{"id":56338,"date":"2025-06-13T22:46:07","date_gmt":"2025-06-14T02:46:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=56338"},"modified":"2025-06-13T22:46:23","modified_gmt":"2025-06-14T02:46:23","slug":"lpd-wont-tolerate-disorder-at-saturdays-pride-in-the-park-and-no-kings-events-at-munn-park","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2025\/06\/13\/lpd-wont-tolerate-disorder-at-saturdays-pride-in-the-park-and-no-kings-events-at-munn-park\/","title":{"rendered":"LPD \u2018Won\u2019t Tolerate\u2019 Disorder at Saturday\u2019s \u2018Pride in the Park\u2019 and \u2018No Kings\u2019 Events\u00a0at Munn Park"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Lakeland Police don\u2019t anticipate problems this weekend when Polk Pride hosts its annual Pride in the Park<\/a> event at Munn Park from 10 a.m.\u20133 p.m., followed by a \u201cNo Kings Day of Defiance\u201d<\/a> march at 5:30 p.m.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\u201cHowever, if there are problems, we are prepared to address that,\u201d Chief Sam Taylor told city commissioners on Friday. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Taylor said Pride in the Park is a permitted event<\/strong>. That gives organizers the exclusive right to use Munn Park during those hours. Polk Pride has also hired five off-duty officers and a sergeant to provide security.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The No Kings event, protesting President Donald Trump, does not have a permit<\/strong> from the city, but Taylor said it doesn\u2019t need one. He said organizers from Indivisible Polk<\/a> plan to stay on public sidewalks as they march from Munn Park to U.S. Rep. Scott Franklin\u2019s office at 124 S. Florida Ave.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI very much support free speech,\u201d Taylor said. \u201cIn fact, I\u2019ll help you carry a sign if you want \u2026 as long as you stay on the sidewalk.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

But if anyone tries to go into the street, block traffic, disrupt local businesses or damage property, \u201cwe\u2019re not going to tolerate that,\u201d Taylor said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mayor Bill Mutz said, \u201cOur policy is simple: It\u2019s free speech with civility.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Taylor said \u201cNo Kings\u201d protests will also be happening in Tampa and Orlando on Saturday, and any troublemakers would likely go there instead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But if people break the law here, \u201cWe\u2019re not going to allow that.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

He said LPD officers are trained to de-escalate conflicts. \u201cWe\u2019re not going to rush right in. We\u2019re going to ask you to stop. We\u2019re going to educate. We\u2019re going to explain what the law is.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But in the unlikely event of any rioting, \u201cI don\u2019t care if I have to call Sheriff Grady Judd and ask him to send me 400 deputies, which he will.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lakeland Police don\u2019t anticipate problems this weekend when Polk Pride hosts its annual Pride in the Park event at Munn Park from 10 a.m.\u20133 p.m., followed by a \u201cNo Kings Day of… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":29124,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"12","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"enabled":true,"token":"eyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvaTAud3AuY29tXC9sYWtlbGFuZGdhemV0dGUuaW5mb1wvbmV3c1wvd3AtY29udGVudFwvdXBsb2Fkc1wvMjAyM1wvMDFcL0xha2VsYW5kLVBvbGljZS1DaGllZi1TYW0tVGF5bG9yLTEuanBnP2ZpdD0yNTklMkMxOTUmc3NsPTEiLCJ0eHQiOiJMUEQgXHUyMDE4V29uXHUyMDE5dCBUb2xlcmF0ZVx1MjAxOSBEaXNvcmRlciBhdCBTYXR1cmRheVx1MjAxOXMgXHUyMDE4UHJpZGUgaW4gdGhlIFBhcmtcdTIwMTkgYW5kIFx1MjAxOE5vIEtpbmdzXHUyMDE5IEV2ZW50c1x1MDBhMGF0IE11bm4gUGFyayIsInRlbXBsYXRlIjoiaGlnaHdheSIsImJsb2dfaWQiOjE2MzA0MDY2MX0.eAu4UqPew5OWqRq3QnsawDwuz148EPtFxOW4FmDK86EMQ"},"version":2,"attached_media":[{"id":29124,"url":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/Lakeland-Police-Chief-Sam-Taylor-1.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}]},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[12,14],"tags":[11698],"class_list":["post-56338","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local","category-news","tag-lpd-wont-tolerate-disorder-at-saturdays-pride-in-the-park-and-no-kings-events-at-munn-park"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56338","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56338"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56338\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":56339,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56338\/revisions\/56339"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29124"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56338"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56338"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56338"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}