War On Driving

Arizona State Senator Joins the Dark Side; Supports Redflex, ATS

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[Above: A meme created to demonstrate the 4 Republicans who voted against SB 1167 last week were siding with Arizona Democrats, making them RINOs]

An email was sent out last week by Arizona’s chapter of Campaign for Liberty or C4L. This email detailed the 4 state senators who voted against their party platform and stopped SB 1167, a bill which bans photo ticketing across the state. C4L is national PAC which has statewide organizations engaged in the fight against the proliferation of red light and speed cameras, among other issues.

One of these rogue state senators, Steve Pierce, from Prescott, AZ, responded via a list serve which goes out to Arizona political activists from someone who uses the pen name, “Thomas Paine.” Paine did not agree with Pierce’s rebuttal, but chose to distribute it to show both sides of the debate. Pierce’s diatribe was so obviously full of Redflex/ATS inspired nonsense, that a rep from Arizona C4L responded in kind.

Links to email exchange:

AZ C4L email, 2/24/2015 - http://drev.me/azc4lsb1167-0224

Senator Pierce responds 3/1/2015: 

Dear Thomas Paine, 
I generally enjoy your views but this one you are just writing with wrong info. I have, despite some claims, listened to my constituents.   
Actually, I’ve listened to the law. My fellow Senator that sponsored the bill has just been given wrong information.  Here are facts that I’ve found. No one can find a court ruling saying photo radar is unconstitutional. In fact there are rulings to the contrary by both the US Supreme Court and the AZ Supreme Court. 
I asked the AZ Supreme Court if  they had any knowledge of photo radar being unconstitutional, and they told me no, there was not.   
Now, let me respond to a couple of your bullet points below. Bullet point three - all license plates are not scanned.  That is just  not true.  Photos are taken of a license plate only when there is a  violation. Records of those are maintained for court purposes  only. 
Bullet point seven - Again, just factually inaccurate. Yellow light  times are set by cities based on the federal standards.  Those times are  normally longer on roads with a higher speed limit and shorter on roads with a  lower speed limit. Redflex has nothing to do with that and certainly does not demand shorter times.   
The opponents of photo enforcement  continue to ignore the numerous studies which consistently show a reduction of  accidents.  In most cases the reduction numbers are quite  significant. Bullet point eight - I am not sure what this means, but every photo  citation is reviewed independently by a law enforcement officer, signed off  by  that officer and then sent out.  Law enforcement has the final say  on whether a citation is issued or not. Bullet point nine - There is a split among law enforcement.  I am not  sure if you watched the hearing on the bill in the Senate, but there were many  uniformed officers in the room supporting photo enforcement and some who even  testified. 
Regarding the specific constitutional amendments you mention, here are more facts! 4th Amendment - Privacy/Search and Seizure.  Several cases, including the US Supreme Court and Arizona courts have repeatedly held that you have no  right or expectation of privacy while in public in your car. The picture  from a photo radar is nothing more than a typical 35mm-type photograph. 5th Amendment - Due Process.  Opponents argue that they are not   allowed to face their accuser.  Courts disagree.  There is no right to   have an officer issued ticket so that you can argue the issuance with him.   You do have the right to face him in court, which is how photo tickets work as  well. 6th Amendment - Speedy Trial.  There is a right to a speedy trial, but  courts have not said that you have a right to a speedy indictment or charge.   You have no right to receive a ticket at the time of your speeding violation. 14th Amendment - Equal Protection. The Arizona Constitution, Article 2,  Section 13 specifically excludes items of municipal privilege (such as traffic  laws) from the equal protection clause. 
Funding clean elections is totally false.  I have a bill to eliminate it because its wrong to have the public fund  campaigns. Furthermore, Senator Worsley and I both spent well over $250,000 of our own money to get elected because we dont like the way the legislature was running itself and protecting clean elections.  It is just wrong.  Look up SCR 1001 in the Senate!  If you were a local person you would already know this.So, none of us voted against the constitution and believe this letter   should prove it.  Do I like photo radar, no I don’t.  But, it does  reduce red light runners, it does make people slow down, it saves lives and it is  constitutional.  
And, like it or not, the two largest companies in the US  are based in Phoenix and employee over 1200 people.  We as republicans are  always saying we need to encourage business and jobs.  I for one, actually  mean it.  
Furthermore, I am not afraid to actually put my real name on my letters.  I am what I believe and proud of it.  Thank you for listening to me.  If you ever came to meet me you would  find we agree on far more than you believe we do. I trust you can correct your  errors in writing.
Regards,
Steve Pierce

Arizona Campaign for Liberty’s response:

Dear Thomas,

I wrote that email and would like to respond to Senator Pierce’s claims.

Where to begin - you can tell when a politician is lying because their lips are moving. It’s truly a shame that Senator Steve Pierce has flip-flopped on this legislation in 2015. He had voted in favor of the bills to ban all forms of photo ticketing across the state of Arizona, every single time since 2011.  He must now be listening to the camera company lobbyists, which include the new chair person of the Arizona Democratic Party, Alexis Tameron. Alexis lists “Director of Governmental Relations with American Traffic Solutions” as her current occupation

Party affiliation aside, Senator Pierce engages in many half truths or flat out lies in his response. He also does not make a single citation for anything he writes, in typical fashion of our opposition to this legislation.

Apparently Senator Pierce’s Google Query missed the following instances where Photo Ticketing has been ruled or deemed Unconsitutional by a Federal court, state court or county prosecutor’s office where that system was operating:

Arizona (County Attorney’s Office) http://thenewspaper.com/news/26/2698.asp

Florida (U.S. District Court of Appeals) http://www.local10.com/news/red-light-camera-lawsuit-filed-on-behalf-of-fla-drivers/29683812

Missouri (Multiple Courts) http://thenewspaper.com/news/42/4288.asp

Minnesota (State of MN Supreme Court) http://www.thenewspaper.com/news/16/1688.asp

Ohio (8th District Court of Appeals)  - from Cleveland.com

Contrary to Pierce’s assertions, there actually never has been a U.S. Supreme Court decision on photo ticketing. The only source we’ve ever heard using this misinformation before was a PR person directly employed by American Traffic Solutions (ATS). Perhaps he has been coaching Senator Pierce.

Senator Pierce also makes the straw-man argument about “expectation of privacy.” Nowhere, in any of our emails or in the text of this bill, is “expectation of privacy” mentioned, nor is it the reason we are stating that photo ticketing violates the 4th Amendment in the US Bill of Rights. The 4th Amendment violation occurs when every single license plate of the registered vehicle owner of every single vehicle passing by the cameras is scanned by ALPR technology and kept in a data base which is owned by Redflex Traffic Systems. This is an illegal search of extremely sensitive information, which includes the registered owner’s physical address and Social Security Number. Information about their payment history on anything ranging from vehicle insurance to court fines and child support is also data-mined by the cameras. That data is then run through a law enforcement database called NLEDS, to look for matches to their “Person of Interest” program. This info is then also shared with the municipality in which it was obtained. A police officer would have to prove “probable cause” to conduct this kind of search, yet every single vehicle owner, regardless of the speed or position of their car in an intersection during green, yellow or red phase has this illegal search conducted by the cameras. Yes, these cameras are streaming live video 24/7, which is quite repugnant to many privacy advocates, but the debate over the right to privacy in public spaces is not a part of our argument.

Senator Pierce’s objections to the next three Constitutional violations (5th, 6th, 7th Amendments), which occur every time a photo ticket is issued, make little sense. When the contracts between the camera vendor and the cities/towns are signed, the vendor is given authority to ask the registered owners of vehicles cited in violations to forfeit their Constitutional rights. Then, if a vehicle owner chooses to argue the matter before a judge, the only person available for them to cross examine is an employee of that private company (camera vendor). Arguments about the accuracy of the equipment used to detect the violation are not admissible. It’s actually been made impossible to argue photo tickets on Constitutional grounds in Arizona, because the courts have been allowed to lower the burden of proof required to convict down to a “preponderance of the evidence.” This, in layman’s terms, amounts to a “hunch” that the vehicle owner may be guilty. This is despite the numerous instances that the camera vendors have been forced to admit their tickets were sent out in error, such as incidents in ScottsdaleParadise Valley and Mesa. Photo ticketing apologists hope that an innocent vehicle owner doesn’t put up a stink when someone else was driving a vehicle registered to them, and just pays the fine. The owner often feels compelled by the language of the citation to simply pay up to avoid having their license suspended or ultimately get their vehicle seized, based on an alleged violation which did not involve them at all. How does the way these citations are issued and handled by the courts constitute any sort of due process or right to a trial and right to face one’s accuser? Frankly, it doesn’t by any stretch of the imagination.

Photo ticketing certainly violates equal protection, which is the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and also held in the Arizona Constitution. How can laws, yes even civil and criminal traffic codes, be equally enforced when photo tickets have an immediately higher fine amount than police officer issued tickets? How is equal protection present when politicians, judges, commercially registered vehicle owners, married people and those who register their car to a private mail box are all exempted from photo tickets? Tonner Vs. Paradise Valley (1994), which is currently the highest a photo ticket case has ever gone in Arizona courts, upheld that personal service is required for traffic tickets to be valid. Photo tickets are always sent through regular mail and can later be served in person, but not when the name on the vehicle registration doesn’t match the assumed gender of the driver. That determination is made by examining a still frame image captured from the streaming video recorded by the cameras. If the registered vehicle owner’s spouse is driving, the ticket is invalid. Rule 4i in Arizona Civil Procedure allows any ticket to be dismissed by the municipality, whether it’s because of registered owner’s status as a politician, judge or employee of the camera company. Yes, it’s also applied to those who ignore their tickets for 120 days after a complaint is filed with the court for non-responsiveness to the mailed citation. Those who choose to fight their ticket also face higher fine amounts by some courts disguised as “administrative fees.” For Senator Pierce to dismiss violations of equal protection based on an obscure technicality in Arizona’s language makes him an extremely poor defender of the Constitutions of the United States and the Great State of Arizona. His response to Equal Protection sounds remarkably similar to a lobbyist from Redflex or ATS, or that of a slick attorney.

Senator Pierce also claims that the Clean Elections funding is “false.” It’s unclear why he chose to write something so easily disproved when a fixed portion (10%) of every photo ticket paid goes in to that fund and has since 1999. That was 9 years before the Janet Napolitano statewide program launched. That incredibly unpopular scheme was operated by Redflex and Arizona DPS. In the first year of the Redflex-DPS program, photo radar tickets contributed $10,095,771 to the Clean Elections fund. Pierce claims contempt for Clean Elections, but his vote allows the system to be financially propped up. We are not debating whether or not a politician should have the option of Clean Elections to fund their campaign, but we do demonstrate the clear conflict of interest that’s been created by this 10% surcharge on photo tickets since 1999. Even privately-funded politicians like Senators Pierce and Worsley have to face the ire of all the Republicans and Democrats who fund their campaigns with this cash obtained from what amounts to an illegal tax on the motorist in Arizona.

Arizona Campaign for Liberty leadership certainly appreciates the business friendly environment fostered in Arizona and the profitability of technology based companies. However, when technology is used by a business, under authorization of a municipality, to circumvent the US and Arizona Constitution while putting the life, liberty and property of those using the roadways in Arizona in peril, such practices should be put to an immediate halt. It’s legislature’s first duty to protect the Constitution. If these 4 Republicans, who voted against their party platform, had bothered to even look at the dozens of studies that were sent directly to them by our members, showing that the photo ticketing technology puts drivers at risk and increases accidents, they’d probably have told the camera company lobbyists to shove off. [LINK TO STUDIES]

It’s quite disappointing to see Senator Steve Pierce, a past supporter of legislation to rid Arizona of the scourge that is the photo ticketing scam, vote No on the same legislation in 2015. To see him parrot the photo ticketing industry and its paid apologists is even more disheartening. We certainly hope he takes this correction to his response seriously, because both times Arizonans have had the opportunity to vote on photo ticketing, they’ve clobbered it at the ballot box.

1991: 69% against in Peoria http://www.thenewspaper.com/news/26/2669.asp

2014: 72% in Sierra Vista http://www.autoblog.com/2014/11/05/voters-overwhelmingly-reject-traffic-cameras-election-day/

20+ years separated these votes, and people dislike the cameras even more now. Let’s hope all the legislators who voted against SB 1167 come to their senses if given the chance to vote on it again. Of course, that depends on whether the bill champion, Senator Kelli Ward is able to bring it back to the floor for another try this year. 2015 has proven that photo ticketing is still very unpopular in Arizona among motorists and law enforcement alike. Many Arizonans, including the 140,000+  registered voters who signed the statewide initiative to ban photo ticketing, are hoping that this bill is not finished.

Please refer to the original email [link] on this subject for reference to Senator Steve Pierce’s rebuttal and contact information for the 4 who voted against SB 1167 on the Arizona Senate Floor on February 23rd, 2015.

Thank you for taking the time to consider the facts, not the PR spin of the camera companies and their lobbies.

Ross Trumble

Arizona Campaign for Liberty

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