Since states began locking down in mid-March, unemployment has skyrocketed, businesses have shuttered their doors, and these uncertain times have grown more worrisome by the day. There is one industry that is hurting, however, that shouldn’t bother many of us and that is the Red Light Camera industry.
Anyone whose been self-quarantining over the last few weeks likely knows that their trips to the gas station have been minimal simply because they are driving less. When people drive less, predatory and unconstitutional Red Light Camera companies like Redflex — who stalk unwitting drivers on the roads — make less money. This is a good thing.
As Business Insider points out, fewer drivers on the road is good for everyone: air pollution is falling, crashes are down, and there’s no blood-pressure inducing congestion.
But one industry in particular is feeling the pain in their bottom line. According to the report:
Redflex, an Australian company that operates “traffic safety programs” in roughly 100 US and Canadian cities, warned that less traffic and suspended construction amid the pandemic will be a stress on its balance sheet.
“Approximately 15% of group revenue is dependent on volume-based contracts,” the company said in a regulatory filing Monday first spotted by The Wall Street Journal, hinting at its business line that includes enforcement cameras. “We anticipate our revenue from these contracts will be impacted broadly in line with the reduction in traffic volumes as well as the duration of the disruption.”
Can I get a “Woooohoooo!!!”?
Shares of the unconstitutional predatory company’s stock have been in free fall since the beginning of the year, toppling near 50%. The company’s CEO, Mark Talbot told investors that travel restrictions are hurting plans for future installations and therefore impact the ability of the company to profit off due process-removing red light camera tickets.
“So far, there have been no terminations to contracts,” he said, according to a transcript compiled by Sentieo. “We are, of course, undertaking cost initiatives where possible to mitigate the impact of reductions or risk of delay. In addition, the Board and executive team will be taking a reduction in compensation effective April 1 for the duration of the disruption.”
For those who don’t recall, Talbot’s predecessor, Karen Finley was sent to prison in 2016 after being found guilty of bribing politicians to implement her due process-removing red light cameras.
After her sentencing, Finley described the company perfectly when attempting to deflect blame for her bribery scandal. “Redflex was a toxic and soul-sucking place to work. I worked over ten hours a day, almost every weekend and never saw my family,” she said — completely ignoring the fact that her job as the CEO was probably the largest contributing factor to the ‘soul-sucking place.’
However, the problem goes much deeper than Redflex, it is industry wide.
Take away the political corruption, bribery scandals, increased accidents, and police state issues with Red Light Cameras and we are still left with a system that is rooted in the removal of due process. The good news is that after the corporatist red light camera industry spread through the nation like a cancer for more than a decade, people are finally beginning to realize their inherently despotic nature.
As a result, people have been fighting back.
As the Newspaper reported, a group of three lawyers had filed suit in 2013, arguing that New Miami, Ohio’s automated ticketing ordinance gave vehicle owners no realistic opportunity to defend themselves against the demand for a payment of up to $180 that arrived in the mail. Optotraffic, a private vendor, sent the tickets to motorists passing through the less-than-one-square-mile town on US 127, a major highway that links Cincinnati with points north.
During that period of Optotraffic extortion, the city robbed drivers of $3,066,523.00. After Butler County Court of Common Pleas Judge Michael A. Oster Jr.’s ruling, the city was forced to pay back all of it in 2017.
On top of the unconstitutional nature of Red Light Cameras is the safety factor. These companies and the corrupt and greedy politicians who accept them know that they are about revenue generation — not safety — as these cameras increase the likelihood of an accident or death.
In February, TFTP talked to Stephen Ruth, aka, Red Light Robin Hood, who risked his very freedom to expose this madness..
Ruth was arrested and was facing years in prison for exposing the deaths of several people, including children who were killed as a result of these shortened yellow lights, through disabling the cameras.
In May 2015, sixteen-year-old John Luke was killed crossing the street when an SUV hit him. Less than a year later, a 64-year-old legally blind man named Warren Karstendick was killed in a hit-and-run when an SUV struck him. After visiting the scenes of their deaths and several others, Ruth concluded that these innocent pedestrians were losing their lives due to cars speeding up to avoid red light tickets.
Although the New York City’s Department of Transportation claims that all of its traffic signals provide a minimum of three seconds per yellow light, the AAA of New York released a 2012 report that found every tested traffic camera had a yellow light shorter than three seconds. Despite the fact that governments claim red light cameras are solely used to prevent accidents while modifying driver behavior, the revenue generated from traffic cameras can grow exponentially if yellow lights are shortened. As a result of the government’s greed for red light revenue, the safety of the driver took second priority.
While the Free Thought Project would never celebrate the decline of a legitimate business, the corporatism-rife red light camera industry is anything but legitimate. During at time when Americans are having to choose between paying rent and eating, the fact that a corrupt and unconstitutional company like Redflex is unable to financially prey on them is comforting.
