Red-light cameras up for a vote Monday morning in Lakeland

LAKELAND — Big Brother is up for a vote Monday morning, with the Lakeland City Commission set to decide on renewing a contract for red-light cameras.

The contract with American Traffic Solutions, the company that built and maintains the city’s 18 red-light cameras at 11 intersections, is scheduled to expire in July. The first four cameras installed, currently billed at $2,375 per month, or $114,000 a year, will remain at that amount. ATS has reduced the price to operate the remaining 14 cameras from $4,750 per camera per month to $4,250 for renewing before the contract expires. That’s a total of $714,000 per year. The total charged by ATS for all 18 cameras is $828,000.

“I want to keep the cameras in place because it continues to enforce the law,” Lakeland Police Chief Larry Giddens said at an informational meeting Friday morning.

Last year, the police department issued 23,085 $158 citations after 39,751 cases were reviewed by sworn police officers, totaling $3.6 million. The state takes a share of the money, in addition to what ATS charges.

Officials reported that since the cameras were installed in 2009, only 15 percent of those who had received a citation received a second one. The statistic was supplied by ATS, but officials said they were not sure whether that counted first-year violators only or whether it counted recidivism among violators for the entire eight years.

Lakeland Police Department statistics also show that the number of crashes after installing cameras at intersections vary by location. At North Florida Avenue and Memorial Boulevard, crashes dropped from 15 in 2008-09 to one in 2015-16.  But at Socrum Loop and Old Combee, crashes went up from two in 2008-09 to nine in 2015-16. The results were similar at the other nine intersections, with crashes at four going up, four going down and one remaining about the same.

In addition, there are plans to upgrade 14 cameras to include radars to accurately calculate a car’s speed and allow the Lakeland Police Department to retrieve video themselves in real time — helpful if there is an incident occurring and they need to look at video immediately.

“We had to request it before – now we can download it,” Giddens said.

Commissioner Justin Troller said he would like to see light-change countdowns installed at every camera-controlled intersection, similar to the count on pedestrian crosswalks, adding that it would provide more transparency to how intersections are controlled. Troller said the money collected from the tickets had been used as a city “slush fund,” but that has since changed since his first criticism last year. He wants to see at least a portion of the money collected fed back into public-safety agencies.

Commissioner Michael Dunn said he did not like the “feel” of cameras and was against them, although he suggested the city install “placebo cameras,” seeming to acknowledge that people behave better if they think they’re being watched.

“I would rather have a motorcycle unit at a particular intersection and have that human interaction,” Dunn said. “I can’t tell you that I’ve talked to one person that likes a red-light camera. If the majority of our constituents don’t want red-light cameras, that’s relevant.”

Giddens said each motorcycle unit represents $135,000, which includes $40,000 for the vehicle, ancillary equipment and the officer’s salary.

Commissioner Bill Read said he was against the cameras until he received a ticket.

“You pay that fine once or twice and it’ll change your behavior,” Read said.

The city is currently holding more than $2 million in paid fines in a trust account as several lawsuits wind their way through courts throughout the state to determine the cameras’ legality. A 2015 state appeals case found a portion of the red-light camera law was unconstitutional. The Florida Supreme Court heard oral arguments on a case about six weeks ago. It is unclear when a ruling on that will be issued.

Kimberly C. Moore can be reached at kmoore@theledger.com or 863-802-7514. Follow her on twitter at KimberlyMooreTheLedger@KMooreTheLedger.