New Jersey’s trial run — if you can call it that — with red light cameras didn’t go so well. For drivers who ran red lights, it went swimmingly, but for the state — not so much.
Last week, word came down that some drivers who were caught on camera running red lights were never informed of the fines they faced because of a technical glitch in the system. The state Judiciary, as a result, asked local courts to throw out the infractions — all 17,000 of them.
In New Jersey, red light camera infractions result in an $85 fine, but no points on a driver’s license. At $85 a pop, that’s $1,445,000 in lost revenue, all because of a technical glitch from a company that supposedly specializes in this.
State lawmakers are angry, and rightfully so.
Said Assemblyman Declan O’Scanlon, of Monmouth County: “These companies incessantly tout the supposed accuracy and consistency of their systems — when the only thing consistent about the camera company representatives is their blatant misrepresentation of what the equipment does and how accurately it does it.”
People make mistakes, but this is a big mistake by American Traffic Solutions, which runs half of the state’s intersections with red light cameras.
“Let’s just switch to the other company that runs our red light cameras,” you might say. Well, the CEO of that other company, Redflex, was just indicted on federal corruption charges for allegedly bribing Chicago officials. Not to mention, a former Redflex executive also accused the company of paying bribes to government officials in 13 states, including New Jersey.
Seems to us that these red light cameras, or at least the companies that were hired to run them, need to be removed, or at least replaced. There’s no sense in paying for a service that’s either ineffective or, worse, possibly obtained through illegal means.
We in New Jersey do enough wrong ourselves that we don’t need an outside company to come in and screw things up for us; we’re plenty good at that ourselves, thank you very much.
The contract for red light cameras expires in December, and it would be best if the state didn’t renew the agreement, not until it studies its full results and finds a new company or two to provide the service.
