Your Life For The Almighty Dollar

Have you heard?  The Red Light Cameras are working TOO well.  The cameras were meant to stop people from running red light.  Well, now it seems that drivers are taking heed of those cameras as drive more carefully and don't run red lights.  That is what was told to the public by the Fat Cat Politicians who were promoting the traffic light cameras as others who were concerned about the abuse of those cameras opposed their use.

According to MSNBC (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23710970/), drivers are so careful now that the municipalities are not getting enough money from fines from tickets given to drivers for running those red lights.  But a federal study found a small but measurable reduction in injuries nationwide in accidents at intersections monitored by cameras.  You would think that this would be fantastic news for the municipal officials because their intersections are now safer and the potential for people to get hurt decreases.  Nope.  They find other studies that show the cameras are not as beneficial for safety as previously thought.  But the truth be known it is a case of money.  With less money collected from tickets the cash cow, the one they said didn't exist nor was the purpose of the cameras for collecting money.  So, what are they going to do?  They are going to shut down the cameras...again citing safety concerns, but the real truth is that they can no longer fleece any money from drivers. 

City officials in Charlotte and Fayetteville, N.C., recently turned off all of their red light cameras, concluding that a state law diverting much of the revenue they generate in fines to schools meant their general funds were actually losing money and in Bolingbrook, Ill., officials ended their red light camera program after statistics showed a 40 percent drop in ticketable offenses.

So, the Fat Cat municipal officials could care less if you live or die...just leave them your money.  That's ALL they care about. Because as long as they could get money out of you, they fought tooth and nail to get to put up the cameras.  Now that they're not able to get your money, they are shutting them down.  When they wanted them up they cited safety issues, now that they want to shut them down they are citing safety issues.  The fact is that they fought for the cameras when they thought they were a cash cow....and now that they aren't, they don't care for them.