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Youngstown police averaging about 100 speeding citations a day
YOUNGSTOWN
The number of speeding citations issued by the city shows no sign of slowing down.
New hand-held radar guns with cameras – used primarily on state Route 711, where the speed limit is 55, and Interstate 680 between South Avenue and Meridian Road, where it is 50 mph, and a small amount in school zones – have been in use since Aug. 18.
As of early Friday, there were 1,741 citations in the 17 days, said Lt. William Ross, head of the police department’s traffic unit. That’s an average of about 100 a day.
The city issued 960 speeding tickets all of last year and 1,050 in 2013. In a few days, the number of speeding citations almost certainly will pass those two years combined.
After an Aug. 28 Vindicator article about 1,000 people caught violating speeding laws, Police Chief Robin Lees said he expected fewer people to exceed the speed limit.
But that didn’t happen with about 700-plus more people cited for speeding in a little more than seven days. And it came during a week in which there was slightly less enforcement than the previous week, Ross said.
“I had reports of people noticing the [radar guns] and slowing down,” Lees said. “Based on the numbers, that obviously hasn’t been the case.”
Ross said: “It’s not going to be an immediate fix. It will decline over time. Most places see a reduction of 50 percent after that first year.”
The new system does not require being pulled over by an officer and given a moving-violation ticket with a fine and points on their driving record. Now, those caught with the radar guns will be mailed a civil fine.
Because officers don’t have to pursue a speeding vehicle, they can get many more speeders, Lees said.
Of the 1,741 citations, 171 were in school zones, Ross said. That’s about 10 percent of total citations.
“A majority will be on the highway because of the volume of traffic there” compared with school zones, Lees said.
CITY MAKES MONEY
Youngstown has a three-year deal with Optotraffic of Lanham, Md., that calls for the city to keep 65 percent of the fee with the company getting 35 percent.
Speeders face civil penalties – $100 for those driving up to 13 mph over the speed limit, $125 for 14 to 19 mph over the limit, and $150 for those driving at least 20 mph over the limit.
Optotraffic hasn’t provided the city with a breakdown yet of the number of citations for each of the three speed-limit categories. The company will send those reports to the police department monthly, Ross said.
If those cited pay only the minimum fee, that’s $174,100 in penalties with the city getting $113,165 of it.
“It seems like a lot of citations, but the purpose is to change people’s driving habits,” said Councilman Nate Pinkard, D-3rd, chairman of council’s safety committee and a retired Mill Creek MetroParks police chief. “Once people realize Youngstown is serious about speeding, they’ll slow down. There’s been too many accidents on our freeways. The idea isn’t to make money, but to alter driving habits.”
Pinkard acknowledges the city is making money off of this initiative, “but once people realize we’re not tolerating speeding, it won’t be as much.”
Even though the speed guns have been used since Aug. 18, the first batch of speeding citations won’t be mailed until Tuesday at the earliest, Ross said.
The turnaround time to mail citations after a motorist is caught exceeding the speed limit is 14 to 30 days, he said.
APPEAL PROCESS
There is an appeal process for all drivers.
They can either pay the fees or plead their case to a hearing officer to be hired by the city to handle appeals, Ross said.
“They can go through the appeals process and have that considered by the appeals officer,” Pinkard added.
There are three Youngs-town police officers, including Ross, trained to operate the radar guns, and 48 others signed up to be trained, Lees said.
Officers on speed duty do so mostly on overtime, Lees said, as is the case with other target enforcement programs such as drunken-driving checkpoints or saturation patrols. Lees said this is so the regular-size police force stays in place for normal city patrols.
“We can’t spare the cars from regular deployment,” he said.
The department often gets government grant money for speed enforcement, Lees said. The city may seek grant money for this work or use the proceeds from citations to pay overtime for officers, Lees said.
PRIORITY AREAS
State Route 711 and I-680 between South Avenue and Meridian Road are two of the highest accident locations in the city, Lees said. Officers in uniforms and marked police cars typically are stationed at overpasses monitoring traffic on those two highways.
During a 30-day test period, police officers were taking pictures with the radar guns of vehicles coming at them and going away from them, but now do it only from the back, Lees said.
That’s because some states, including neighboring Pennsylvania, don’t have front license plates and neither do motorcycles, he said.
Meanwhile, five attorneys submitted their qualifications to the city by Friday’s deadline to serve as the speed-enforcement hearing officer.
They are Christopher Sammarone, Joseph Messuri, Roklyn DePerro Turner, Gene Fehr and Troy Barnett. All are from Canfield except Barnett, who resides in Salem. Fehr is a retired Mahoning County Common Pleas Court magistrate.
The law and police departments will review the qualifications. The law department will negotiate terms of a contract with the attorney chosen, said Law Director Martin Hume. The appointment needs to be approved by the board of control, which Hume, a board member, said should be done in one or two weeks.