GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – After one month of enforcing the Slow Down Green Bay initiative, the number of traffic citations issued by Green Bay Police has skyrocketed.
“We’re asking all our officers: community policing officers, school resource officers, traffic officers, and road officers to in their spare time, when they’re available, focus on traffic,” said Chief Andrew Smith of the Green Bay Police Department.
In January 2019, officers issued 541 traffic citations. This January, 1,142 were issued – a more than 100% increase.
Smith tells FOX 11 he doesn’t have a breakdown yet to say how many of those citations are for speeding. He also doesn’t have a tally on how many warnings were handed out.
“I tell our officers be compassionate, be understanding, sometimes a warning is just what a person needs. Often times though, we’ll see the same person doing the same violation over and over again and a citation is warranted.”
The extra enforcement was at the urging of city council members.
“I think it’s long overdue,” said Randy Scannell, a Green Bay Alder.
“There’s been complaints for a long time about speeding in Green Bay and it’s time we started addressing it is so good news.”
One thing Smith stressed is the extra citations are not to fill any sort of quota or raise more revenue.
“What it is about is keeping Green Bay safe, keeping our kids safe, slowing down traffic so we all get where we need to go without getting in a collision.”
Drivers that spoke to FOX 11 say they have no issue with more tickets being handed out.
“We do have kids walking around,” said Vivian Tourtillott, a Green Bay driver. “After school people are driving past the school buses and if they want to crack down on speeders I believe they should.”
“Along with the speeding and the texting and the kids blaring the music, I don’t know what is the worst situation, but speeding has to get addressed,” said Cindy Degeneffe of Green Bay.
Chief Smith says it will, until people realize Green Bay is no longer a place you can speed.
