Free Republic

The economy is in the toilet. So do yourself a favor and ease up on the accelerator. That's the indirect message of a recent study by two economists, who found that when government revenues dry up, police write more speeding tickets. After analyzing 14 years of data in North Carolina, the pair found that for every 1 percent drop in government revenue, the number of traffic tickets issued per capita increases by 30 percent the following year. “It's significant,” said University of Arkansas-Little Rock economics professor Gary Wagner, who co-authored Red Ink in the Rearview Mirror: Local Fiscal Conditions and...

Billions of dollars collected from motorists from gasoline taxes, tolls, and registration fees are being diverted by state and local governments into uses that have nothing to do with roads and highways. According to the latest figures from the Federal Highway Administration, motorists gave state and local government $40.3 billion in 2005 for the ability to drive and own a vehicle. Gasoline taxes accounted for $20.5 billion in revenue while registration fees and miscellaneous taxes generated $13.5 billion. State and local toll roads also collected $6.4 billion from motorists. After accounting for administration and overhead, $28.5 billion remained for all...

Bailed out Citigroup fund spends $10 billion buying 44 foreign toll roads. Just one week after receiving a pledge of $306 billion in support from US taxpayers, Citigroup announced the intended $10 billion acquisition of a debt-laden Spanish toll road group. Citi Infrastructure Partners will hand over $3.6 billion in cash and assume $6.3 billion in debt from Sacyr Vallehermoso, the parent company of the Intinere Infraestructuras toll road group. Itinere operates 32 toll roads in Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, Portugal and Spain and Ireland. Another twelve concessions are under construction. Sacyr today issued a statement to Spanish investors noting...

Commission approves financing plan for toll lanes on Highway 101, other Bay Area freeways A Bay Area transportation commission took a step today toward creating an 800-mile network of toll lanes on parts of Highway 101 and other local freeways for car pools and drivers who pay a toll. The Metropolitan Transportation Commission approved a 25-year financing plan that allocates $6.1 billion for the lanes. Transportation planners say the money for the project will come from the tolls collected from motorists who use the lanes. The commission also approved a set of principles for developing the network. The profits from...

800 miles of toll lanes on Highway 101, other Bay Area freeways proposed A Bay Area transportation commission is proposing the creation of a $3.7 billion, 800-mile-long network of mixed-use carpool and toll lanes on more than 12 freeways in a big new attempt to ease chronic traffic congestion. Called High Occupancy Toll or HOT lanes because they are free to car poolers in rush hour and open to other vehicles for a toll, the network of express lanes would be developed over the next 25 years by a group county, regional and state transportation agencies. The lanes would be...

I can't help but notice that the NYS Police, the Sheriff's, and the local town and city cops no longer walk the beat or do much "protecting" They are trained now to make their primary priority issuing minor tickets that have big fines. Offense: Cell phone use = $150 bucks They also are trained to scan your auto inspection sticker, one day out of inspection and you may pay $200. Speed traps, you name it, Police are now a profit center first and foremost, more reason for people who want to prtect themselves to purchase the guns of their choice.

55 mph is So 70s: Voters Oppose Lowering National Speed Limit Monday, July 07, 2008 A proposal to conserve energy by reducing the nationwide speed limit to 55 miles-per-hour is strongly opposed by the nation’s voters. Voters continue to prefer solutions that lead to finding more energy rather than relying upon conservation efforts. Majorities support both drilling for oil in both offshore wells and in the Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that 59% of voters oppose the lower speed limit and 34% support it. Democrats are fairly evenly divided on the proposal with...

WASHINGTON (AFP) - Some cash-strapped US municipalities are resorting to slapping fuel surcharges onto tickets issued to speeding drivers in order to fill dwindling city coffers hit hard by skyrocketing gas prices. Beginning July 1, the Georgia town of Holly Springs, near the city of Atlanta, will add a surcharge of 12 dollars for each moving violation as a means to avert a budget deficit brought on by high fuel prices. "It's a creative and innovative idea of our police chief," said Holly CothranDrake, spokeswoman of the city administration which on Wednesday received queries from several American municipalities that are...

Among the thousands of drivers who have been issued $40 fines after being nabbed by Montgomery County's new speed cameras are scores of county police officers. The difference is, many of the officers are refusing to pay. The officers are following the advice of their union, which says the citations are issued not to the driver but to the vehicle's owner -- in this case, the county. That view has rankled Police Chief J. Thomas Manger and County Council Member Phil Andrews (D-Gaithersburg-Rockville), who chairs the Public Safety Committee. "You can't have one set of laws for police officers and...

A driver nailed by a roving radar truck in San Jose is taking his case to court in hopes of getting back the money he spent on speeding tickets and increases in insurance costs for himself and others mailed fines by the city. The city killed the program that put white radar photo vans on the streets to cut down on speeding after questions were raised in 2006 about the legality of having city engineers - not cops - write citations. But that was after officials had issued about $5 million worth of tickets through the decade-old program. In 2006...

BRADENTON In Florida, the law on red light cameras puts cities and police departments in an odd position. They can install the cameras, photograph cars that go through a red light and send the driver a warning. What the law does not allow, however, is sending the driver a traffic ticket. But some cities and counties have found a way around that. Across Florida, local officials are using the cameras and a loophole in the law to issue "civil violations" instead of moving violations to fine drivers for running red lights. It is the same method governments use to go...

LIMA — Two robbers who broke into Luther Ricks Sr.’s house this summer may have not gotten his life savings he had in a safe, but after the FBI confiscated it he may not get it back. Ricks has tried to get an attorney to fight for the $402,767 but he has no money. Lima Police Department officers originally took the money from his house but the FBI stepped in and took it from the Police Department. Ricks has not been charged with a crime and was cleared in a fatal shooting of one of the robbers but still the...

Motorists in Colorado are expressing outrage over a weekend stunt in Gilpin County, about an hour's drive west of Denver, where highway checkpoints were set up so a private organization could ask for samples of blood and saliva. "I don't think they're authorized to do what they're doing, and I view it as a gross violation of law-enforcement protocol," Roberto Sequeira, 51, told reporters for the Denver Post. He said he and his wife were "detained" for about 15 minutes even after they protested they wanted to get home because of a sleepy child in their car. (Story continues below)...

WAVERLY, Ohio (AP) — Nearly 100 drunken-driving suspects in this southern Ohio town avoided convictions or jail time last year after making voluntary $1,000 donations to the police department, county records show. More than a third of the drunken-driving cases filed by Waverly police in Pike County Court last year were dismissed, according to a report published Sunday in The Columbus Dispatch.

The Honorable Nancy Pelosi Speaker House of Representatives United States Capitol Dear Speaker Pelosi: I am writing concerning the Select Committee to Investigate the Voting Irregularities of August 2, 2007, established by the House on August 3, 2007 to investigate the circumstances surrounding the overturned 215-213 vote on a Republican measure that sought to add language to the Agriculture Appropriations bill prohibiting illegal immigrants from receiving taxpayer-funded benefits. Now that you and I have appointed six distinguished Members of the House to serve on the panel, I hope you will join me in ensuring that the select committee is provided...

Hutchison files bill in response to TXDot's actions 9/5/2007 7:20 PM By: Associated Press WASHINGTON -- Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison has filed a bill designed to block Texas officials efforts to turn some state's highways into toll roads. The Republican Senator filed the bill Wednesday after days of clamor in the state. The Texas Department of Transportation wants to be allowed to "buy back" parts of existing interstates and add toll lanes. It also has proposed tax breaks for private company investment involved in the projects. As proposed, Hutchison's bill would prohibit collection of tolls on any part of federal...

Levies increase despite decline in home values. Residential property taxes rose an average of $161 in cities and towns across the state in the past fiscal year, as home assessments hit historic highs despite declining market values. The average property tax bill for a single-family home hit $3,962, up 4.2 percent from the previous year. Taxes climbed 7 percent or higher in more than 65 communities, according to data from the state Department of Revenue. Since 2000, property taxes have shot up nearly 50 percent, from $2,679, far outpacing gains in wages, which climbed 30 percent statewide over the same...

Bloomberg's Plan To Charge $8 Still Very Much Alive (CBS/AP) WASHINGTON -- New York's plan to reduce traffic by charging tolls to drivers entering the busiest part of Manhattan will get a major boost from the government, which has agreed to fund the pilot project, congressional aides said Monday. If implemented, the congestion pricing scheme proposed by Mayor Michael Bloomberg would be the first of its kind in the nation. London and Singapore have similar toll programs. For weeks, New York officials haggled over whether to approve the mayor's idea in time to qualify for a share of $1.2 billion...

SAN ANTONIO — A sheriff's deputy accused of threatening Mexican motorists with detention if they didn't pay him off has pleaded not guilty to extortion. Deputy Henry James Jr., 45, was arrested after he stopped two FBI agents late last month. The agents were posing as Mexican motorists after several drivers claimed they had been stopped by law enforcement and ordered to pay. The agents, pulled over by James for disregarding a stop sign, recorded the deputy telling them that because they were Mexican, they had to pay him $150 or be detained until a judge could see them, according...

FRONT ROYAL, Va. — This small Shenandoah Valley town must wait to become a battleground for the growing public debate about whether the General Assembly overreached in assessing high fees for Virginia drivers who break the law. The Town Council last night postponed a decision on whether to stop its 36-officer police force from enforcing most "abuser fees" laws for motorists. "It seems to me it may be appealing in a kind of small guy versus big guy way, but I'm not sure that is the answer here," said council member Stanley W. Brooks Jr., who proposed postponing the vote....