Dueling bills on I-95 iTraffic speed camera
Sarita Chourey
COLUMBIA -- Beaufort Republican lawmaker Shannon Erickson plans to introduce legislation to allow municipalities like Ridgeland to use a camera system to ticket speeders, following a protracted controversy and federal class-action suit over the town's approach.
"I'm very impressed with the safety," said Erickson, adding that she had been initially skeptical of the town's system on Interstate 95.
Erickson said her Beaufort County colleagues, Rep. Bill Herbkersman, R-Bluffton, and newcomer Rep. Andy Patrick, R-Hilton Head Island, would be co-sponsors to her legislation.
Her proposal would conflict with another bill, S. 336, that was filed on Tuesday by Sen. Larry Grooms, R-Berkeley, and seeks to bar traffic citations based in any part on a photograph.
At the end of the last legislative session, an amendment effectively banning photographic evidence pushed by Rep. Todd Rutherford, D-Columbia, and boosted by Grooms in the Senate, drew no legislative opposition and became law. The lawmakers, supported by Jasper County's Democratic Sen. Clementa Pinckney, said the speed camera amounted to a speed trap.
But on Tuesday, Erickson said the issue should receive a deeper look.
"I didn't think we gave it enough time and attention," she said.
Despite the Rutherford-Grooms effort to ban Ridgeland's speed camera last year, the town of Ridgeland installed it anyway. The move led to a federal class-action lawsuit on behalf of those ticketed.
Asked about Grooms' bill and the fight brewing over whether a municipality may use the camera system, Erickson said, "I think that bill is going to get, equally, a fight over here."
The lawmaker added that allowing the town to devise its own approach to I-95 speeders is central to the notion of "home rule," which she supports.
Ridgeland Mayor Gary Hodges has said the town spends more than $1 million annually responding to accidents on the interstate, including police, fire and EMS, and the expense should be born by the top speeders instead of the town's citizens.
About 50,000 vehicles travel Ridgeland's 7-mile stretch of interstate every day, he said, but only about 2 percent are speeding excessively. Since August, thousands of violators have been captured on radar and camera exceeding the speed limit by at least 11 miles per hour, while a police officer observed from inside an RV station.
Erickson said she was convinced of the system's effectiveness by data that show a decline in fatalities since its installation. She also stressed that manned component of Ridgeland's iTraffic system, and noted that with accidents in Ridgeland, the town must pay for the emergency response.
Hodges said excessive speeding has declined, while the number of vehicles clocked on the interstate increased to nearly half a million in November. In August, the percentage of violators was 2.86, in October it was 1.54 percent and in November only 1.22 percent were going 81 mph or faster.
The Jasper County Sun contributed to this story.
Reach Sarita Chourey at sarita.chourey@morris.com or (803) 727-4257.