Lowndes Co. Sheriff’s Office awarded grant to help reduce traffic accidents

VALDOSTA, Ga. (WALB) - The Lowndes County Sheriff’s Office (LCSO) is beefing up the traffic unit in hopes of saving lives and cutting back on wrecks.

LCSO is working to accomplish those goals with a grant that was awarded by the Governor’s Office of Highway Safety.

The High Visibility Enforcement Grant for $52,063.60 was awarded to the Lowndes County Sheriffs Office.

Funding for this grant is provided by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and is awarded based upon the partnership with the Governor’s Office of Highway Safety to help reduce crashes, injuries and fatalities across the State of Georgia.

Sgt. Lonnie Spikes, the supervisor of the traffic unit, said this grant is going to be very beneficial to the department.

“We really want to cut down on injuries in our community and definitely want to cut down on accidents being fatal,” said Spikes.

This year, the sheriff’s office saw an increase in traffic fatalities and hopes this grant will help to reduce those numbers.

“Hopefully, with the equipment from this grant, it’ll be used to help reduce speeds down, hopefully, educate the public to slow down, no texting and driving and cut back on impaired driving, wear seatbelts,” said Sgt. Spikes.

From additional speed detection devices to keeping deputies on the roads longer and educating the public, the sheriff’s office hopes this grant will help tackle the issue at hand.

Spikes said the biggest cause of the crashes this year has been speed.

“Speed has definitely been more of a contributing factor this year. As we know with the pandemic, people are now starting to get back out and moving, so we attribute it to people getting out, moving around more, but also distracted driving. People still texting and talking on the cellphone when driving,” said Spikes.

And as the holiday season starts rolling around, Spikes has a message for the community.

“We would like to remind everyone with the holiday season coming up, to wear your seat belts, please slow down and put the phone down before you start driving,” said Sgt. Spikes.

The grant will continue through Sept. 2022.

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