Legislators green light a red-light camera ban

In a long-running dispute, two Miami-Dade lawmakers want to ask voters to pass a constitutional amendment to prevent state and local governments from using red-light cameras.

Sen. Ileana Garcia of Miami last week filed a proposed constitutional amendment that would ban the use of “traffic infraction detectors.” Her proposal, which would need voter approval, wouldn’t apply in school speed zones, for which Miami-Dade commissioners have recently approved a new program of digital speed enforcement.

Meanwhile, Rep. David Borrero of Sweetwater filed a proposed constitutional amendment that also would ban red-light cameras.

The proposals are filed for consideration during the 2024 legislative session, which will start Jan. 9.

State lawmakers almost annually over the past decade have tried to repeal a law that created what is known as the Mark Wandall Traffic Safety Program. The 2010 law, named for a man killed by a motorist who ran a red light, authorized the use of red-light cameras throughout the state.

The proposals by Sen. Garcia and Rep. Borrero would need support from 60% of the House and Senate to get on the ballot. Also, support from 60% of the state’s voters would be needed to pass a constitutional amendment.

A dispute about whether Aventura’s red-light camera program violated state traffic laws went to the Florida Supreme Court in 2020, one of numerous legal fights in recent years about red-light cameras in the state.

In 2019, a dispute arose over cities operating red-light cameras on US 1 in South Dade. The concern was that those cameras might disproportionately target nonresidents commuting from unincorporated areas.

Miami-Dade Commissioner Dennis Moss said he’d observed red-light cameras at US 1 intersections in Pinecrest, Palmetto Bay and Cutler Bay aimed at motorists leaving municipalities traveling westward. That was the 15th county commission discussion of red-light cameras in a decade.

In 2010, Miami-Dade joined other Florida counties in authorizing red-light camera installations at high-crash, high-volume intersections after state lawmakers ratified the Mark Wandall Traffic Safety Act, which authorizes camera enforcement of red-light traffic infractions, including their use on state roads by municipalities that receive state approval.

But Miami-Dade never did install at the county level a single red-light camera or generate funds based on infractions they detect. And June 2016, commissioners amended county code to prohibit use of red-light cameras at the county level but amended the ordinance to allow cities to continue using them, including Aventura, Pinecrest and Medley.

According to the Florida Department Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles’ “Red Light Camera Summary Report,” 508 red-light cameras were active in Florida as of June 30, 2018, down from 629 in 2017.

In fiscal 2017-18, law enforcement in Florida issued almost 1.6 million notices of violation stemming from red-light cameras. Over that same period, however, police issued only 50,249 in-person citations for red-light infractions.

A Miami-Dade County ordinance passed this year would permit speed detection systems in 206 public and private school zones in unincorporated areas. The measure, sponsored by Vice Chairman Anthony Rodriguez, piggybacked on a state law signed this year that provides that a county may enforce speed limits on roadways maintained as school zones by using speed detection systems.

Sen. Garcia’s measure explicitly avoids impinging on those new measures.

The county legislation said that “speed violations in school zones in the unincorporated area of the county are rampant, with the Miami-Dade Police Department issuing nearly 2,500 citations for speeding in a school zone in the last year alone.” The legislation said that while county police had issued those citations, they could have issued many more because while they have stopped one speeding driver, others can speed past with impunity.

The new state law allows counties to avoid that manpower gap by installing a “portable or fixed automated system used to detect a motor vehicle’s speed using radar or LiDAR and to capture a photograph or video” of cars that speed past. The speed detection system and photos or videos, the state law says, can be used to cite motorists going more than 10 miles over the speed limit in the zone.