How local governments view your car
You may have figured out that I think many cities use traffic enforcement as a random tax on its citizenry. If you disagree with that, you aren’t paying attention.
Folks in Knoxville, TN noticed that traffic enforcement has gone up with the city’s budget woes. In a blog posting about it I found this sage advice:
"Can citizens fight back?"
YES!: If EVERYONE who gets a ticket contests it in court, the judicial system simply can’t handle the volume. Right now, only a tiny fraction of citations are contested, even if that tiny fraction merely doubled (a small increase overall) the system would grind to a halt.
Always contest a ticket. (1) you take the chance that the officer won’t show and you win by default (2) You deny them any profit: because even if you go in and plead ‘no contest’ and ask for a reduced fine you eat the judges time, the officers time, the bailiffs time, the court recorders time, etc…
Fight the ticket = deny them the profit.
I agree. I haven’t had a ticket in 20 years, but if everybody fights back together we can beat this scourge.
My brother is a cop. I’m friends with a number of cops. Most claim “ah that traffic stuff is penty anty, I don’t do that”. But I’m old enough that most that I know are high ranking or senior and have their pick of jobs – and they aren’t on patrol anymore. They don’t do it, but their departments almost certainly are.
St. George’s department used to post traffic stop statistics. But then I brought to their attention, and the local newspaper’s attention, that the statistics did not vary with population in our seasons… implying a quota system was in effect.
Now they don’t publish it anymore.
They just want the money – safety has little to nothing to do with it.
March 10th, 2010 at 3:36 pm
Rebel without a cause? Never had a ticket but shouting “foul” on behalf of whom or what? Justice? How about some info on the time and energy lost from useful activity to challenge a traffic ticket in a court where you cannot be sure of the time your case will be called? To gain what? I presume that every case was an actual infraction and that most infractions happen outside police sight anyway.
Some things in life are just to be endured.
March 10th, 2010 at 3:38 pm
So I should only care what happens to me? I’ve been in my wife’s car when she became the mobile ATM.
What I want is for police to work on crime, not fund raising.
March 10th, 2010 at 3:52 pm
The effort used to meet ticket quotas takes away from the patrolling that would prevent theft like the one that happened to us in the middle of the night when our truck was hot-wired and driven off with two ATVs towed behind. That same evening had several reported car thefts. That was much more expensive than than a ticket.
March 10th, 2010 at 7:48 pm
What quotas? That’s as old as the cops and donuts nonsense. You think there was a traffic cop out at 200am writing expired registration tickets the night your stuff got stolen? Please. Not a chance. And if the bad guy who stole your truck committed a vehicle code violation, I suppose you want the cop to ignore that, and thus not recover your property and make an arrest? But in Ken’s world, the truck wouldn’t have plates or registration, so no way for the cop to know its stolen.
I guess you want your cake and eat it too.
Pops is right that all the cases in court were actual infractions witnessed by an officer, chickens— or not, and that everyone who got a ticket probably got away with it a thound other times, or more.
March 10th, 2010 at 10:09 pm
You miss the point. Instead of writing tickets at 4PM, he could have been out at 2AM stopping thiefs.
Look – stats don’t lie. Our traffic stops remained level with population decline.
I’m not saying “rules” aren’t broken, just that they are randomly enforced for monetary not safety reasons.
March 10th, 2010 at 11:31 pm
If he is out there at 200am who will take the burglarly report at 4pm? We do 24/7.
I didn’t miss the point- I think you don’t understand how the police thing really works.on the chicken—- tickets we agree. I have verbally chastised other cops for that stuff.
May 4th, 2010 at 10:16 am
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