A need for speed cameras
Bay Ridge pol’s new bill would bring hundreds more to city school zones
CAMERA READY: A new bill in Albany introduced by state Sen. Andrew Gounardes (right) would more than quintuple the number of city school-zone
speed cameras if passed by the Legislature and Gov. Cuomo. Gov. Cuomo’s offi ce / Brandon Paillere
COURIER LIFE, M M BR B G ARCH 15–21, 2019 3
BY JULIANNE MCSHANE
The number of school-zone
speed cameras across the city
could quintuple if state lawmakers
pass a new bill introduced
by a Southern Brooklyn
pol on March 7.
State Sen. Andrew Gounardes’s
(D–Bay Ridge) legislation
would allow local
offi cials to install up to 750
cameras across the city’s 2,300
school zones, where the current
140 cameras in place do
not adequately protect young
scholars from reckless drivers,
he said.
“I do not want to be in a
position where I tell people,
‘Your child’s school is or is not
worthy of having street protection
in front of it.’ This is
a proven solution to the problem
of speeding, especially
in school zones,” said Gounardes,
who recently launched
a street-safety task force in his
district , which includes Bay
Ridge, Dyker Heights, Gravesend,
Bensonhurst, Bath
Beach, Marine Park, Manhattan
Beach, Gerritsen Beach,
and parts of Sheepshead Bay,
Borough Park, and Midwood.
In addition to increasing
the amount of cameras
— which automatically photograph
the license plates of
cars driving thirty miles-perhour
or more in school zones,
and send the vehicles’ registered
owners $50 tickets — the
bill would also:
• Lengthen the hours the
cameras are on, extending
their current operating times
from an hour before and after
school is in session to between
6 am and 10 pm on weekdays.
• Broaden the areas where
the cameras operate, allowing
offi cials to install them
within a quarter-mile radius
of schools, not just within a
quarter-mile stretch of the
same street a given school is
on, as current law allows.
• Require the city to hang
signs in school zones with
speed cameras that warn drivers
of the technology’s presence.
• Mandate local offi cials prioritize
placing the cameras in
school zones with higher rates
of speeding and crashes.
• Require the city to submit
annual reports to the governor
and leadership of both
chambers of the Legislature
with data including the total
amount of ticket revenue that
local offi cials spent on traffi c
and pedestrian safety measures,
as well as “the effectiveness
and adequacy of the expanded
hours of operation.”
Data shows that the already
in place speed cameras work.
In the two years after offi cials
fi rst installed them in 2014,
there were 60-percent fewer
daily violations in school
zones with speed cameras, according
to a report published
by the Department of Transportation
last year.
And the majority of Gounardes’s
constituents support
expanding their presence, according
to a 2018 poll commissioned
by street-safety group
Transportation Alternatives.
The cameras became a
hot-button issue during last
year’s 22nd state Senate District
race between Gounardes
and former eight-term Republican
state Sen. Marty Golden
— a known speeder and longstanding
opponent to the technology,
who briefl y reversed
his stance on the issue as the
speed-camera program authorized
in 2013 approached its
expiration date last summer.
Back then, Golden supported
a bill to preserve and
expand the number of cameras
to 290. But his colleague,
state Sen. Simcha Felder (DMidwood),
blocked the legislation
from leaving the Cities
Committee, which he chaired
at the time, for a fl oor vote
in the upper chamber. And
the cameras subsequently
switched off in late July , forcing
Council to broker an emergency
deal between Mayor De-
Blasio and Gov. Cuomo , who
signed an executive order to
turn the tech back on before
school started in September.
Cuomo earlier this year
included a proposal in his executive
budget that would reinstate
the speed-camera program
without the need for an
executive order, and up the
number of cameras to 290. But
reps for the governor did not
immediately reply when asked
if he would sign Gounardes’s
bill into law if it passes in the
Legislature. Manhattan Assemblywoman
Deborah Glick
on March 7 also introduced
the lower chamber’s version of
the Brooklyn pol’s bill.
And Gounardes is confi -
dent the governor would back
his legislation, he said, adding
that 290 is the minimum number
of cameras that local offi -
cials hope to install citywide.
“The consensus seemed
to be that the 290 was just a
starting point for discussion,
based on where that discussion
had ended last year,” the
pol said. “There did not seem
to be obstacle in my initial
conversation with the governor
to bumping that up.
We’ve been discussing this
bill with the city, with the
Council — everyone seems to
be on board.”
Should the bill become law,
it would be valid beginning
30 days after Cuomo signs it
through June 30, 2022. But
Council will fi rst need to pass
a resolution — called a Home
Rule Request — asking the
Assembly and state Senate to
pass the legislation, since it
only affects the city.
Reps for Council, which
convened on March 13, as this
paper went to press, did not
immediately respond when
asked if its members planned
to pass the resolution then.