Lawmakers make U-turn on traffic-camera issue

By Lynda Arakawa
Advertiser Capitol Bureau

Four years after the Legislature gave its near-unanimous approval to traffic cameras, a sizeable number of lawmakers now want to scrap or modify the program.

The movement appears strongest in the Senate, where a majority of the 25 members support bills that would repeal at least the speed-enforcement half of the program. Catching red-light runners is the other half of the program's mission.

Although it is unclear whether there is enough support to repeal the measure in the House, it's evident the Legislature believes the program is rife with problems.

Some lawmakers and staff say they have received more calls and e-mails about the speed enforcement photo system than any other issue this session. Nearly all of them are from people opposing the system.

"This is getting more attention than the budget," said Rep. Ken Hiraki, who headed the House Transportation Committee when the program was approved. "It's certainly taken on a life of its own."

Hiraki, who is now co-sponsoring a bill to repeal the traffic enforcement photo system, said the traffic camera bill was very popular in the Legislature in 1998, largely because of news reports of traffic accidents and fatalities. Only two legislators, former Sen. Whitney Anderson and Sen. Sam Slom, R-8th (Wai'alae Iki, Hawai'i Kai), voted against the 1998 bill.

In 2000, only Slom and Reps. Barbara Marumoto, R-17th (Kahala, Wai'alae Iki), and Jim Rath, R-6th (N. Kona, S. Kohala), voted against a bill to extend the length of the pilot program; six other lawmakers did not take part in the vote.

But several legislators said the state Department of Transportation's implementation of the program is flawed.

	Traffic cam bills
	Some of the bills introduced at the Legislature regarding the traffic photo program would:
•	Scrap the program entirely, including red-light enforcement.
•	Repeal the part that enforces speeding laws.
•	Bar increases in auto insurance premiums for citations issued by a photo enforcement system where no accident is involved.
•	Let drivers exceed current speed limits by up to 10 mph.
•	Prohibit traffic-cam violations from being treated as moving violations.
•	Prevent speeding tickets issued by the photo system from appearing on a person's driving record, unless he or she drove at least 25 mph faster than the speed limit.

"So my impression was that it was going to go after those people," said Hiraki, D-25th (Downtown, Ala Moana). "It wasn't meant for the person next door that just speeds like five miles over the speed limit. So when DOT said zero tolerance, that made your neighbor a lawbreaker, and that was not the intent."

Meanwhile, Senate Minority Policy Leader Bob Hogue, R-24th (Kane'ohe, Kailua), on Friday circulated a petition asking the Department of Transportation to remove photo speed enforcement vans from the H-1, H-2 and H-3 freeways, the Pali Highway and other major commuter highways and instead place them in school zones and roadways that have high accident rates. The petition also asks the department not to expand the program until lawmakers review the law.

Hogue collected signatures from a majority of lawmakers in the House and Senate within two hours.

"There's an enormous amount of people who want action now," Hogue said. "We want them (transportation officials) to listen to the public."

Perhaps the staunchest supporter of the program in the Legislature is Senate Transportation, Military Affairs and Government Operations Committee Chairman Cal Kawamoto, D-19th (Waipahu, Pearl City), who has maintained he will not hold public hearings on bills to repeal or alter the program despite "big time" pressure from his colleagues. Instead, Kawamoto plans to introduce a resolution that would ask the Department of Transportation to re-evaluate speed limits and vendor compensation as well as the placement of the speed enforcement cameras.

"It's working," he said. "We have reduced the speeders from 30 percent to 5 percent, and with the photo red light, people start braking on yellow now and the cameras are not up yet."

But Kawamoto's power as a key gatekeeper of such bills may evaporate. A majority of senators on his committee support repealing the speed enforcement portion of the pilot program, which means they can force him to hold a hearing. There are also more than enough senators to pull such bills out of Kawamoto's committee and refer them to another committee or hold a floor vote.

"I'll look at the bills, but if it jeopardizes the program, then they will have to go through the process of pulling it out of my committee," Kawamoto said. While sitting at his desk, he shook his head as he flipped through pages of previous House and Senate committee reports that show votes approving the program. "What are they talking about, they didn't know?" he said. "It's very disappointing."

But Senate Judiciary Chairman Brian Kanno, who is also introducing a bill to eliminate the speed enforcement portion of the traffic camera program and another to amend it, said when the bill was passed it wasn't made clear the private vendor operating the program would share the revenue generated from citations. He and other lawmakers expressed a concern that such an arrangement gives the vendor a financial incentive to issue more tickets.

Kanno, D-20th ('Ewa Beach, Makakilo, Kapolei), also said lawmakers have a duty to listen to their constituents.

"As lawmakers I think one of our responsibilities is representing the public, and in terms of the kinds of calls we've been getting it's been overwhelmingly against the system," said Kanno. "I support controlling the speeding that's being done on the roadways, but I think we've got to do it in a way that the broader community can support and feel good about and feel that it is accurate and fair."

You can reach Lynda Arakawa at larakawa@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8070.