Miami-Dade county commissioners on Tuesday will hear another litany of sob stories
from the mayor’s office about why the county can’t go out to bid again on red light cameras.
And Commissioner Sally Heyman is tired of the excuses.
“I’m not happy about it,” Heyman said of a status report that basically doesn’t move the ball forward at all and, instead, recommends that the county not implement any red light cameras, despite the commission’s directive to do so.
It’s like the county staff, under the mayor’s likely direction, is saying they know better than the elected officials.
“We voted on this three times,” said an exasperated Heyman.
The last time the commission voted to put the red light cameras out to bid was in June, after a committee threw out the five bids the county received in May. Lawyers said then that too much time had elapsed since the request for bids was issued and that state law governing the ticketing process with red light cameras had changed. Commissioners, frustrated with what some saw as an attempt to usurp their power, on June 2 directed the mayor’s office to go back out to bid or come back with a report in 60 days on why they could not re-solicit.
Sixty days. That would have been somewhere around the beginning of September.
Read related story: Pinecrest to install red light cameras on U.S. 1
Instead, commissioners got a memo this week from Deputy Mayor Russell Benford, who the mayor put in charge of the item after he recused himself (in an abundance of caution because his son once represented the firm as a lobbyist), telling them that it is basically undoable.
“Based on changes in the legislation pertaining to the manner in which citations may be reviewed and issued, the burden of responsibilities and costs have now shifted to the county,” Benford wrote. “As such, the services to be provided will change, requiring a thorough review of the operational and fiscal impact for the establishment and management of the program.”
He said it would take a staff of 25 police personnel and a budget of $3 million to initiate a program with 150 cameras. The ongoing annual expense is estimated at $2.6 million.
Final recommendation: “Pending judicial rulings that may further alter red light camera programs and legislation that may eliminate red light camera programs, it is recommended that the county not implement the red light camera program.”
But Heyman isn’t buying it. She said that the changes in the laws do not affect the M
iami-Dade program because it had always been based on law enforcement review. She seriously questions the estimate budget — particularly $275,000 earmarked for vehicles, which are likely to transport personnel to and from court appearances. And she wonders why the report doesn’t take into account projected savings from fewer accident investigations and how cities like Pinecrest are able to make it happen.
She said the court case references are irrelevant to Miami-Dade. “I know what I’m doing. If I didn’t think it was possible, I wouldn’t have done it the first time,” Heyman said.
“I painstakingly worked this in the sunshine, in the open with public hearings,” Heyman said. The original item, the first one voted on, was so long ago it was co-sponsored by then Chairman Joe Martinez.
“I’ve been trying to get this done for three years. In June, we voted for the third time and told him to do what we told him to do on two other occasions,” she said of the mayor. Because while he has recused himself, everyone widely believes Benford speaks for him. After all, he has said he didn’t want the cameras and now he is getting what he wants.
Read related story: Sally Heyman spanks Mayor Gimenez on red light cameras
Heyman publicly spanked the mayor about this in May and it is likely he will get an earful Tuesday. She point blank said that the mayor simply doesn’t want the cameras, perhaps because it would hurt his re-election, and blamed him for the staff direction.
“He never wanted to do it. He’s found a million reasons not to do it. He should just man up and admit this,” Heyman told Ladra.
“But that’s not how our government works. It’s not about the red light cameras any more. It’s about the disrespect to this commission. The majority of the commission on three occasions directed him to move forward. It is not his option to do something else.”
But that’s exactly what his office is going to suggest on Tuesday — three months late.
Because the red light cameras don’t resonate with millennial voters like Uber does.
Stalling on red light cameras drives Sally Heyman mad added by Ladra on
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