Seeing red in Senate's camera games

Democratic Senate President John Cullerton has turned fixing red-light-camera laws into a shameful game of public humiliation and private policymaking.

We call upon the Illinois House to focus intently on improving safety, in public, and without the Senate's demeaning gamesmanship.

Cullerton and the Senate Democratic majority likely will pass legislation that would ban an extra fine if tickets are appealed. It would prevent ticketing of those who stop beyond the white line before turning. His plan also allows for video review by motorists, but all of those things already are happening. The Senate plan still allows for ticketing drivers who make rolling right turns, something that generates 90 percent of the camera income. Experts say rolling rights are far less dangerous than forward, red-light violations. Cullerton's legislation does nothing to fix the most significant finding of a Daily Herald investigation into the cameras: that many are up at locations with no history of related crashes.

House legislators should approve a bill that requires a history of red-light-related crashes before a camera is approved for an intersection by one state agency. That same agency also should be required to keep a searchable, public database so repeat offenders can be tracked. Requiring proof of a history of red-light-related crashes before cameras go up will address the widespread concern that they are more about generating revenue than improving safety.

Cullerton, meanwhile, should be ashamed of the tactics and process he used. His staff submitted a Freedom of Information request to secure video he played and replayed of state Sen. Dan Duffy, a Lake Barrington Republican who has called for repealing the cameras, driving through a right-hand turn without stopping as he should. Duffy should be ashamed as he misled us about his actions and how many tickets he had.

But having used FOIA to get the video to embarrass Duffy publicly, Cullerton also hosted a closed-door meeting on the public policy. In the meeting were camera critics, camera supporters and camera company lobbyists. How much sway did the lobbyists with a clear profit motive have on the compromise? We don't know because the public wasn't included. This is outrageous, especially coming on the heels of the outcry over the closed Senate session Cullerton convened to hear about the state budget crises a few weeks ago.

State Sen. Martin Sandoval, the Cicero Democrat who chairs the subcommittee that targeted Duffy, said Duffy just didn't line up enough votes to ban the cameras. "I've always said you can have the cure for cancer under this dome," he said, "but if you don't have enough votes, you're not going to cure cancer."

Isn't that rich? Perhaps we should be lauding our public servants in Springfield. Perhaps they cured cancer decades ago, but they did it in private and never told anyone because a member of the minority party found the solution.

Or, perhaps we need to keep working on a cure for what ails the Senate Democrats.