Eliminate Red Light Cameras
The red light camera systems in Bremerton issue about 10,000 tickets per year.
The company that owns the camera systems is based in Arizona; several of their executives were recently convicted of bribery and fraud.
These systems have drained millions of dollars out of the Bremerton economy.
Let’s stop them now!
City Stats (Bremerton City Government)
Contract signed – 09/10/2007
Go Live Date - 2008
Original Term – 5 years with 2x2 year extensions
Current Term – ends on 06/30/2021
Notices Issued
2018 – 10,357
2019 – 10,701
2020 – 8,608
Most of these violation notices went to motorists who didn’t come to a complete stop when turning right on a red light.
In 2015, it was reported that motorists in Bremerton had paid $2.6 million dollars to the Arizona based Redflex Traffic Systems. Since then, that amount has increased significantly.
If the massive loss of our city’s revenue wasn’t enough to convince you that we should remove the red light cameras, you should also know that several executive level staff members of Redflex were convicted of bribery and fraud. Redflex was caught bribing city officials in at least 13 different states, including Washington. Who exactly they bribed is still not known, but it really makes you question if any of our city officials benefited from this criminal behavior.
According to a 2015 article by Josh Farley of the Kitsap Sun:
“The company that runs the program, Phoenix-based Redflex Traffic Systems, is fighting its own public relations battle following a bribery scandal that ensnared a former Redflex executive who signed the city’s contract. City officials say they are monitoring developments.”
“Aaron Rosenberg, the company’s executive vice president and one of those fired, has filed a counterclaim suit against Redflex alleging he was a scapegoat to cover up for the company, which he claimed had been handing out bribes and gifts in “dozens of municipalities” in 13 other states.
While Rosenberg’s signature appears on Redflex’s 2009 contract with Bremerton, it is unknown whether the city, or others in this state, could be part of his unfounded claim.
According to a 2019 article by “Thenewspaper.com”:
In the Windy City, Redflex gave the deputy transportation director $2 million in return for his help in landing the red light camera contract that turned out to be worth $125 million to the company. Exposure of this and the two similar schemes in Ohio satisfied the US Department of Justice, which struck a bargain with Redflex on December 23, 2016. Prosecutors agreed to drop further charges in exchange for the company's acceptance of responsibility for its actions. The deal was conditioned on payment of the $20 million fine assessed by a federal judge in Chicago, Illinois, and a $100,000 fine in Columbus, Ohio. The agreement also required Redflex to file regular reports documenting its efforts to implement anti-bribery training measures, though DOJ officials refuse to make the submissions available for public review.
These non-prosecution agreements rescued Redflex from potential prosecution in over a dozen states. Former Redflex executive vice president Aaron M. Rosenberg admitted that he bribed officials in Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, Ohio, Tennessee, Virginia and Washington. No details have emerged about which politicians took bribes in each of those jurisdictions. Because he ratted out his colleagues at Redflex, Rosenberg escaped with a felony conviction on his record but no jail time. His boss, US operations chief Karen Finley, was imprisoned on February 6, 2017, and released on December 4 after serving 22 months of her 30-month sentence.
Redflex lobbyist John P. Raphael was convicted of soliciting bribes for speed camera contracts on behalf of Columbus and Cincinnati councilmen. He reported to prison on August 15, 2016, and was released on October 30, 2017, having served nearly all of his 15 month sentence. Martin O'Malley, the bagman for the Redflex bribery scheme, spent just six months in jail. That leaves John Bills as the only individual in the corruption scheme still paying the price for his crime. Chicago's former deputy transportation director is scheduled for release on August 12, 2024.
Regardless of whether or not one or more Bremerton city officials accepted a bribe in return for approving the contract with Redflex, I think it’s time we take a serious look at this program to see if it actually makes our community safer or not.
According to a 2018 analysis by Case Western Reserve University:
“In Houston, the installation of the cameras led to 18 percent more non-angle accidents, with an estimated 28 percent jump in these collisions in a combined Houston-Dallas data sample, researchers found.
While removing the cameras in Houston caused 26 percent more “angle” accidents—such as T-bone collisions, considered among the most dangerous—it’s likely the cameras actually led to more accidents overall, since there are more non-angle accidents, researchers concluded.”
While it may be true that these camera systems tend to decrease the amount of right-angle crashes, they also tend to increase the amount of total crashes. For this reason, I believe that these camera systems have not significantly contributed to the safety of our community.
Just to recap one more time, our tax dollars and the fines collected from the systems themselves are leaking out of Bremerton, and going to a company in Arizona with a recent criminal history.
If you elect me for Bremerton City Council, District 3, I will continue to research and investigate the Redflex traffic systems, and do my best to end their city contract.
-John Johanson
Bremerton City Council, District 3 Candidate
Vote for me in the Primary Election, before August 3rd, 2021