{"id":4297,"date":"2024-05-19T16:23:56","date_gmt":"2024-05-19T23:23:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/?p=4297"},"modified":"2024-05-21T16:30:16","modified_gmt":"2024-05-21T23:30:16","slug":"they-film-you-rolling-through-stop-signs-and-fine-you-100-one-socal-agencys-1-million-idea","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/2024\/05\/19\/they-film-you-rolling-through-stop-signs-and-fine-you-100-one-socal-agencys-1-million-idea\/","title":{"rendered":"They film you rolling through stop signs and fine you $100. One SoCal agency\u2019s $1-million idea"},"content":{"rendered":"

Source of this article, the Los Angeles Times, May 19, 2024<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Stop signs and warnings to not violate them or face a $100 fine in Temescal Gateway Park in the Santa Monica Mountains in Pacific Palisades.<\/p><\/div>\n

The citation that Andrew Rice received in the mail looked like a traffic ticket, including a photo of his license plate. But the mail didn\u2019t come from any police or city agency he recognized.<\/p>\n

Back in July, one of his adult kids visited Temescal Canyon park near Pacific Palisades. A camera recorded Rice\u2019s Prius rolling through a stop sign at the park\u2019s parking lot, resulting in a $100 fine for Rice, the registered owner of the car.<\/p>\n

Yet it was not a violation of the vehicle code. It won\u2019t affect Rice\u2019s driving record, and it was not a traffic citation. Instead, it was a fine for violating park rules, issued by the Mountains Recreation & Conservation Authority \u2014 a local public agency dedicated to protecting local parkland.<\/p>\n

Rice is not alone. The agency collects more than $1 million a year from such tickets.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis agency that is ostensibly all about land preservation and public access, things I totally support, is sending fake $100 tickets to the people they claim to serve,\u201d Rice said.<\/p>\n

But the citations are real and can have real consequences. If they\u2019re not paid on time, the debts are sent to a collection agency, and unpaid fines can affect credit scores. Rice missed the initial notice in the mail, he said, possibly tossing out the letter thinking it was junk mail. He discovered the fine in March, seven months later, after it was sent to a collection agency.<\/p>\n

Like Rice, thousands of other drivers are receiving similar citations from the Mountains Recreation & Conservation Authority after visiting their parks. The controversial practice was first reported by KTLA-TV.<\/p>\n

Tasked with preserving and managing open space and parkland, the Mountains Recreation & Conservation Authority is a local government organization that manages more than 75,000 acres of land and more than 100 parks. It was created in 1985 in a partnership between state and local park and recreation agencies.<\/p>\n

With seven cameras installed in four parks, the organization issues about 17,000 citations a year, bring in about $1.1 million every year, said Dash Stolarz, spokesperson for the Mountains Recreation & Conservation Authority. That means that the agency tasked with preserving free open space, parkland and coastal access issues about 47 stop sign citations a day.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s set up like a turnstile to generate money,\u201d Rice said. \u201cIt\u2019s a money machine for the park.\u201d<\/p>\n

The cameras were installed at Temescal Gateway Park, Marvin Braude Mulholland Gateway Park, Top of Topanga and Franklin Canyon Park in 2007.<\/p>\n

Stolarz, spokesperson for the agency, said the cameras and citations were not installed to make revenue but as a safety measure and to enforce the park rules.<\/p>\n

\u201cHow are you supposed to keep people safe if you can\u2019t enforce the rules of the park,\u201d she said. \u201cIf you don\u2019t get the cars to stop, everyone thinks they don\u2019t have to stop.\u201d<\/p>\n

The $1.1 million generated from the fees is only a fraction of the agency\u2019s multimillion-dollar budget. This year, the 2023-24 budget showed the agency expected to see more than $77 million in grants. The money from the fees goes back into maintaining the parks, she said.<\/p>\n

However, the citations generated more revenue than parking fees ($920,000), more than double the revenue from leases and licensing ($460,000), and nearly as much as the funds generated from filming fees ($1.25 million), according to the agency budget.<\/p>\n

With the thousands of citations issued each year, however, Rice said he feels the $100 fine is similar to a \u201cregressive tax on their user base.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFor a lot of people who go there to go hiking or have a picnic, $100 is a lot of money,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Rice is also concerned that, like him, many people toss out the initial citation thinking it is junk mail.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s also concerned that, unlike traffic cameras used by cities and law enforcement agencies, the tickets are issued to the owner of the vehicle, not the driver. Because the citations are rule violations, instead of traffic tickets, the park agency is not required to meet vehicle code requirements for operating traffic cameras and identifying drivers when it issues the citations.<\/p>\n

Red light cameras, for example, require law enforcement agencies to confirm the identity of the driver when tickets are issued.<\/p>\n

The citations also state that, despite the similarity, it\u2019s \u201cnot issued for any violation of any provision of the California Vehicle Code.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNeither the issuance of this Citation nor its non-payment will be reflected in your official driving record,\u201d it reads. Not paying, however, can result in \u201can adverse report on your credit rating.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Mountains Recreation & Conservation Authority has been sued by ticketed motorists over the citations and was named in a class-action lawsuit challenging the validity of the tickets.<\/p>\n

In July 2015, however, the California 2nd District Court of Appeals ruled that the agency could issue the tickets under the Public Resources Code and it can enforce its own rules to manage park lands.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis [ruling] affirms that the MRCA has the authority to enforce its ordinance, including the photo enforcement program,\u201d Stolarz said in an email.<\/p>\n

In an interview, Stolarz said tickets are issued by park rangers for violations such as parking, speeding and stop sign violations.<\/p>\n

She added that the cameras were placed in locations identified in traffic studies as \u201chot spots,\u201d or with repeat violations.<\/p>\n

The intersections with cameras, she said, also include multiple signs that alert drivers about the stop signs and the camera enforcement.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s very well marked,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Source of this article, the Los Angeles Times, May 19, 2024 The citation that Andrew Rice received in the mail looked like a traffic ticket, including a photo of his license plate. But the mail didn\u2019t come from any police or city agency he recognized. Back in July, one of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4298,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37,33,19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4297","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-budget-and-spending","category-mrca","category-santa-monica-mountains"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4297","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4297"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4297\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4299,"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4297\/revisions\/4299"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4298"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4297"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4297"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4297"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}