BILL ANALYSIS
SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE
Senator Ellen M. Corbett, Chair
2009-2010 Regular Session
AB 2567 (Bradford)
As Amended June 17, 2010
Hearing Date: June 29, 2010
Fiscal: No
Urgency: No
BCP:jd
SUBJECT
Parking Violations: Digital Photograph Recordings
DESCRIPTION
This bill would authorize a local public agency to install and
operate an automated parking enforcement system that uses
equipment installed on street sweepers to take digital
photographs of parking violations occurring in street-sweeping
parking lanes during designated street sweeping hours.
The bill would require a designated employee to review the
digital image recordings, determine whether a parking violation
occurred, and to issue a notice of violation.
This bill would require that notice of parking violation to be
served by depositing the notice in the mail to the registered
owner's last known address listed with the Department of Motor
Vehicles.
This bill would allow the local public agency to contract with a
private vendor for the processing of notices of violation,
provided that overall control and supervision is maintained by
the local public agency.
BACKGROUND
While some counties may have already installed certain automated
systems, legislative authorization for automated enforcement
procedures relating to traffic violations began in 1994 with SB
1802 (Rosenthal, Chapter 1216, Statutes of 1994). That bill
authorized the use of "automated rail crossing enforcement
(more)
AB 2567 (Bradford)
Page 2 of ?
systems" to enforce prohibitions on drivers from passing around
or under rail crossings while the gates are closed. (Veh. Code
Sec. 22451.) Those systems functioned by photographing the
front license plate and the driver of vehicles that proceeded
around closed rail crossing gates in violation of the Vehicle
Code provisions. Those drivers, in turn, received citations for
their violations.
In 1995, the Legislature authorized a three-year trial red
light camera enforcement system program. (SB 833, Kopp, Chapter
922, Statutes of 1995.) Using similar technology, that program
used sensors connected to cameras to take photographs of the
front license plate and driver upon entering an intersection on
a red light. That program was permanently extended in 1998 by
SB 1136 (Kopp, Chapter 54, Statutes of 1998).
In 2007, the Legislature authorized a four-year pilot project
where the City and County of San Francisco was authorized to
install video cameras on city-owned public transit for the
purpose of videotaping parking violations in transit-only
traffic lanes. (AB 101, Ma, Chapter 377, Statutes of 2007.)
The City and County of San Francisco is required to provide an
evaluation of the effectiveness of that program no later than
March 1, 2011, and the authorization itself will sunset on
January 1, 2012.
This bill would grant a broad authority, based on AB 101, that
would allow a local public agency to utilize an automated
parking enforcement system that uses cameras on street sweepers
for the purpose of taking digital photographs of parking
violations. Under current law, parking violations are civil
violations, subject only to a civil penalty. Those violations
must contain the basis for the violation, a statement that
payment is due no later than 21 days from the date of issuance,
and the procedure to contest the citation. Those violations
must also state the license number and registration date, if
visible, the last four digits of the vehicle identification
number, if readable, the color of the vehicle, and, if possible,
the make of the vehicle. This bill would adapt those provisions
for use in enforcement of parking violations in street sweeping
parking lanes, as specified, including the procedure for
contesting a notice of violation, contents of the notice of
violation, use of the digital photographs, and method for
delivery of the notice of violation.
In vetoing a substantially similar bill last year, the Governor
stated that AB 1336 (Eng, 2009) "could present a significant
AB 2567 (Bradford)
Page 3 of ?
risk of violating an individual's privacy unrelated to the
enforcement of law. It may also lead to the unwarranted
proliferation of camera enforcement in many other arenas."
Similar concerns regarding privacy and the unintended
consequences of authorizing the additional use of cameras are
discussed in the Comments below.
This bill was approved by the Senate Committee on Transportation
and Housing on June 15, 2010.
CHANGES TO EXISTING LAW
Existing law authorizes the use of an automated enforcement
system for enforcement of red light violations by a governmental
agency, subject to specific requirements and limitations. (Veh.
Code Sec. 21455.5.) Existing law provides that a violation of
any regulation governing the standing or parking of a vehicle
under the Vehicle Code, federal statute or regulation, or local
ordinance, is subject to a civil penalty. (Veh. Code Sec.
40200.)
Existing law provides that notice of a delinquent parking
violation must contain various information, including a notice
that unless the parking penalty is paid or contested within 21
calendar days from the issuance of a citation, or 14 calendar
days from the mailing of a delinquent parking violation, as
specified, the renewal of the vehicle registration is contingent
upon compliance with the notice. (Veh. Code Sec. 40207.)
Existing law authorized the City and County of San Francisco
(San Francisco), until January 1, 2012, to enforce parking
violations in specified transit-only traffic lanes through the
use of video image evidence. San Francisco was authorized to
install automated forward facing parking control devices on
city-owned public transit vehicles for the purpose of
video-imaging parking violations in transit-only traffic lanes.
If implemented, San Francisco was required to submit an
evaluation of the program on or before March 1, 2011. (Veh.
Code Sec. 40207 et seq.)
This bill would enact a similar program with regards to street
sweepers throughout all of California. Specifically, this bill
would allow a local public agency to install and operate an
automated parking enforcement system on street sweepers for the
purpose of digital photographing of street-sweeping parking
violations occurring in street-sweeping lanes. That equipment
AB 2567 (Bradford)
Page 4 of ?
must be angled and focused so as to capture photographs of
license plates of vehicles violating street-sweeping regulations
and must not unnecessarily capture identifying photographs of
other drivers, vehicles, or pedestrians.
This bill would permit that equipment to only capture digital
photographs when the automated parking enforcement system
detects the occurrence of a parking infraction. The equipment
shall record the date and time the photograph was captured onto
the photograph, and require any information read from a license
plate at a location or at a time not designated for street
sweeping to be destroyed by the close of the next business day.
This bill would permit citations to be issued only for
violations captured during the designated hours of operation for
a street-sweeping lane, as specified.
This bill would provide that, at least 30-days prior to issuing
notices of parking violations, the local public agency shall
make a public announcement of the automated enforcement system
and only issue warning notices during that 30-day period.
This bill would permit a designated employee for the local
public agency to review digital photographs for purposes of
determining whether a parking violation occurred in a
street-sweeping parking lane. A violation of a statute,
regulation, ordinance governing parking under the Vehicle Code,
a federal or state statute or regulation, or an ordinance
enacted by the local public agency occurring in a
street-sweeping parking lane observed by the designated employee
in the photographs would be subject to a civil penalty.
This bill would provide that digital photograph evidence may be
retained for up to six months from the date the information was
first obtained, or 90 days after final disposition of the
citation, whichever date is sooner, after which time the
information shall be destroyed in a manner that preserves the
confidentiality of any person included in the record or
information, as specified. Photographs that do not contain
evidence of a parking violation must be destroyed, in a manner
that preserves the confidentiality of any person included in the
information, within 15 days after the information was first
obtained.
This bill would provide that the digital image photographs made,
and any information read from license plates, by an automated
AB 2567 (Bradford)
Page 5 of ?
parking enforcement system are confidential, and that local
public agencies shall use and allow access to those photographs
and license plate readings only for purposes authorized by this
bill.
This bill would require a designated employee for the local
public agency to issue a notice of parking violation to the
registered owner within 15 calendar days of the violation, as
specified. The notice must include a statement that payment is
required within 21 calendar days from the date of issuance, and
the procedure to deposit the parking penalty or to contest the
citation. The notice must include a copy of the digital
photograph evidence.
This bill would state that the notice of parking violation shall
be served by mail and sent to the registered owner's last known
address listed with the Department of Motor Vehicles. If
payment is made within either 21 calendar days from the date of
mailing of the citation, or 14 calendar days after mailing of
the notice of delinquent parking violation, the parking penalty
shall consist solely of the amount of the original penalty. The
local public agency shall allow a person to contest a notice of
parking violation, as specified.
This bill would permit a contestant to seek court review by
filing an appeal, as specified, following an initial review by
the local agency and an administrative hearing.
This bill would also permit the local public agency to contract
with a private vendor for the processing of notices of parking
violations and notices of delinquent violations, if the local
public agency maintains overall control and supervision of the
automated parking enforcement system.
This bill would require a local public agency that utilizes an
automated parking enforcement system to collect and report to
the Senate and Assembly Committees on Judiciary, the Senate
Committee on Transportation and Housing, and the Assembly
Committee on Transportation, data regarding: (1) number of
citations issued; (2) number of violations contested and the
final disposition of those violations; (3) number and percentage
of photographs recorded from which notices of parking violations
were issued; (4) number and percentage of photographs recorded
from which no notices of parking violations were recorded; (5)
summary of instances in which a request for a photograph for a
purpose unrelated to this bill; (6) procedure use for
AB 2567 (Bradford)
Page 6 of ?
destruction of license plate readings; (7) evaluation of the
overall effectiveness of the program; and (8) an evaluation of
the privacy implications of the system.
This bill would define local public agency, street sweeper, and
street-sweeping parking lane.
This bill would additionally codify various findings and
declaration regarding the benefits of street sweeping.
This bill would sunset on January 1, 2016.
COMMENT
1. Stated need for the bill
According to the author, "[t]his bill allows public entities to
install automatic parking enforcement systems on owned or
operated street sweepers. These systems use scanning technology
as well as digital photography to cite vehicles that are parked
on street during designated street sweeping hours." The
California Public Parking Association, in support, further
states:
AB 2567 will significantly help reduce urban runoff into our
lakes, rivers, and beaches while uniformly enforcing posted
parking regulations. Each year, illegally-parked private
cars, trucks and service vehicles on local streets and roads
disrupt full street sweeping of as many as three parking
spaces per illegally parked vehicle, resulting in
significant debris, grease, oil metals, and other pollutants
being needlessly washed into storm water drains rather than
being captured by street sweepers. . . . We believe street
sweepers that use an automated parking enforcement system
for the purpose of enforcing parking violations occurring in
street-sweeping parking lanes will effectively complement
the work and responsibilities of parking enforcement
personnel as well as help in the allocation of resources for
higher priority parking violations and other more critical
transportation enforcement demands.
2. AB 101 (Ma, Chapter 377, Statutes of 2007)
This bill is similar to AB 101, which authorized the City and
County of San Francisco to issue citations based on
photo-evidence of transit-only parking violations. This
AB 2567 (Bradford)
Page 7 of ?
committee's analysis raised questions about the privacy
implications resulting from the placement of outward facing
cameras on transit vehicles and stated:
While previously allowing citations based upon photographic
evidence for dangerous rail crossings and red light
violations appeared to be mainly supported by the lives that
would be saved by increased enforcement, and deterrence of
reckless conduct, parking violations do not rise to that
level.
. . . Thus, the program proposed by this bill represents a
fundamental shift in the justification required in order to
implement an automatic enforcement system. If cost savings
are considered sufficient justification for such automation,
many additional types of violations could be modified
pursuant to the precedent set by [AB 101].
This bill would rely upon the precedent set by AB 101 (Ma, 2007)
to allow street sweepers throughout the state to capture digital
photographs for purposes of issuing parking citations. That
precedent - authorizing the use of cameras to save on costs -
represents a fundamental change in how California has
historically used cameras to enforce violations. This
legislation represents another step away from the rationale
previously used to justify the use of cameras for automated
enforcement. Although this bill could arguably result in
reduced employee costs for local governments (and increased
revenue from citations), part of that cost reduction could also
come in the form of fewer employees needed to patrol for those
violations.
It should also be noted that AB 101 will sunset on January 1,
2012, and the Legislature has not yet had an opportunity to
review that narrow pilot program to see if it should be renewed.
3. Privacy considerations of authorizing digital imaging from
street sweepers
As approved by this committee, AB 101 permitted cameras to only
record images when the driver actually observes a parking
violation. The committee analysis noted that the proposed
"limited use of video recording would prevent unnecessary,
potentially privacy invasive video footage from being captured."
While floor amendments removed that provision, those compromise
amendments sought to respond to the privacy concerns by removing
street sweepers (which were originally included in AB 101), and
AB 2567 (Bradford)
Page 8 of ?
allowing citations only for violations occurring in named
transit-only traffic lanes. Similar to the amendments accepted
in this committee on AB 101, this bill would permit the
equipment to only capture digital photographs when the automated
parking enforcement system detects the occurrence of a parking
violation.
From a privacy standpoint, the routes of transit buses
authorized by AB 101 were through downtown urban areas. On the
other hand, street sweepers travel through all parts,
residential and nonresidential, of a city. As a result, the
proposed cameras represent a greater privacy risk by authorizing
the use of cameras in residential areas for which there
currently may be no surveillance - that potential privacy risk
is even greater if street sweepers continually transmit data
while moving down the street.
4. Opposition's concerns
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), in opposition, notes
that AB 2567 raises numerous privacy concerns that should be
addressed before authorizing this technology to be used
statewide.
The ACLU asserts that the Legislature should wait until the
evaluation of AB 101 (Ma, 2007) has been completed before
authorizing another pilot project (see Comment 2), and that
"[t]here needs to be a careful cost/benefit analysis of the use
of this government operated technology that possibly captures
images of individuals and places them at specific locations,
especially in residential locations." ACLU urges the author to
hold AB 2567 until AB 101 has been evaluated by the Legislature.
Regarding the proposed use of automated parking enforcement
systems that can detect parking violations, the ACLU notes that
"Both Chicago and the District of Columbia, two cities mentioned
in the bill that have already employed digital photography on
street sweepers for the same purpose, use a technology referred
to as 'License Plate Recognition Technology.' Questions
regarding how privacy will be protected as the technology
'recognizes' license plates, and 'detects' violations, must be
answered before implementing this technology statewide."
Committee staff notes that although AB 1336 contained a
definition of "automated parking enforcement system" - that
definition was removed from AB 2567, thus permitting any form of
system that meets the other requirements of the bill. Those
AB 2567 (Bradford)
Page 9 of ?
systems could employ the license plate recognition technology,
triggering the above questions by the ACLU regarding how privacy
will be protected with such a system.
Due to those serious concerns, the ACLU strongly urges that the
bill be made into a pilot project that specifies certain cities
- that narrowing would be consistent with the approach taken for
AB 101, which limited that program to not only a specific
city/county, but to specific streets within that city/county.
5. Issues associated with private vendor contracts
Similar to AB 101, this bill would allow a local public agency
to contract with a private vendor for the processing of notices
of parking violations and notice of delinquent violations. A
similar allowance is provided in Vehicle Code Section 21455.5
relating to red light photo citations, but that allowance states
that certain activities may not be contracted out to the
manufacturer or supplier of the automated enforcement system.
It should be noted that nothing in this bill details the fee
that a public agency may pay to the private vendor for
processing the notices of parking violations and notices of
delinquent violations. Depending on the role that the vendor
has in the process, and whether their pay is based upon the
revenue generated from the parking violations, that vendor may
have an incentive to become overzealous in the issuance of those
violations. While the agency is required to maintain overall
control and supervision of the program, as noted above, it is
the day-to-day operations (such as installation and maintenance)
that impact whether a consumer receives a notice of violation.
Committee staff notes that legal questions have been previously
raised about the red light camera program in San Francisco and
other cities. The San Francisco Chronicle's February 22, 2006
article discussing an agreement by red light camera plaintiffs
to dismiss a case against the cities of San Francisco and San
Diego noted that "[l]awyers for the plaintiffs argued that the
use of automatic cameras was unconstitutional because some of
the money from ticket fines was being paid to a private company,
which installs and maintains the cameras." The article reported
that the plaintiffs dropped the action "to avoid exposing
clients to a potential claim from San Francisco and San Diego
for legal costs."
6. Provisions of the bill do include protections previously
AB 2567 (Bradford)
Page 10 of ?
recommended by this committee
Despite the above issues, this bill does contain language either
suggested by this committee, or later agreed to by the author of
AB 101 that provides both due process protections and addresses
some of the issues relating to privacy.
Specifically, this bill would: (1) require equipment to be
angled and focused so as to capture digital photographs of
license plates on vehicles violating designated street sweeping
regulations; (2) require the designated employee who reviews the
recordings to be qualified by the local public agency to issue
parking citations; (3) require images to be destroyed within 15
days after the information was obtained if it does not contain
evidence of a parking violation; and (4) allow citations to be
issued only for violations captured during designated hours of
operation for a street-sweeping parking lane.
It should also be noted that the bill does include additional
provisions beyond those contained within AB 1336 (Eng, 2009),
including: (1) requiring any information read from a license
plate at a location or time not designated for street sweeping
to be destroyed by the close of the next business day; and (2)
enhancing the requirements of the report to include, among other
things, a summary of instances in which a photograph was
requested for a purpose unrelated to this bill.
7. Governor's veto message
As stated above, the Governor's veto message for AB 1336
expressed concern that the bill could pose a "significant risk
of violating an individual's privacy unrelated to the
enforcement of law," and that the bill "may lead to the
unwarranted proliferation of camera enforcement in many other
arenas." Given that this bill arguably codifies a policy of
using cameras for enforcement in order to reduce costs - it is
unclear how this substantially similar bill would address
concerns regarding the unwarranted proliferation of camera
enforcement.
Support : California Public Parking Association; California
State Association of Counties; City and County of San Francisco;
City of San Diego; City of Los Angeles; Oakland City Council;
League of California Cities
Opposition : American Civil Liberties Union
AB 2567 (Bradford)
Page 11 of ?
HISTORY
Source : ACS
Related Pending Legislation : None Known
Prior Legislation :
AB 1336 (Eng, 2009) See Background.
AB 101 (Ma, Chapter 377, Statutes of 2007) See Background.
Prior Vote :
Assembly Transportation Committee (Ayes 11, Noes 3)
Assembly Floor (Ayes 49, Noes 24)
Senate Transportation Committee (Ayes 7, Noes 1)
**************