Speed camera ban bill zooms through state house

A bill introduced by a Macon Statehouse representative to ban school zone speed detection cameras in Georgia passed the House and will be taken up in the Senate.

Rep. Dale Washburn, R-Macon, said he was “honestly delighted” to get House Bill 225 passed 129-37.

“I’m planning to work very hard on the senate side,” Washburn told The Melody after the March 4 vote.

The bill would reverse a 2018 law permitting local governments to use automated school zone speed cameras. 

The enabling law “was well intentioned,” Washburn said at the lectern under the Gold Dome, but “has not improved public safety and instead has become a highly profitable revenue stream for private corporations and local governments.

“It is often seen as very unfair ticketing that preys on, sometimes, the least able in our society to pay these fines.”

After Washburn presented the bill, Rep. Floyd Griffin, D-Milledgeville, who represents a portion of Bibb County, expressed his support for it because “we don’t know where the money is going to.”

Bibb County installed its first speed cameras in 2022. Since then, it has expanded them to 20 school zones and — as of last September — raked in more than $5.7 million in revenue from citations. Cameras also are installed at charter and private schools.

Altumint, now Optotraffic, the Maryland-based company that owns the speed cameras, gets $25 for every citation paid, per its contract with Macon-Bibb County. Washburn said the company has netted at least $1 million from its arrangement with Macon-Bibb County. 

The county’s revenue goes to a fund dedicated for public safety purposes, which can include a broad category of expenses. 

So far, the county has spent nearly $3.6 million of the revenue on items including radios, tasers, drones, surveillance cameras, school crossing guards, fire department equipment and Macon Violence Prevention grants. 

“I am absolutely opposed to these school zone speed cameras,” Washburn told The Melody. “I know they are raking in millions of dollars and they are unfair. I think they’re designed to rake in money. It is not about school safety.”

All but one member of Macon’s house delegation voted to approve Washburn’s bill: Rep. Miriam Paris, D-Macon, who voted nay.

Paris did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Now that the bill has cleared the house, senators will take it up and add their own amendments before voting on it. If it passes the Senate, it goes back to the House, which will review the Senate’s changes. If the House agrees to the Senate’s changes, the bill goes to the governor’s desk to be signed into law. 

If the House disagrees with the Senate’s changes but the Senate insists on the changes, then a committee is formed to try and work things out. The committee submits a report back to the House and Senate. If both agree with the committee report, the bill heads to the governor’s desk.