City Council Delays Vote on Cardenas' Motion to Keep Red Light Cameras

The City Council voted today to delay ruling on whether to keep the city's red light traffic camera program alive for another year in order to assess its public safety value and how to make it work financially.

The motion by Councilmen Tony Cardenas and Bernard Parks would ask the Police Commission to keep the program's operator, American Traffic Solutions, on a month-to-month contract for up to one year. The council will continue the debate June 21.

Councilman Richard Alarcon wanted more information from the city attorney about whether the council has the authority to direct the Police Commission to take a certain action.

Councilman Bernard Parks, a former Los Angeles police chief, also asked the city attorney for more information about the legality of creating a revenue-generating traffic ticket system within the police department. A deputy city attorney said state law makes such a system illegal.

"I don't understand why there are people quibbling about revenue," Parks said, adding that very few city operations generate revenue. "This is about saving lives."

The commission voted last week to end the program, citing concerns that it is running a deficit, in part because state law does not mandate that judges actively enforce traffic tickets generated by the cameras.

"What we really have here is a voluntary citation program, and it's voluntary because there are no teeth in it. There's no enforcement mechanism," Commission Vice President Alan Skobin said last week. "So it relies, in large part, on the goodwill of people who receive these citations in the mail."

In its 5-0 vote, the Police Commission also questioned the program's safety value. However, Cardenas said a recent Los Angeles Police Department study found that collisions at the 32 city intersections with cameras decreased by 64 percent from 2004 and 2009.

Cardenas called for the Police Department to study the public safety risk of turning the cameras off. The motion also asks the City Administrative Officer and Chief Legislative Analyst to jointly look at the holes in the program's fee structure and to meet with the Los Angeles Superior Court judges regarding their refusal to impose penalties for red light camera violations.

The Police Commission has until July 31, when the program is set to expire, to extend the photo red light program.

Councilmen Paul Koretz and Bill Rosendahl made it clear that they would vote next week to oppose keeping the cameras operating.

"I don't know why we have to continue fooling around with this," Koretz said. "Our Police Commission looked at this carefully ... These cameras give us nothing except expense. There are other things we can do to to change signal timing. And when those have been done in other cities, most of the violations have disappeared."

The City News Service contributed to this report.