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Home=20 / Auto=20 Insurance / Explained= =20 / Auto Speeding Ticket Laws =

The town that lived off speeding tickets

By Karen Aho

Posted : 10/19/2011

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3D"speedingRandolph, Mo., is a tiny town with a common problem: money = is=20 tight.

[Compare=20 car insurance quotes now.]

To keep afloat, the Kansas City outpost apparently did what many = little towns=20 on big highways do. It came to rely on passing motorists filling its = municipal=20 coffers one traffic ticket at a time.

The problem came last year when, 15 years after Missouri passed a law = capping=20 certain ticket collections at 35 percent of a town's revenue, the state = decided=20 to actually enforce the law.

It's unclear why state auditors suddenly opened the town's books, but = upon=20 doing so they discovered that Randolph--population 47--had collected = more than=20 three-quarters of its $270,000 budget the year before from traffic fines = issued=20 on state and federal roads. By law, money that exceeds the 35 percent = limit must=20 be turned over to county schools.

Car insurance rates spike for speeders

An even greater chunk of change doesn't go toward any public = good--city or=20 otherwise. That's the hundreds of thousands of dollars those motorists = will=20 collectively pay to auto=20 insurance companies, which almost always raise premiums for ticketed = drivers.

A driver with one speeding ticket might pay an additional 20 percent = or more=20 for the three to six years the ticket remains on his record, an analysis = by=20 Insurance.com found. Multiple tickets could add thousands of dollars to = a=20 driver's insurance charges. (For more, see "The=20 $5,000 speeding ticket.")

With towns across the country grasping for funding in recent years, = and with=20 the situation only expected to worsen, drivers may want to proceed = through all=20 'burbs with extreme caution. Individual officers may concentrate on = public=20 safety, but the data show that departments tend to increase the number = of=20 tickets issued during hard times.

Welcome to town, have a ticket

One analysis even calculated an average = dollar-to-destitutioncorrelation. A=20 2006 study by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis ("Are = traffic=20 tickets countercyclical?") found that towns increased the number of = tickets=20 issued by an average of 0.4 percent for every 1 percent decline in other = revenue.

Concerned drivers can, however, take heart in a smattering of laws = intended=20 to prevent towns from treating traffic tickets as a revenue stream.

At least three states now limit the amount of income a town can = collect from=20 traffic tickets, according to the National Conference of State = Legislatures.=20 Arkansas and Missouri cap the overall percentage of a town's budget = gleaned from=20 state and federal highways at 30 percent and 35 percent, respectively. = New York=20 state prohibits a town's ticket revenue from exceeding the equivalent of = $5 per=20 resident, with any excess going to the state's general fund.

Other states appear to be joining the mix. Oklahoma can strip the = ticketing=20 powers on state and federal highways from a town that has generated more = than 50=20 percent of its revenue from traffic fines. Vermont and Louisiana are = among other=20 states that have introduced similar legislation.

No more ticket money for you

Texas has capped ticket revenue since 1975. During a 1989 revision, = the=20 Patton Village police chief became so outraged at the bad press his town = received--Patton Village was essentially funding itself through Highway = 50=20 speeders--that he went on a hunger strike, limiting himself to "coffee, = water=20 and an occasional beer," the Dallas Morning News reported at the = time.

At least Patton Village did not go bankrupt as a result, a fate that = befell=20 tiny Macks Creek, Mo., after that state's law was put into effect in = 1995. The=20 town, nearly 85 percent funded by passing motorists, had issued a ticket = to the=20 wrong driver--one with the right connections. That driver was a state=20 legislator, and he promptly went home and drafted what is now known as = Macks=20 Creek Law, the legislation that caps the percentage of a town's budget = gleaned=20 from state and federal highways at 35 percent.

These days, several other states try to discourage any abuse of = police powers=20 by essentially minding the treasure chest. Certain traffic = tickets--typically=20 including speeding violations on highways--are automatically processed = by the=20 state, which then returns a set amount to the issuing town.

In California, for example, towns keep about 20 percent of the = driver's fine=20 for speeding. In Connecticut, towns get just $10 a ticket. The state of=20 Massachusetts keeps about half of the portion of the fine that exceeds = $50.

"It seems to work," says Robert Katims, a lawyer with Hoff Curtis, in = Burlington, Vt. "There is no incentive for people to set up speed traps = because=20 they don't keep the money. The money goes to the state."

But beware the holes in any system. The National Motorists Association, a = drivers'=20 rights group, cautions that because some tickets don't get routed = through the=20 state, an officer merely has to rephrase the violation a bit.

The full fine then goes directly to the city or town and the baffled = driver,=20 initially pulled over for speeding, heads home with a citation for, say, = inattentive driving.

"Some city administrators game the system by having their police = write=20 tickets for local ordinance violations rather than for speeding, in = order to=20 avoid mandatory reporting to the state," says Gary Biller, motorist = association=20 spokesperson.

 

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