City Council approves speed, red-light camera settlement

Red-light and speed cameras that Chicago motorists love to hate will finally be generating something other than $100 tickets.

The City Council on Wednesday gave final approval to a $38.75 million settlement that will offer 50 percent refunds to 1.2 million motorists denied due process when the city failed to send them a second notice of violation required until May, 2015 and imposed $100 late fees four days too soon.

After the vote, Mayor Rahm Emanuel accepted responsibility for the due process mistakes made on his watch.

“I take responsibility that, under my tenure….the continuity of the way it operated was wrong, “ the mayor said.

“That said this system does save lives where a lot of people have questioned that before.”

Asked whether he was sorry, the mayor said, “It’s implicit in the payment. As well as explicit because otherwise, we wouldn’t have agreed to it.”

Corporation Counsel Ed Siskel has said he agreed to the settlement after a string of adverse court rulings to avoid a massive liability for Chicago taxpayers.

Siskel pegged the amount at $264 million in voided tickets and $143 million in outstanding debt if a judge chose to void all tickets issued during a five-year statute of limitations and $700 million in refunds and $206 million in debt if there was no limit on motorists’ claims.

With those heavy numbers in mind, aldermen had no choice but to hold their noses and approve the settlement that includes a mix of refunds, forgiven debt and attorneys’ fees.

But they couldn’t resist the opportunity to score political points by railing against a red-light camera program built on a $2 million bribery scandal that has turned into a cash cow.

Ald. Anthony Beale (9th), chairman of the City Council’s Transportation Committee, railed anew about the fact that $11.7 million will go to attorneys.

That’s nearly one-third of the settlement — standard for class-action lawsuits. But Beale called it galling.

“…The lawyers found a loophole in this system, filed a lawsuit against the city and now they are getting that pot of gold,” Beale said.

“If 100 percent of the people submit to get reimbursed, you’re gonna be waiting for your check — a whole whopping $7. Now, if the county has their way, that $7 might get you a two-liter” of pop.

Finance Committee Chairman Edward Burke (14th) insisted that the average refund check will be more like $42. And the average amount of forgiven debt will be $88.

But he used the opportunity to appeal to Emanuel to permanently prohibit Redflex Traffic Systems, the Arizona company at the center of the bribery scandal, from doing business with the city.

If not, Burke warned, “We’ll be right back here again.”

The 1.2 million motorists eligible for 50 percent refunds together received 1.5 million red-light and speed camera tickets between 2010 and 2015, when the rules were changed to drop the second notice requirement the city had ignored.

That’s somewhere between one-third of and one half of all red-light and speed cameras tickets issued during that period.

A judge still needs to sign off on the settlement.

After that, impacted motorists must be notified by mail and offered the opportunity to opt in or out of the refunds. Siskel has said it’s likely to be “months” before motorists receive cash returns. The city also intends to set up a website to get the word out.

Almost as important as the refunds is the city’s promise not to use any of those 1.5 million tickets when it comes to determining whose car gets a Denver boot and whose driver’s license gets suspended.