Safety Zone for Private Party Transactions, Jan. 11

Lincoln Co. Sheriff Curtis Landers announced to the Lincoln County Board of Commissioners that the concept he presented to them at a previous Commissioners’ meeting – called the “Blue Line Safety Zone” – is now available for public use.  Immediately following their regularly scheduled public meeting, Commissioners Hall, Hunt, and Jacobson braved the January coastal weather to join the Sheriff and members of the Sheriff’s Office in unveiling the new Blue Line Safety Zone located next to the public entrance at the County Courthouse. This consists of clearly marked “blue line” parking spaces in a well-lit area for the community to use for various types of transactions that occur every day.  This would include child visitation exchanges and the legal buying and selling of merchandise between private parties. Sheriff Landers said, “By providing a safe space in the courthouse parking lot, our hope is to deter those who would take advantage of or do harm to citizens in our community.”  The concept was presented to Sheriff’s Office Administration by a member in their Investigations Unit, Detective Nicole Rickles, who has seen this program being used in another county. Deputies will not directly these transactions, however if an incident does arise they would have the surveillance video to refer back to. The time limit for using the spaces is 15 minutes.