forward
to it. You are correct or doubling the size. We're
going from fourteen thousand square foot facility to twenty eight thousand.
One of the biggest things for me is that we're
(15:34):
hardening the building. We'll like originally this building was probably
built for like a three plus for a hurricane, and
that been you know, when it is a hurricane, we
hunkered down in the building. So I've set to sleep
my office. And you you don't feel as easy when
you you know the building you have is only a
three plus as you're watching that storm car. So our
(15:56):
new building it's being hardened, it'll be for a five plus,
so be uh much better because we you know, unfortunately
we don't have the liberty of you know, leaving the
state or getting out of town when there's a hurricane.
You know, we we we go to the storm, so
we have to be available here when it happens. And
I've been through plenty of them that have had to
sleep in the building and be ready to deploy right
(16:18):
after the storm passes. So keeping us safe and keeping
the officers here safe through a storm is really one
of my one of my biggest priorities.
Speaker 2 (16:26):
Now one thing. And they're going to have this done
November still the date.
Speaker 3 (16:31):
Yeah, right after hurricane season, but yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:35):
But that's still still it's like it's still on still
on track for November because you know, we always hear
about that November and then they move it anytime, not
specifically for you guys, but in general.
Speaker 3 (16:45):
Yeah, No, we're still good. They you know, we have
updates every week with the builder or every other week sometimes.
But everything looks good. The building itself is up, the
windows are in, they extold the drywall. Infact, we're got
to take a walk through tomorrow to see the progress.
But it's been difficult because they're working in the old
building at the same time too, trying to innovate renovate here.
(17:07):
We double the size of our evidence room, you know,
we're adding a gym, facility for the officers to work out.
We made a bigger briefing room.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
Are you getting like that? Are you getting?
Speaker 1 (17:18):
And I don't know if maybe you already have it,
but you know, we hear about West Palm Beach and
some of these other larger police agencies with the real
time traffic center. Do you have something like that? And
if not, are you getting that with this new building?
Speaker 3 (17:33):
No? I mean in real time traffic center or crime
crime center?
Speaker 2 (17:36):
Yeah, yeah, real time crimes. Yeah, I'm sorry.
Speaker 3 (17:39):
That is we're not getting with that with this, but
we do have space to accommodate that. We have some
space on the second floor actually to add something like that.
So we're kind of like we're like wiring it up
for like something similar to that, so it can be
adapta to that some day. But I'm assuming media plants
from that, but I'm assuming that.
Speaker 1 (17:58):
Would be something that the that the Commission or the
Council would have to approve spending for.
Speaker 3 (18:04):
Yeah, I mean it spends up what you do. I
mean it is. I mean, you can you can go
crazy on those things. You could spend a little money
and you know, do something decent, or you could spend
a million dollars and you know, really, I know the
Sheriff's office has a great center. I know West Palm.
I think they I think they're upgrading their center now.
I heard that the Shriff's Office had given them some
(18:25):
equipment too to help upgrade their center.
Speaker 1 (18:29):
I saw there the West Palm Beach one years ago
and I was pretty impressive. Then they're going to upgrade it.
That's pretty cool. And they're the shot spotter technology that
they used there when it was first new. We were
toured around that building, so.
Speaker 3 (18:44):
We had years ago, I remember we had a a
shot smarts be still being used as a bunch of
them out there. But we had tried one time a
graffiti censor, which is supposed to you know, we had
one area with a lot of graffiti, so it was
supposed to pick up the sound of a spray can.
But it got a lot of false false readings on
(19:05):
that one.
Speaker 1 (19:05):
Now you run out and it was just oh, it's
just somebody with their asthma thing.
Speaker 3 (19:11):
Yeah, the shot spotters have really front I've heard they've
The technology is much better. They can you know, almost
triangulate areas where you know, they pick out what the
type of gun was. I mean, I've heard these stories,
I've been seen in practice, but I have been told
that technology is so much better with them.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
Just going back to the construction one more time, I
think you had told me the old building, which is
it's still going to stand, You're still going to use
that once the new one's built for certain things. They're
hardening that as well, because you said that it was
built for a Cat three? Is that what are they
making that? Are they going to make that they're going
to be able to make that to be good or
(19:49):
you know, hopefully good for a Cat five or what
are they able to Oh?
Speaker 3 (19:52):
Yeah, yeah, the biggest things of the roof. They had
to tear the old roof off, which wasn't the best
time during rainy season because we out flooded in one section,
so that wasn't great. But yeah, they they're ripping the roof,
making that are much there's ways of making stronger. They're
replacing all the windows, even though we have impact glass
(20:13):
on our windows, that are replacing them to a much
higher standard glass. And our all our bay doors and
our other doors are being replaced with higher grade you know,
equipment to upgrade our the whole building to a five plus.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
I got some events coming.
Speaker 3 (20:31):
Up, right, Yeah, we do. We know, summer we get
a little bit slow. We had some stuff, but we
have a Hispanic Heritage Vestival that's going to be a
village event. That's going to be on September nineteenth, which
is a Friday, from six to nine pm on the
Village complex.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
And what happens then these have.
Speaker 3 (20:51):
Vendors come out, this food, is music. It's just a
way for the community to come out and it's everyone
to get together. And then October first, we're doing National
well it's a National Coffee with a cop Day, so
we're going to be participating in that, and we will
(21:11):
be at the Starbucks. It's at Forest Hill Boulevard and
Military Trail. I don't have the exact address, but it's
in that plaza on the southeast corner where the Walmart
grocery stores, but there the Starbucks there will be there
between nate thirty and ten thirty if anyone wants to
stop by.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
Okay, aren't anything else for we wrap up?
Speaker 3 (21:34):
No, I think we know we have some movie nights
coming up, but I'll probably talk to you again before then,
you know, end of October. Yeah, we were just trying
to get out in the community more, doing more community outrage.
You know, we do a lot of like we do
ice cream patrols in the summer where we go out
to the neighborhoods and hand out ice cream to the kids.
And I'm trying to think we do other events, just
(21:55):
just trying to keep in touch with the community, but no,
I think I think that's about it.
Speaker 1 (22:00):
All right, Well, appreciate you joining me again. It's a
Palm Springs Police Chief Tom check Arelli right here for
protecting the Palm Beaches. We'll talk to you in a
couple few months
Speaker 3 (22:11):
All right, Thanks Joe, good talking to you.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark
My Favorite Murder is a true crime comedy podcast hosted by Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark. Each week, Karen and Georgia share compelling true crimes and hometown stories from friends and listeners. Since MFM launched in January of 2016, Karen and Georgia have shared their lifelong interest in true crime and have covered stories of infamous serial killers like the Night Stalker, mysterious cold cases, captivating cults, incredible survivor stories and important events from history like the Tulsa race massacre of 1921. My Favorite Murder is part of the Exactly Right podcast network that provides a platform for bold, creative voices to bring to life provocative, entertaining and relatable stories for audiences everywhere. The Exactly Right roster of podcasts covers a variety of topics including historic true crime, comedic interviews and news, science, pop culture and more. Podcasts on the network include Buried Bones with Kate Winkler Dawson and Paul Holes, That's Messed Up: An SVU Podcast, This Podcast Will Kill You, Bananas and more.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.