New student/bus safety measure on tap in Medford
Zipping past a flashing school bus stop sign could be costly and getting caught could be easier than you think
Nobody likes getting stuck behind a school bus, but if you think no one’s watching when you zip past that extended stop arm – you might be right – for now.
The Medford School Committee is asking the City Council to adopt legislation that would pave the way to installing mounted cameras to record motor vehicles that illegally pass a stopped school bus when it’s displaying flashing red lights and a deployed stop arm.
“The way that this whole process works is the council first has to say, ‘Yes, we’re adopting this statute,’ and then once the council does that under the law, then we have to go to the superintendent to bring a contract forward,” said School Committee member Jenny Graham, who introduced the resolution.
Graham, who has already looked into this , said Medford was defined by one vendor as a city where violators would cover the entire cost of implementation.
The cameras are installed on the stop arms for free and the company that does the installation is paid through the violation revenue, she explained. And if there are no violations in any given month, the company eats the cost, she added.
Graham said she believes the monthly cost of the program is $250 per bus, which would equal one violation.
And if Medford is anything like a pair of North Shore communities already doing this, revenue won’t be an issue.
Graham said a three-month pilot program in Peabody resulted in 977 violations and in Salem, a similar pilot program had 942 violations.
And those are recent studies, Graham noted, because the law allowing for the cameras only passed recently. However, she also said studies show that tickets peak in the first year then plateau.
“They find that when you get a ticket, you do not usually get a second ticket … it’s not an inexpensive ticket,” she said.
The cameras can also be put on special education vehicles, but Graham said if a violation happens outside Medford, the footage cannot be used. Footage is only valid if taken within the city limits.
Any photos that are taken and are not used to prove a violation would also be destroyed within 30 days, and nothing inside the bus is filmed, Graham said.
“Just so people are aware, the camera is fixed on the outside of the bus, but it does not start recording until that arm comes out, with the stop sign on it,” said acting Superintendent Suzanne Galusi. “Then it will start recording from that moment on, and then once the arm comes back in, the recording stops.”
The resolution, read by Mayor Breanna Lungo-Koehn, also calls for establishing a joint committee made up of a representative from the committee, City Council, the police chief, the superintendent, and the mayor or her designee “to evaluate and recommend policies regarding the use of revenue generated citations.”
The School Committee is also asking Lungo-Koehn to allow the School Committee to exclusively direct how the citation revenue should be spent, with priority given to student safety initiatives, transportation infrastructure improvements, and public awareness campaigns.
School Committee member Erika Reinfeld called it a great idea and said she appreciated the earmark piece. She did wonder if there were other companies that provide the service, however.
Graham said there are, but she said the one she looked into is on the approved vendor list and also takes care of the curation.
“They’re maintaining the cameras, they’re previewing the footage, they’re culling out all the stuff that’s junk so when it gets to the Police Department here in Medford, it’s an easier lift for Medford to go ahead and issue those citations,” she said.
Graham said once the police have photo evidence of a violation in hand, they will issue a citation just as they would in any other situation, but it’s not a ticket per se. She said while it will come with a fine that if not paid could — down the road — impact license renewal, it is not going to be tagged as a moving violation on insurance.
“I thought there were just a lot of net positives for us and students,” Graham said. “And if we stop having revenue because there are no more big violations, that is also a win, because that means people aren't passing school buses when they shouldn’t be... It seems like there’s only wins in this.”
The committee unanimously approved the resolution, which puts the issue of adopting the state law into the hands of the City Council.
