Chicago DUI lawyer comments on city workers getting out of city camera tickets

This Chicago DUI lawyer has posted here and here about traffic cameras. Unfortunately, today’s news probably belongs in the “no surprise there” category.

April 8, Chicago, IL

Chicago's Big Brother network of red-light cameras has turned into a money machine for the city, generating $58 million in annual revenue in 2009.

The same cannot be said for city employees caught by the cameras in the act of running red lights. Nearly 70 percent of their tickets get dismissed.

Since January 2007, 2,685 red-light-camera tickets have been issued to vehicles registered to city departments. At $100 a pop, that should have generated $268,500. Instead, only $77,167 has been collected.

A whopping 1,830 of those tickets were dismissed for reasons that include the municipal code exemption for emergency vehicles. Not all of those vehicles were responding to emergencies with lights flashing and sirens blaring. Some police vehicles were working undercover. Some were vehicles assigned to city departments not typically considered emergency departments.

Of those tickets, 689 have been paid by city employees who apparently had no valid defense. Another 77 tickets remain unpaid. Some are eligible for administrative hearings and could be overturned by city hearing officers.

Am I the only one reading this that can’t help but hear George Orwell’s “Four legs good, two legs better”?