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DEAR EDITOR:
Since I've always believed using traffic cameras is nothing but "policing for profit," it was nice to see the newspaper editorial board supporting traffic camera restrictions in the Feb. 27 editorial.
If traffic cameras were all about improving public safety, they would all be placed in town where people know where they are so drivers would be forced to watch their speed. Instead, local police park near interstate highways, pointing the cameras at unsuspecting motorists -- the vast majority of whom don't even live around here -- so the local township or municipality can rake in big money from fines. Those motorists aren't encouraged to slow down; they don't even know they're being clocked until a week or two later when they receive the ticket in the mail.
Kudos to Ohio Rep. Tom Patton for introducing bills in the Legislature to restrict traffic camera use. It is infuriating to those of us who recognize camera use for what it really is that none of his bills have made it out of committee. This means they won't be voted on by the full state legislature. I wonder how many of those legislators receive campaign donations from the companies that sell that equipment and issue the tickets.
Unfortunately, Patton's bills still would give money-hungry local governments wide latitude to continue fleecing drivers, as well as discriminate against smaller rural communities. For example, the legislation would not allow sparsely populated villages that can't afford their own fire department or EMS organization to use cameras, but would allow cities to issue twice as many tickets by camera annually as their population size. So let's say Girard, whose Mayor James Melfi gleefully speaks about money the city collects from traffic camera fines, has a population of 10,000. That would mean Girard police can issue 20,000 traffic camera tickets each year, for an average of 55 tickets per day! I guess that hefty revenue stream (about $1,000,000) makes it easy not to have to cut the costs of local government and get their fiscal houses in order.
To those who always watch their speed while driving and think this money-grubbing practice won't affect them, think about the larger implications of communities using police-state tactics -- governments always looking to fleece the public and refusing to bring government costs in line with reasonable tax revenue.
They would be wise to seriously consider what kind of country we're becoming when government and employers (big tech as well) constantly watch you. Remember, when you give up your privacy, you've given up your freedoms.
JAMES DUNLAP
Mineral Ridge