A Really Bad Idea
Albuquerque is not a bad place to live or be a lawyer. The biggest city in New Mexico, the "Land of Enchantment," is also sometimes a place of great opportunity. Especially for a lawyer who represents City employees and labor unions.
Every once in a while the Mayor comes up with a new idea. And when it's a novel scheme to circumvent the law, or to do something that's legally bizarre, I somehow feel compelled to say (and maybe even do) something about it. Especially when the Mayor's "new idea" turns out to be a really bad idea.
That's what happened when the City jumped on the red-light camera bandwagon and invented its own version of a traffic law. Sure, cities around the country, and especially in California, are putting into place their own red-light camera and speed camera enforcement laws. Although it may be hard for some people to understand, speeding and failing to stop at stop signs and red lights are misdemeanors; "petty" to be sure, but little crimes nonetheless.
But in Albuquerque, under the direction of Mayor Marty Chavez, traffic enforcement is headed in a different direction. Now we have a new concept, "nuisance abatement," driving (puns here are generally gratuitous and intentional) local traffic enforcement.
The relatively new city law is called the Albuquerque "STOP" Ordinance, for "Safe Traffic Operations Program."
Albuquerque's new traffic ordinance substitutes a wacky enforcement scheme for the traditional traffic law. It was developed here as a revenue source, in defiance of state law and traditional judicial enforcement of traffic laws. They want you to think it's all about "safety," but really it's all about money. Unique to Albuquerque, it's based on the notion that offending vehicles (as opposed to their drivers) are "public nuisances." So "law enforcement" becomes "nuisance abatement."
I've got nothing against stopping for red lights, and I'm all for obeying red turn arrows. But the new Albuquerque STOP law is the result of governmental greed and it is an essentially irrational, somewhat abusive, and ultimately unconstitutional attempt to control people while making lots of money for the city at the people's expense.
So that's the subject of this new blog, a subject of interest and concern in Albuquerque, N.M., just as it is around the country and in some other parts of the world. There is plenty more to come, as I write here about traffic cameras and surveillance, enforcement and engineering, and about the law and our government's sometimes unwelcome intrusions on our lives.
Every once in a while the Mayor comes up with a new idea. And when it's a novel scheme to circumvent the law, or to do something that's legally bizarre, I somehow feel compelled to say (and maybe even do) something about it. Especially when the Mayor's "new idea" turns out to be a really bad idea.
That's what happened when the City jumped on the red-light camera bandwagon and invented its own version of a traffic law. Sure, cities around the country, and especially in California, are putting into place their own red-light camera and speed camera enforcement laws. Although it may be hard for some people to understand, speeding and failing to stop at stop signs and red lights are misdemeanors; "petty" to be sure, but little crimes nonetheless.
But in Albuquerque, under the direction of Mayor Marty Chavez, traffic enforcement is headed in a different direction. Now we have a new concept, "nuisance abatement," driving (puns here are generally gratuitous and intentional) local traffic enforcement.
The relatively new city law is called the Albuquerque "STOP" Ordinance, for "Safe Traffic Operations Program."
Albuquerque's new traffic ordinance substitutes a wacky enforcement scheme for the traditional traffic law. It was developed here as a revenue source, in defiance of state law and traditional judicial enforcement of traffic laws. They want you to think it's all about "safety," but really it's all about money. Unique to Albuquerque, it's based on the notion that offending vehicles (as opposed to their drivers) are "public nuisances." So "law enforcement" becomes "nuisance abatement."
I've got nothing against stopping for red lights, and I'm all for obeying red turn arrows. But the new Albuquerque STOP law is the result of governmental greed and it is an essentially irrational, somewhat abusive, and ultimately unconstitutional attempt to control people while making lots of money for the city at the people's expense.
So that's the subject of this new blog, a subject of interest and concern in Albuquerque, N.M., just as it is around the country and in some other parts of the world. There is plenty more to come, as I write here about traffic cameras and surveillance, enforcement and engineering, and about the law and our government's sometimes unwelcome intrusions on our lives.
posted by anon at 4:17 PM
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