The City Council of a small Florida town named Waldo has voted to disband its police department following controversy surrounding the department’s speed enforcement operations.
Waldo is located along US Route 301, a busy north-south road that runs on a diagonal between the Jacksonville area and Gainesville, Ocala, and points further south. Having gained notoriety as a genuine “speed trap,” ensnaring snowbirds, Florida football fans, and just plain folk, the Waldo City Council voted 4-to-1 in late September to eliminate the department not long after both the chief and interim chief resigned because of state investigations into departmental corruption and an illegal ticket quota.
Route 301 is a multi-lane highway, and when approaching Waldo the speed limit changes from 65 to 55 to 45 to 35 over a very small distance, catching inattentive drivers in great numbers. While a 35-mph speed limit is unreasonable for a highway such as US Route 301 in Waldo, the controversy appears not to be rooted in the posted speed limit. We have seen nothing to indicate that the speed limits themselves are being challenged. Instead, the focus has been on enforcement methods and departmental corruption.
For the moment at least, the county sheriff’s office is providing policing for the town.
But not far up Route 301 from Waldo is the even smaller town of Lawtey, which has similarly earned a widespread reputation as a speed trap. So far at least, Lawtey seems to have avoided allegations of departmental corruption, although at least one individual officer was accused of offering to take cash payment on the spot from speeders.
We have traveled through Waldo and Lawtey on numerous occasions, and we have so far not been cited for speeding. We attribute this to the ample signage alongside the road leading into the towns, and to the fact that our vehicles are equipped with what a family member once dubbed a “factory-installed radar detector” – a speedometer.
