Redmond resident John Cherrie rides four miles to and from work everyday on his bicycle — and every once in a while he will have a scary close encounter with a car.
“Every few months, I come home and tell my wife, ‘yeah, it was another close one today,'” said Cherrie, a senior program manager at Microsoft.
Cherrie believes a controversial pilot program in which the city uses cameras to catch traffic violators and fine them will ultimately improve safety for everyone who uses roads — pedestrians, bicyclists and motorists.
“Police can’t be everywhere at once,” Cherrie said. “If this is one way to save lives, then I’m all for it. It will make drivers pay more attention to what the laws are. (This program) could make a huge difference. It makes sure drivers are more conscious about the laws.”
Based on early data from the program, there are many drivers who disobey the law. But many residents disagree with the camera enforcement, claiming the cameras are intrusive, distracting and could evolve into a potentially unethical form of policing and money making by the city.
During the one-month warning period in February, the Redmond Police Department (RPD) issued 2,562 warnings at the three intersections with red-light cameras and one school zone with a speed camera, Police Chief Ron Gibson told the City Council’s public safety committee at a meeting Tuesday evening at City Hall council chambers.
The number of camera-enforced citations is on pace to exceed that amount this month as RPD issued a combined 1,586 citations between March 3 and 16 — an average of about 113 violations per day.
The cameras are located eastbound on Redmond Way at 148th Avenue Northeast, eastbound and westbound on Northeast 40th Street at 156th Avenue Northeast, and westbound on Union Hill Road and northbound on Avondale Road where those two roads intersect. A speed zone camera is also located at Einstein Elementary, 18025 N.E. 116th St. If caught on camera, violators will receive a $124 fine, the same amount if an a patrol officer caught someone running a red light or speeding in a school zone.
“The only difference here is we’re using technology in order to monitor the intersection 24/7 as opposed to posting an officer there,” Gibson said. “The criteria for issuing a citation are exactly the same.”
TAKE IT TO A VOTE
Redmond resident, Scott Harlan, who created a Facebook page called, “Abolish Red Light Cameras in Redmond,” said this pilot program should have been put to a vote by the residents.
“I and anybody I know doesn’t like this thing,” said Harlan, who has 620 friends on his Facebook page as of Wednesday afternoon. “If ever there was an issue where the government should be polling its citizens, this is it. … The public is the government and we have a right to have a voice in how we are policed.”
These safety cameras are not a permanent fixture in Redmond as they are part of pilot program that will be reviewed by city officials at the end of the year. After that, the city council will vote to continue or discontinue the safety camera program.
“Our hope is that through our education and enforcement efforts we will be able to reduce the number of traffic violations in the city,” Gibson said. “I actually think it is a good thing that this program has people talking about traffic safety in our community.”
Harlan said he feels the future use of camera enforcement should be put to a vote by the residents, not just seven elected officials. Harlan said there have been 15 jurisdictions in the country, most recently Mukilteo, Wash., that have voted down the use of camera traffic enforcement.
“The public hates this for a lot of different reasons,” Harlan said. “Once you do this, what’s next? They could start putting up speed cameras on arterials. I drive all the time and by and large people drive pretty well.”
MONEY MATTERS
Harlan pointed out that $124 is a too steep of fine for a traffic infraction and is a large revenue generator for the city.
“Ultimately, that’s what it is about,” Harlen said.
City officials say the data shows drivers are breaking the law and the city wants to be proactive in their efforts to avoid injury or fatalities.
“We’re not after the money, we’re not after anything,” said council president Richard Cole. “We just want people to slow down in school zones and quit running red lights. Running red lights is a real hazard. People keep pushing the envelope and that’s what causes fatalities.”
Cole admitted that this program will generate “hundreds of thousands of dollars” for the city, but he quickly pointed out that the money will be used to rent the seven cameras and any extra money will be used for pedestrian and traffic improvements.
“If this was truly not about money, then they would absolutely take a vow that says every single dollar of this will never touch the municipal budget and go to charity,” Harlan said.
The five intersection cameras are $3,750 apiece per month and the two school zone cameras are $4,750 apiece per month, according to Redmond Police Commander Shari Shovlin.
Council member Hank Myers, who is the chair of the public safety committee, agreed that the $124 fine is too steep, but said the camera enforcement will improve safety and free up officers “to handle more serious calls.”
DISCRETION ADVISED
At Tuesday’s public safety committee meeting, Gibson and Shovlin gave a presentation to committee members to clarify how officers decide whether to issue a citation. Gibson said the police officers who review the video footage are instructed to use the same level of discretion they apply when they are patrolling on the streets.
Shovlin showed several videos at the different camera-enforcement locations, where citations were issued and others where officers chose not to issue a ticket. A couple of the videos showed vehicles barely stopping before taking a right at a red light and the drivers were not issued tickets. However, if there were pedestrians there, “it might have been a different story,” she said.
There were other videos where drivers sped through red lights. In one video, a driver sped up on the yellow light and then slammed on the brakes halfway through the intersection when the light turned red before continuing through the intersection.
It’s obvious people need to improve their driving behavior, especially at the selected intersections for red-light cameras, Gibson said.
Gibson pointed out that there is a website printed on each ticket issued and violators can go to that website and view their own video to see if they want to contest it or not.
OTHER CONCERNS
People against the camera enforcement say that the cameras are distracting and may cause collisions because people are slamming on their brakes to make sure they come to a complete stop. However Gibson said at Tuesday’s meeting, there has been only one rear-end collision at a camera-enforced intersection since the program began and investigators concluded that the driver who caused the collision was not trying to stop for a camera.
In addition, strobe shields have also been installed on all the intersection cameras and the wattage on the flash has been decreased so it’s not as distracting to drivers, Shovlin said.
Public works engineer Bruce Newman gave a brief talk at Tuesday’s meeting about the city’s signal cycles. Newman said most of Redmond intersections have yellow-light periods of four seconds, with the range between three and 4.7 seconds. Before the meeting started, Redmond council member John Stilin scoffed at the idea of the city shortening the yellow light time in order to generate more citations, something he has heard from some of the anti-camera residents.
Myers said this program was carefully reviewed by city officials before implementing and reiterated that it is only a pilot program. Residents can comment on the issue at any of the city council’s upcoming regular business meetings. The next business meeting is April 5.
“We’re gonna be watching this closely,” Myers said. “If we find we haven’t had any effect on safety and all we are doing is ticketing people, then the program is not achieving what we hoped it would achieve.”
