Missouri Court Upholds Right Of Citizens To 'Vote' Traffic Enforcement Cameras Out Of 'Office'

A (generally) good news story for once.

Corrupt politicians lose their court battle to enforce their will upon the people in this Missouri city.

Of course, the politicians use taxpayer money to litigate against the people who have voted to remove the traffic cameras used by the local government to harass and fine the people as much as they can to raise revenue.

The corrupt local government claims the public cannot enforce their will upon the government through the use of charter amendments. The court ruled that the people can use charter amendments to force the government to give the people what they actually want and that it is perfectly constitutional.


Highlights below, full story at link:

www.techdirt.com...

by Tim Cushing
Tue, Nov 17th 2015

Citizens don't care much for red light/traffic cameras. These revenue generators do little more than turn moving (or parked) vehicles into ATMs for the governments that deploy them. Obviously, local governments love them. They love them so much they're willing to overlook badly-broken systems, crooked manufacturers and increases in vehicle collisions.

Sometimes the citizens win the fight against red light cameras. That's when the government's hate for the little people really shows through. Late last year, residents of St. Charles, Missouri, showed Redflex the door by voting for a ban on camera-based traffic enforcement.

In St. Charles, Missouri, it was the county council, not a petition, that put the question of a photo ticketing ban on the ballot. County Councilman Joe Brazil came up with the measure as a means of reining in automated ticketing in St. Peters. Len Pagano, the town's mayor, insisted it violates "local control" to allow voters to decide such an issue. They did decide by a margin of 72.6 percent that the cameras should be banned.

It's unclear if Pagano's relationship with traffic enforcement camera manufacturer Redflex is as close as his predecessor's was. The former mayor, Shawn Brown, was sentenced to 18 months in prison for soliciting a bribe from the traffic camera company -- threatening to withhold approval until it paid him off. Redflex's hands were clean in this incident (not so much in other cases).

Shortly before this measure went up for public vote, Pagano told constituents he would spend their money to prevent them from enacting the ban they clearly desired.

The constituents of St. Charles County have been handed a victory by the court -- something that will slightly lessen the sting of having to fight a taxpayer-funded opponent just to be granted the ban taxpayers had already overwhelmingly declared they wanted.

The cameras will not return to St. Peters after Judge Pelikan decided that counties in Missouri do indeed have the power under the state constitution to regulate "any and all services and functions of any municipality" through the county charter.

Nice to hear. S&F.

The city I live in put up a good fight against the red light cams and traffic cams in general, We now have some sort of compromise where there are only about 10 and only at intersections that had a large history of accidents due to running red lights and yellow lights at high speed.

a reply to: infolurker

Outstanding!

Chalk one up for liberty!

Where I live they put visible cameras up and people had a fit. Then they made an anouncement saying they heard the public outcry and were acting accordingly.

Now you can't see the cameras because the are actually in the red lights. However the people they hired to do it weren't too pleased and told everyone what they were doing.

they can vote alright but what about those college kids .
"The University of Missouri’s football program is currently on strike. They believe that they are not safe. This due to the fact that majority of the team is and have joined demonstrations over the university’s handling of racial tensions on campus by vowing to boycott team activities until the president of the university system resigns"
urbanpolitix.com...

a reply to: Urbanbro

# the students
theyre just stupid kids who dont know anything
also the president of the university was a pretty cool dude... i would have a beer with him

democratic rule should only apply when i agree
if i disagree with public opinion then i am grateful we live in a republic where we have representatives rather than letting the unwashed masses decide

now if youll excuse me i have to go pleasure myself to the confederate flag

a reply to: Urbanbro

Most of that Mizzou stuff was proven false. The most racist people there are apparently the black students, and they were pissed the Paris attacks stole the media and asked the media to focus on them instead.

Pretty disgusting behavior.

hahaha # you Redflex, # you Len Pagano! American traffic solutions is currently being taken to court in nearly every country they operate in Florida with litigation ongoing with its constitutionality in the state . Good job citizens of ST Peters, Missouri. We know your suffering down here. I suspect there will eventually be a shift away from this industry in many municipalities in the coming years. And I remember on Seaquest so many years ago when the captain got an automatic ticket on his motorcycle for speeding and thought not in my time. Well maybe I can see it go in my time as well.