Bluff City traffic cameras hit another speed bump

BLUFF CITY, Tenn. --

From staff and wire reports

The city's traffic enforcement cameras hit another speed bump this week: Ticketed motorists filed suit in federal court seeking $6 million in damages.

Chris Cawood and Jonathan Proffitt claim the city and Arizona-based American Traffic Solutions Inc. are conspiring to violate the federal Fair Debt Collections Act, state law and city ordinances. The lawsuit also names Bluff City Mayor Irene Wells as a defendant.

The suit seeks class action status and accuses the defendants of affixing an illegal $40 administrative fee to traffic camera fines and threatening criminal prosecution and driver's license suspension if the money is not paid. Originally, the fee was imposed in addition to the $50 speeding fine, but the $40 fee was dropped earlier this year.

The suit also alleges that the city created a speed trap near the cameras.

Bluff City already has begun remedying that problem – voting Thursday to expand the 45 mph zone along U.S. Highway 11E so that it starts more than a mile before the location of the cameras. The change puts the camera system in compliance with a state law that became effective July 1, more than a year after Bluff City installed the cameras.

City officials have said they believed their program was grandfathered and they did not have to immediately comply with that state law, which included the provision prohibiting enforcement cameras within a mile of the point where the speed limit drops by 10 mph or more.

But in September, after the grandfathering status was challenged by a ticketed driver, the city shut down the southbound camera and began tallying refunds. Records showed that more than 1,300 tickets had been issued since the law changed and 640 had already been paid.

The lawsuit also accuses Bluff City of dropping the speed on the highway without performing an engineering and traffic study to assess the need for that reduction, as required by law.

Bluff City and American Traffic Solutions have until Oct. 27 to file a response. Neither Paul Frye, who represents Bluff City, nor Crews Townsend, who represents American Traffic, responded to requests for comment.

The city also is refunding about $12,000 from traffic camera collections after a Bluff City Police Departmentreserve officer was allowed to review and approve hundreds of tickets.

The new state law requires potential violations captured on camera to be reviewed and approved by an officerwho is certified under the state's Peace Officers Standards and Training Commission.

For more information on these matters, please call our office at 305 548 5020.

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