Amory police cracking down on speeding motorists

AMORY, Miss. (WCBI) – One city in Northeast Mississippi is cracking down on motorists who speed through residential areas.

Amory Police Officer Matt Flippo is parked along Hatley Road, running radar in clear view of motorists.

Amory Police Chief Ronnie Bowen said his department has received a high number of complaints about people driving well above the 30 miles an hour posted speed limit along Hatley Road, and other residential areas in the city.

The chief posted a warning on Facebook that officers would be conducting increased patrols in the problem areas.

“We issued the notice we were going out to start cracking down on speeding violators,” said Chief Bowen.

The chief said the stepped-up enforcement is making a difference. Last week, there were 23 tickets written for speeding.

The chief said during a typical week, six to seven speeding citations are written.

“Speeding is not a big problem, unless it’s in front of your house and your kids are playing and you’re concerned about their safety.  So, what we do is out of respect for others, obey speed law, especially through residential areas, we have some thoroughfares but there’s houses all along those streets in the city,” said Bowen.

Amory schools start back in a couple of weeks.

Chief Bowen is hopeful the stepped-up patrols will have a positive impact when students start back to school.

“We’re fixing to introduce school buses into traffic flow in mornings and evenings, kids getting out, we don’t want a tragedy, we are going to not only continue to look at speeding real close, especially school zones, there are 15 miles an hour school zones,” he said.

Chief Bowen said the increased patrols will continue as long as they are needed.

Chief Bowen also points out that all of the traffic details will involve marked units, in plain view of motorists.