Sheriff Grady Judd - He's Our Huckleberry

He's our Huckleberry. This is the Elevate Polk Podcast, and I'm your host Chrissanne Long. And with me, as always, is Rob Arturi. And I've got to admit, I'm a little bit nervous. My first interview with our esteemed Sheriff Grady Judd. Well, I—

it's hard to get people to agree on anything in this county, but I think there's a clear consensus. There's no one better suited to be our sheriff than Grady. Hence the "He's our Huckleberry." Correct. Man for the job.

Yeah.

So with that, Sheriff, thank you very much. Appreciate it.

Welcome to the show.

Well, gosh, I could only mess it up from there.

There's nothing to mess up.

I appreciate the introduction.

So we're going to talk to you about a lot of things. But before Rob gets into some of the stuff he wants to talk about, I want to go— I want to hear the story of the Grady Judd who graduated from Lakeland High School before he was the sheriff. And the person that you have become isn't always necessarily, I hope, my fingers are crossed, I hope there's a story in there that you can share that maybe there were some questions about. You say you always wanted to be the sheriff or a sheriff, but were there ever some questions along the way? Did you ever slip and fall, have an accident, do something that you shouldn't have done that may have caused you to doubt whether you would ever become a sheriff?

You know, that's an interesting question that If I had a slip and fall, I'll never admit it. The reality is, from the time I was a little bitty fella, I wanted to be the sheriff. There was never a doubt in my mind. I always thought it was God's mission for me because I never wavered off of that path, even though a lot of other folks, you know, take some time to develop what they want. Some people just happen into their job. Always knew I wanted to be the sheriff, but I was a member of— I call it the Lakeland High School— 19 1972, which seems like forever ago. Go Dreadnoughts! Yeah, football team, by the way, is a lot better now than it was then.

Were you on it?

No, I wasn't. The coach looked at me in my sophomore year— I played football a little bit in junior high school back in the day— and he looked at me and I said, Coach, my dad's offered me a motorcycle, or I can play football and ride the bus. Coach looked at me and said, son, you better go get that motorcycle. I was slow and uncoordinated.

Okay.

But I started working at the local ambulance back in high school. That was before there was such a thing as EMTs and paramedics. In fact, I was later on in the first EMT class at Polk State College, which was then Polk Community College. Delivered my first baby when I was 16 years of age while working on the ambulance. That scarred me for life, by the way. Well, that's what I work—

that's what Graham gets it from. That's where Graham gets it.

Absolutely.

He was raised hearing that story, I'm sure.

He heard that story a lot. So at the end of the day, when I graduated from high school, I started hanging out at the sheriff's office. They wouldn't let me apply before I graduated, so I filed my application and I waited and I waited. And I would, on my days off when I wasn't going to Polk Community College, starting studying police science, I would be working at the ambulance. If I wasn't working at the ambulance, I'd be hanging out on the midnight shift in the communication center. So after about a month, the captain came in and said, "Son, how long you going to, uh, hang out here in the communication center?" And I said, "Until you hire me." And on July 21st, 1972, then the sheriff Monroe Brannon hired me as a dispatcher in the communication center. At 19, I was the first deputy ever sworn in under 21 years of age, and he allowed me to go to the police academy while working midnights in the radio room. So I worked 11 PM to 7 AM, then I went to school 8 AM to 5 PM. That was an exercise that I don't want to ever repeat again, but I was a lot younger then. And then I moved up through the system, and then the wonderful people of Polk County graced me and allowed me to be the sheriff. And I've been living my dream ever since. It's an honor to be the sheriff. It's an honor to serve people. And you have to remember every day when you wake up, you're here to serve people and help people when they're in some of the most desperate times of their life. And I like being able to help people.

Well, you've really been a fixture. You were the— I remember the Colonel of Administration when I first started, and a few years later you became the Sheriff. Very well known, obviously, with that long tenure here in this county. But it was a rather dark circumstance that we were both a part of in obviously different ways where I think you took that next level jump to, I think, what some might have thought would have been infamy, but it really took a much more positive turn when you were asked quite bluntly about the SWAT teams shooting Angela Freeland after Matt was killed, and that infamous quote about, "I guess that's all the bullets they had." That is a very profound quote. It's not one that people would normally get from an elected official, and I think some people would think, "Oh gosh, that was a faux pas," but it actually turned the other way and it kind of became your calling card and your frank communication style with the community, which was very well received here. And that kind of, I think, pushed you up into almost a national notoriety because that's not something you normally hear from elected officials, let alone a sheriff. And as a result of that exposure, you know, now you are truly a national figure. You've been intimately involved with President Trump and the White House roundtables about criminal justice reform, and that was one of the big things I wanted to talk to you about today. A lot of people like the idea of criminal justice reform. There's always these anecdotal stories of an innocent person being wrongly imprisoned or people that are doing long prison sentences for rather minor crimes, and I think sometimes we lose the perspective because the average person doesn't understand much about the criminal justice system. And if you just base it on the anecdotal stories, it can seem like there's this horrible injustice going on and at every level from here locally with us all the way on up to the federal level. And I just don't think that that is absolutely accurate. I believe there are those cases, but I heard you talk about something recently about some of the problems with kind of the blanketed approach to criminal justice reform. And I think it would— benefit our audience to have that perspective, and I really wanted you to come on and share that with us. So what do people not know about that reform and what they should probably be considering when making those decisions?

Sure. First and foremost, the criminal justice system is a very complicated system, and it's created to ensure that there's justice and fairness. For not only the victim but the criminal suspect. So when you see the end plea after a case has gone through the system, more times than not, this has been a plea down. So they may have combined 3 or 4 robberies, 5 or 6 burglaries, an aggravated assault, and they said— the defense attorney said, rather than go to the trial on all this, What— why don't we just agree that he'll take 5 years in the state prison system? Before we had criminal justice reform in the late '80s and the early '90s, understand, here's the state of affairs in Florida. The felons owned Florida. Now, if you're old enough to remember, they were shooting and killing tourists in rest areas. They were targeting tourists that were here visiting. We had been telling the Florida legislature in the '70s and '80s, crime's out of control, the felons are out of control. Someone gets 10 years finally for robbery with a firearm, and in 22, 25 months they're out. They're serving 25 30, 32, 33% of a sentence. Legislature didn't pay any attention, but upon 17— and I think that was magic number— tourists being killed over a 2-year period, and Europe giving out travel warnings about coming to Florida on vacation because it was dangerous, the legislature acted definitively. They gave us 10-20-life laws 85% of your sentence, minimum mandatories. Immediately, precipitously, crime started to fall. In 1989, there were 8.24 crimes per 100 people per year in Polk County. Last year, there were 1.52 crimes per 100 people per year in the sheriff's jurisdiction in Polk County.

That is incredible.

It's incredible. And I become absolutely angry when they call this the failed criminal justice system. There is a movement that's alive and well across the state and across this nation where they are lying, not misleading, outright lying to the people of the state of Florida. Crime has never been so low in Florida as it is right now, and this is still a very forgiving criminal justice system. We just had a guy run head-on into one of our patrol cars the other night. At 25 years old, he's already been to state prison twice, has 14 felonies, many more misdemeanors, and he's out because it is a forgiving criminal justice system. There are people there actively and successfully getting airtime across the state and nation that we're too tough on criminals. Since when have we forgotten the victims, the hardworking, God-fearing people who work hard and have a right to be left alone and not victimized? Nobody in this recipe is talking about the victims. No body. And it makes me angry. So at the end of the day, you know, whenever people tell you we, we have people locked up for low-level nonviolent crimes in prison, they That's just fiction. Fiction. These people worked really hard. They had to beg their way into state prison, and they should get to stay there for the entire 85% of their sentence.

Well, I think the problem is that we don't talk enough about how they arrive at those things. So you may take a plea. For what would seem like a lengthier period of time for the charges that you have. But there's no mention of, were you a prior offender? And there's no mention of the totality of things. So like what you talked about where you could have multiple crimes all pled down to one. But if you look at these things on a piece of paper, you see a name, you see a charge, and you see a term, a prison term. And if you just look at it based upon those few pieces of data, there's very little of the story that you get, but it can, I think, sometimes look like, well, that may be a little bit excessive. And I think from my perspective, I think there's this prison of two ideas where either we have to lock up everybody and throw away the key, or we have to just let people go and give second, third chances to serious offenders. I mean, the system allows for— for people to make mistakes and to learn. But I think we have this binary approach to everything. It's in everything. It's in every level of politics. It's ingrained in our thinking, and it's certainly involved in this. So my thought is we need a more nuanced approach. We have the Clemency Board who looks at a lot of different factors, but my concern with criminal justice reform is that it's going to be that binary process where you're going to have these benchmarks. "And if it doesn't reach that level on paper, then that person gets to leave." And there's very little consideration. I mean, despite what— you ask 100 people and 90 will tell you that the crime is worse today than it was, but that's, like you said, it's not true, but it's perceptually true. So what can we do? How can we have a more nuanced approach and look at these things more intelligently so that we can make better decisions? Not just the right decision one way or the other, make one side happy, but the best decision decisions for our state and then country overall?

Well, first and foremost, we've got to get a media to quit accepting what these activists are saying as fact when it's not true at all. This is not low-level nonviolent criminals they're wanting to let out of prison. They don't tell you we already have diversion programs. We have many different probation programs. We have mental health courts. We have veterans courts that we are a very, very forgiving system. Have you once, Chrissanne Long or Rob, heard anyone say, hey, out of everybody that touches the criminal justice system in the state of Florida this year, out of every 100 that touches the system, less than 4, less than 4 will serve any time in prison. So 96 and a quarter percent are being diverted away from prison. Did you ever hear that?

No, never.

No. Do you ever hear of a group of mamas charging the Capitol steps in Tallahassee and saying My children are dead from a drug overdose. My children are addicted to heroin or methamphetamine. And oh, by the way, would you please do away with the minimum mandatory sentence of the trafficker that caused their death or their illness? Have you heard anybody say that?

Nope.

I don't think so.

All of this— in all of this criminal justice reform, nobody other than the cops are talking about the victims. Nobody.

I mean, would you say that there are maybe anecdotal cases— there's always exceptions, right? But we should have a provision for those and evaluating, because things do fall through the cracks. But there is— there's a danger in using one of these litmus test approaches because it doesn't allow for that nuanced discussion like you're talking about.

Sure. In fact, there is checks and balance systems. It starts with a criminal defense attorney that's provided to everyone for free if they can't afford an attorney, but if they face one day in prison. Second of all, there's appellate courts. Third, this is us managing human behavior, so of course There will be mistakes, and of course there not only needs to be, but there are significant and more redundancy than you can imagine in our criminal justice system. Nobody's turning a blind eye to that. Nobody argues that we shouldn't better prepare inmates in the prison system with a skill so if they decide to go back and work legitimately that they'll have that skill. Nobody denies that, but the people pushing this criminal justice reform are just not being honest with the people. And what shocks me more than anything, we have a legislature specifically in the Senate, the Florida Senate, the Republican-led Florida Senate, that's buying into that garbage.

Why do you think that is?

I believe that in their effort to, quote unquote, save money, they've hooked up with this, what I call these extreme left people who think that people should not be incarcerated at all. And yes, There's a group out there that believes that all but the very worst offenses. I think they've hooked up with them and saying, hey, you Republicans, you can save money if we let people out of prison. But you know what they don't tell you? They don't tell you that with this forgiving criminal justice system that these reformers talk about being so bad. Even with this forgiving system we had today, the people of Florida lost $1.3 billion to criminals last year. So why do we want to turn tens of thousands more out to victimize and steal more and break into more and rob more and shoot more under the illusion that they're low-level, nonviolent criminals.

I wonder if the people that are really pushing this are— maybe they're collectively, on average, too young to remember the time when you had 17 tourists being killed while vacationing here in Florida. You know, everything is perspective, right?

Yes, Rob and Chrissanne Long, I have said that affectionately to some of the senators And the reason I say that, I don't mean this in a condescending way, but first off, no one in the House or the Senate today has any institutional knowledge of what it was like then, because not only were they not in the House and Senate then, most of them were at best in college. Some in high school, some in junior high school, some in elementary school. So what I'm saying, their entire adult life, they've lived in an environment in Florida where crime commit continues to go down. So they just think this is the way it's always been. They don't have the institutional knowledge, right? They weren't here watching the numbers in the '70s and '80s when they were shooting stabbing, robbing, and killing tourists as well as the people who live in Florida. So I've tried to say, look, I don't expect— when you're in high school, you wake up every day and look at the crime stats, right? What you don't know, even though you're in your 40s now and in the legislature, you haven't lived in Florida when there was a real crime problem. But the thing you're supporting now is going to take us back to where we were before, because that's the rules that were in place that got us a high crime rate.

And again, it all comes back to that perspective, right? And I think that the point that you made is right. I don't, I don't think any of these young people were looking at those, you know, the FBI Uniform Crime Report in high school. Maybe, maybe you were, Sheriff. You might have been, um, But I don't think most of them were. And it shows. And I think, you know, we have to have a nuanced conversation with this. This is why I really wanted to have you on and talk about this, because people need to hear it. They don't need it curated by cable news per se. They need to hear it directly from you that this is— that it's not about a lack of compassion. It's about telling the whole story. And it's about covering all of the pros and the cons and having a— making a real educated informed decision about how to proceed. And so much of what we do is politically motivated and tied that you just, you don't get that perspective. So if there's one thing that you would send everybody off with respect to this one issue, what would it be?

Rob and Chrissanne Long, if what the reformer, quote unquote reformers, recommended worked, I'd be in favor of it. I would love to shut down half the prisons. I would love to be able to shut down half the population in the county jail. If it worked, I would be for it, but it doesn't, and they have no empirical evidence to show it works. But I have empirical evidence that it doesn't work. California passed Proposition 47 and 57 and Assembly Bill 109. They call that the Prison Realignment Bill. After Proposition 47 passed, between February— or November and February, just 3 months— property crime had already risen by 10%. Robbery had a 14% increase, and crime continues to go up. Then in New York, they decided, oh my gosh, people can't make bond because they're poor and we don't need people to have to post bond. We experimented with that in Polk County. Guess what happens when you put somebody in jail on a criminal charge and release them without a posted bond? You never show up.

They're gone.

You never see them again. So how about 42-year-old Jared Woodby? A serial bank robber in Manhattan. He just made the New York Post front page in the last couple of weeks, laughing all the way to the bank. You know why? He was arrested 3 times, I think it was 3 or 4 times, for robbing the bank with a note, not a gun, and he was released every time. And when they asked him, they interviewed him, he said, you know, I can't believe they keep letting me out. And then he went and robbed his 5th bank in a 2-week span. So my point is, the people who commit crime for a living, unless they are monitored and put under strict sanctions, which includes prison when nothing else works, will continue to steal and rob from you if you don't do anything. And I can tell you, these reformers are wanting to turn tens of thousands of criminals back into your neighborhood to rob and steal from you.

So I want to add into this conversation at this point with what you said, going back to those who are pushing the reform, with kind of an idea of framing the work that you do as your craft. So law enforcement is your craft. You have compelling way of leading the community, and we all are behind you and support you. Not all, I guess 100% of us aren't, because there are a lot of critics of the brand that is Grady Judd. But I want to insert this quote from Hemingway to just kind of share where I come from, from a sense of my leadership role. Like, I am in a position of leadership, but I'm constantly improving my craft. And Hemingway's quote is, "We are all apprentices in a craft where no one ever becomes a master." And so as we're constantly improving our craft, the world is changing, society is changing, laws are changing, the legislature is changing. Young people who weren't aware of what was going on when, when you were aware of what was going on are coming in and kind of turning that quote around and saying, well, I'm a master, I know all of these things, and I haven't even lived. Like you said, I don't even have the institutional knowledge. I think if we can come in from a position of leadership respecting the people with the institutional knowledge and deferring to some data, because you have the data, like you said, you have empirical evidence. We would be better served in trying to find solutions that work with the empirical knowledge, the empirical evidence, and your experience instead of coming in and combating what you know to be true, finding ways to bring a different level of experience to the conversation. Because I, as a young person, I might have something to shed light on or a question to present to you. And I think knowing you, that you're here on this podcast listening and being a part of this show, you're open. But if someone's coming in to say, hey, I know more than you and I haven't lived half of the life that you've lived, to say you're wrong is a complete, like, bogus proposition in my opinion.

And I appreciate that because the reality, we're always looking for better ways to do it, right? And I'm all for that. I support what works, but it can't just work for the criminal. Yeah, it's got to protect the victim and the community. Because once again, when you look at a system that less than 4 out of every 100 that are introduced to the criminal justice system in Florida this year will go to prison, it's a pretty forgiving system.

Oh yeah.

Yeah. So Tell us how to do it better with evidence. What happens and what's occurring? They're ignoring the empirical evidence because it doesn't work for them, right?

Well, because they don't have the— so we learn by doing, right? So I think, as you know, hands-on experience is much better. Experiential learning is much better than just, you know, book learning. And so they've been doing all of the book learning, the theoreticals, and they haven't done enough of the experiential. To be able to apply that. And I just believe that you have to have some of that experiential information and knowledge before you can assert a new way. You have to test it. You can't just say this is going to be the way we're going to do everything. Well, let's change the laws. You've got to find at least a bit of a sample group before you're going to—

Well, I'll do you one better. I think you're giving them too much credit in many respects. The growing popular argument strategy today is our pleas to emotion.

Yeah.

So what the sheriff's talking about with data and years of historical data and record and experience, it's hard because we can look at this objectively and say, "Let's make a mathematical comparison. Let's make an economic comparison between two choices." And the fact of the matter is that not everybody thinks the way that we do. The way that you think and the way that you evaluate these things makes a big difference. So we have a public, a populace that's addicted to making decisions based upon the emotional significance. Which makes me feel better.

Right. It's compelling to base something on an emotion.

It is compelling, right? Tom Hanks' performance in Forrest Gump was compelling and emotional. It doesn't mean he was a real person.

Right.

That's the struggle that we have with this argument. And they make jokes about the sheriff and liking the media attention and all of this stuff. And I've always known you to have a good sense of humor about those things, but I think the sheriff could probably just sit down and eat Ritz crackers and win reelection. The idea that he needs to do all of that to somehow beat out these competitors everywhere. It's ridiculous. I think it's important that somebody tell that story, that somebody give that perspective, because Lord knows you're not getting it from many other places.

Right. Well, I want to unpack that a minute because I believe that the voice of those who are critical of you are again coming from a place of lack of knowledge or lack of experience or lack of something. So one of the questions that we had, you know, it's the It's the quote of Grady, Grady is the dangerous, most dangerous place in Polk County is the space between you and the camera. And I think it's a joke, but I think that there are people who believe that you're just all about staying on brand, that this is all a show, that this is an act, that you're just performing for the media. And when I go back to the very first question that I asked you, when you said, I believe that this was God-ordained and that I was supposed to be a sheriff and I've never deviated from that path, you are living a dream life that a lot of us can't comprehend. Comprehend because so many of us have fallen off of this goal or that goal or that dream. And we make it, we set a goal and say, we're going to do this. And then 6 months later, something new comes along and we change our mind. So for us, it's hard to really wrap our head around, here's this person from the age of however old, 11, said, I'm going to become the sheriff, did it, and now is completely confident in the person that he is, has no questions or doubts, doesn't deal with things like I deal with imposter syndrome. I'm like, who the hell am I to be on this podcast? By golly, I don't have anything. Anything to share that's real. And yet I'm here having this conversation with you. So talk to us about what you would say to those critics in a real honest way, not in a, not in a, I'm the sheriff and you're not, but in a, talk to us like the real man that is the sheriff.

I worked for a most wonderful sheriff, professional in every sense of the word, called Lawrence Crowe. He was very quiet. He didn't particularly like being on the media, in the media, talking to the media. He didn't. He was an introvert by nature. He just worked hard and he was criticized because nobody ever knew what he was doing, what the sheriff's office was doing. We never hear from the sheriff. And then I come along and it's, you know, he's in front of the media. Every day. Well, duh, my job is to report to my bosses, and every day I report to my bosses, and that's the people of Polk County. They elected me, and they have a right to know that, again, the return on their investment, that crime's down, that our deputies, who are simply the very best are working very hard to communicate. How else can we get help solving crimes, identifying people, if we don't use social media or the traditional medias? So what I have found, those who don't like me communicating with my bosses are usually those that have had problems, or families, or those that have problems. There are some people that have petty jealousy. And I don't suggest for one moment that there aren't a few of those people out there, because there are. But I can tell you that there's hundreds for every one that doesn't think I should ride for the brand every day that agrees with it. And that's who I hear from. So think about it. Pepsi-Cola. Coca-Cola, Anheuser-Busch, Ford, Chevrolet, Chrysler, BMW, and I can go on and on. Brand names. If just having a great product was enough, why do they spend billions and billions and billions of dollars every year advertising and selling the brand. Well, I'm selling the brand.

That's an excellent point, and I'm glad you said that that way, because when you first started coming out using social media, you were the first elected official and leader in the community that did that, and everyone else was shying away from it and trying to figure out how to avoid it and not, not embracing the opportunity that it is to catch criminals and do your job with it. So I applaud you for that, because from the public relations side of things, you've got the You've got it down. You're not afraid to do the job you're doing and live in the brand that you are because you're serving us. And I don't, I don't question that or doubt that. I just wanted to give you an opportunity to maybe say that in a way that a lot of the people listening to the show who might not buy in 100% to, you know, this is the Grady Judge Show. I wanted them to hear what you had to say about it because I think that that was a compelling thing to ask.

Well, Chrissanne, think about this. People said, oh, he's only doing it because he wants to run for another office. No, no, all I want to be is the sheriff of Polk County. I want to work hard. I want to serve the people. I want to be their servant. They're the bosses. And my goodness, anyone with two good brain cells boss understands you got to keep the boss happy, right? And I'm trying to keep almost 700,000 bosses happy every day.

Well, let me ask you a question about— we had one, one of our submitted questions was about body cameras, and that was quite an emphatic question a few people had. It was the only thing we should talk to you about were body cameras. And I, you know, I, I've been gone for 10 years now. It seems crazy, but But I still keep up, and I try to give my explanation. But for those who believe that body cameras are the end-all, be-all, that somehow it will make everything better, because again, there's a perception that there's an epidemic of police violence. And I've made this argument for many years now that that simply is not true, and using empirical data, and I've had about as much success with that as you have against people who make emotional arguments But the argument is that these body cameras will stop everything. What's your opinion on that?

Sure. First and foremost, I'm a big privacy wonk. I don't think the government's got a right to hang a body camera on me. See, it doesn't point at me, it points at you.

Mm-hmm.

And now you're the victim of a burglary. I walked into your house. I'm going in all of the bedrooms. I'm surveying, writing my reports, dusting for fingerprints. When I leave there, now the government's got photographic evidence of the most private place you have in your possession, your home. I don't believe the government's got a right to do that. I also don't believe when a law enforcement officer— God forbid this ever has to occur, but it does every week— walks up to the door of your home and there's Mama in her bedclothes and Daddy in his boxers and look those folks in the eye and tell them their teenage son or daughter just got killed in a car crash. I don't think the government's got a right to record that emotional minute. I don't think when somebody wants to walk up to a law enforcement officer and say, I don't want to get involved, I'm scared, but here's who's doing the robbery or the shooting— do you think that's a chilling effect when they know the government's got a video or photographic record of that? So So when it comes to the privacy, I still hear no one saying, hey, let's put body cameras on school teachers. After all, they're watching the most precious things we have in our life, right? Our children. Nobody's up in a hue and cry to put body cameras on children. So let me give you a news flash. Aside from the fact with an agency my size, it is a multi-million $30 million a year, every year investment for equipment, technology, maintenance, storage, and public records regurgitation. Ignore all that. Think about this: there is rarely a person that doesn't have a cell phone. There is not a cell phone made today that doesn't have a camera. If you want to take our picture or video, take it. You keep it, you maintain it, and you produce it. So why should the government have to do it? There's your sign.

Yeah.

Yeah. Well, there's the implications that you mentioned are— aren't even things that I would have come up with. So there's your institutional knowledge. There's your application to, hey, here's this thing. What would happen if we did this? And you could rattle that stuff off because you know that it's not just about the cost, it's also about all of those other repercussions and consequences that would come along with it. And the public records request in and of itself would be an endless job.

I can tell you, I am really biased. I love cops. City cops, county cops, state cops, federal cops, because I know their heart and their soul and their servant's heart. I'm not letting one of them come in my house and work a burglary with a camera. They're not coming into my private space.

I heard that.

And I, as the leader, have been elected to be— make the decisions in the best interest of this community. So once again, my statement is this: when you put cameras on school teachers and television reporters come back and talk to me.

That's, that's, uh, I, I got nothing to add to that.

Thank you for that. Yeah, for sure. So let's do a little bit of lighthearted stuff as we wrap this show up. Um, I think that was— you thought that was lighthearted? Well, we're gonna go a little bit more lighthearted than that. Um, so we know that you have to eat, um, and when you decide that you're going to order maybe takeout, or going out in public might be a little challenging being that you're such a public figure. But where— what's your favorite local restaurant? Where do you like to go? Where do you, where do you enjoy eating?

Well, the reality is I eat anything that doesn't eat me first. So I, I love Italian food, I love Mexican food, I love McDonald's.

But if I had to put it in one category, I like seafood best of So is there a place you like to go locally, or maybe if it's Tampa or Orlando because you just want to get away, where do you like to— what restaurant? Call them out. Give them a shout out.

Yeah, you don't get away in Tampa and Orlando because I couldn't— I didn't get away in Denver, Colorado trying to eat at a restaurant, or South Florida. But that's good. That's good problems to have. I love people and I don't mind them talking to me when I'm out eating. I think if you ask me, on balance, I don't— I don't know. I just like them all. I don't have one preference over the other.

I've been to Gary's Oyster Bar in Lake Alfred.

Well, I eat at Gary's a lot.

There you go.

Traditionally, we have private— Gary does a lot of private parties.

Okay.

And I eat enough there at private parties that I've not been to the restaurant during restaurant hours. And, you know, I like to go to nice restaurants, Scarpa's, Arabella's, you know, and sit over in the corner. So I like it all.

There you go. Okay, well, that answers that question. Now I'm going to do a shout-out for my dear friend Michael Huff, who I know you have grandkids in common with. So why don't you brag on your little ones? This is your chance to talk about your family minute and what you love to do when you're not on the clock, which is probably never, but when you you actually get a chance to relax? What are you doing and who are you doing it with?

Now, first I want to brag on Mike Huff. He is, he's my grandfather-in-law with some, some of my grandchildren. He is a wonderful man, and the children couldn't have a better grandfather than Mike Huff. He's awesome.

Yes, I agree with you.

I've got 13. I picked up my 13th grandchild this week.

Congratulations.

I love that you use the term 'I picked up my 13th grandchild.' That's—

well, I actually Actually, that's a misnomer. I had the flu this last week, so I haven't picked her up, but I've looked at her.

Okay.

So I'm pretty excited. Our children have their children, and I call them originals and aftermarkets, and I love them all equally. And so grandchildren is a big deal in my life because they're the, the future. And when they come to Granddad's house, they march around and say, yes, sir, and no, sir, and yes, ma'am, and no, ma'am. Because you know what? It all starts at home. If you don't raise those babies right at home, nothing else is going to work for them their entire life. And we take them to church on Sunday.

What about photography? We hear you're big into photography. I hadn't heard that before.

That's my main hobby. It's very relaxing. I like the woods and the water. I can set out in the middle of the Green Swamp all day long. And if you've not done that, you don't realize when you drive by or through the swamp that it's alive with all these wonderful things in nature. And quite frankly, that's where I feel closest to God first. And second is where where I'm at peace. And I've got some of the most awesome photographs because I found with this new technology, if you take enough pictures with good equipment, just every now and then one of them works out to be pretty awesome. Mm-hmm.

Well, I'm going to do a shout out to my stepdad because I love the fact that you have found that hobby. And my stepdad found that hobby after he retired from being the dean and athletic director at Auburndale High School. His name's Dick Meyer. Myers. Don't know if you guys have ever crossed paths before, but you guys are a lot alike. And he, he raised me as his daughter, and it's just really fun to— when you see an older gentleman who's always been athletic get into a hobby like he got into photography and just goes to Epcot, takes pictures of doors, and, and they're beautiful. And it's just an amazing— and wildlife and his grandkids and everything. It's just fun. So I applaud you for finding that hobby and, and enjoying that time time for yourself, but also would love for you to share some of those photos with us at some point in time.

I would be more than happy to do that. I've got a few thousand.

Well, pick, pick your top 5 in the last, you know, year that you've taken, and maybe we can put them in the show notes.

I would love it.

Perfect.

Thank you very much for, for coming on, Sheriff. I appreciate it. We know you're, you're a busy man, and especially being out sick, we appreciate it.

Um, we're sorry for getting started a few minutes late, but, uh, Joe Tedder was on before you, and he ran a little bit And he asked us to ask about Corky, but we didn't have time to get it into the show.

I told him I'd heard that story and I'm not— I wouldn't call the sheriff.

See, I wasn't going to tell bad things about him, but you know, we'll edit this part out too. You know, it's terrible when your grandmother gives you that nickname when you're a little bitty guy. When I got in first grade, they asked me, do you want to be known as Corky or Grady? I knew in first grade you couldn't get elected sheriff with the name Corky.

Well, I have to leave that in.

I think that we're going to leave that in because you're right. I don't think we could walk around Polk County with pride saying Sheriff Corky Judd.

Oh my God, that would be terrible.

Oh, well, well, thank you, Sheriff.

Thank you so much for your time.

I had a great time being with you. If you run out of people, I'll spend more time, talk more stuff, and then let those that don't like it, you know, go suck a wind.

All right.

If you're pleasing everybody as a sheriff, you're not doing your job.

So, well, we appreciate you for all that you do. Thanks for serving, and thanks for being on our show today.

It's good to talk to y'all. Have a great day.

You too.

Well, thanks for listening, and make sure to subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen. And automatically— I don't like that sentence. I don't like how it's written. Let me—

you can rewrite it.

I sent you the word doc. I know, I didn't open it. I trust you. I trust you till we get into these grammar things. And I'm like, okay, all right, let me try it again. All right, I think I can do it. Thanks for listening and make sure to subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen. Remember to leave us a review. We promise to read every one. And I am loving the messages that I'm getting from my friends who are saying they're binging on the Elevate Polk podcast. So if you have my number, give me a text and let me know that you're listening. And you can always find all of our episodes at elevatepolk.com. If there's something you want to hear about, on an upcoming episode or a person you want us to feature, reach out to us on Facebook at Elevate Polk.