News Features

Umatilla Considering Automated Ticketing Cameras

    The City of Umatilla is considering joining other county municipalities in ticketing speeders via electronic surveillance. During a meeting of the Umatilla City Council on April 7, council members agreed to let the firm Ultimate undertake a free traffic study in town to measure the need for the system.
   Ultimate is one of several companies providing electronic traffic surveillance under a recently created state law that allows for electronic devices in school zones to track speeders. Those going ten or more miles per hour over the posted speed limit in those zones, whether school is in or not, are mailed $100 tickets.
   “It’s about changing driver habits,” said Umatilla Police Chief David Seeley this week. Seeley forwarded the proposal to the council based on a city goal of increasing safety.
   “Aaron (city manager Aaron Mercer) wants the city to be safe,” Seeley said.
   A study was to be conducted this week to measure the amount of speeding through selected areas of the city, but Seeley said he thinks the area along SR 19 and Bulldog Lane would likely be the most logical place to install the system, though any school zone in the city could be included.
   “This would help,” Seeley said, “because officers can’t be everywhere.”
   The proposal gained modest support with the council, though Mayor Chris Creech voiced reservation. Creech said he was given a ticket through an Ultimate system in Eustis that he felt was improperly issued.
   Tickets are issued to people registered to owners of vehicles based on license plate readings.
   Tickets given through the system can be hard to fight, given the fact that no human is involved in the surveillance process. A representative from Ultimate at the meeting did say, however, that there are provisions for a person to shift responsibility for tickets should a car they own get ticketed while someone else was driving.
   Of the $100 fines, $60 would go to the city, of which an unstated portion would be peeled off for Ultimate. $12 would go to the school district, $5 to a school crossing guard program, $20 to the Florida Department of Revenue, and $3 to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.
   A timetable for approval or denial of the program has not been set by the city.