"Republicans in Washington are harnessing the gripes of speeding suburban drivers across the nation with a new proposal to defund the 26-year-old traffic enforcement camera program in the nation's capital and override the city's law banning right turns on red. Hollowing months of tough-talk from Trump about the city's alleged state of disorder, House Republicans included the proposals in their Financial Services and General Government Committee budget released last week,"
"amid President Trump's "takeover" of the D.C. police and deployment of National Guard troops to patrol the city, Speed, red light, stop sign, school bus stop-arm and bus priority enforcement cameras have been a longtime bugaboo of the House GOP, whose members pushed a similar provision in 2023 that failed to become law. Trump's latest intervention in the city's self-governance in the name of public safety breathed new life into the effort, say Washingtonians."
"Yet the cameras remain controversial in the D.C. area despite those numbers - as in other cities, study found cameras and violations to be concentrated in majority Black and low-income neighborhoods. This year the city began offering lower income drivers a discount on the $100 speed camera fine."
House Republicans inserted proposals to defund the District's 26-year-old traffic-enforcement camera program and to override the city's ban on right turns on red into a committee budget. The measures gained momentum alongside President Trump's heightened rhetoric about disorder and federal deployments in the city. Speed, red light, stop sign, school bus stop-arm and bus priority enforcement cameras have long been targeted by the House GOP, including a failed 2023 effort. A 2014 District report found injuries and crashes fell in the three years after new cameras, but controversies persist because violations concentrate in majority-Black and low-income neighborhoods; the city now offers reduced fines for lower-income drivers.
Read at Streetsblog
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