Opinion Red-light cameras hanging on in O.C. Aug. 27, 2015 Updated Aug. 28, 2015 9:02 a.m. By ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER EDITORIAL Orange County was nearly free of red-light cameras. Los Alamitos and Garden Grove, the last holdouts using the dubious traffic safety devices, crashed the party by renewing their contracts with their camera operator. The Garden Grove council chose Tuesday not to act on its cameras, allowing the contract to automatically renew with Redflex Traffic Systems Inc. Monday, the Los Alamitos council voted unanimously to renew its contract with Redflex, despite paying nearly $2,000 more per camera than Garden Grove. While the Los Alamitos council seemed persuaded of the cameras’ beneficial uses, the Garden Grove council at least showed willingness toward reasoning that hopefully will see the city become camera-free. Despite suggestions by the Garden Grove Police Department, city staff and the company that the cameras had proven their worth, a majority of the council was moved by data compiled by Jay Beeber, executive director of Safer Streets L.A., a grass-roots coalition for motorists that has had success in removing red-light cameras in that city. He compiled data from the Highway Patrol’s traffic records system and found that, when counting all collisions caused by red-light running, collisions at photo-enforced intersections either increased or the decrease was not statistically significant enough to attribute to the use of cameras. In fact, only one intersection in either city, Garden Grove’s Harbor Boulevard and Trask Avenue, saw a reduction in crashes deemed statistically significant. At many other intersections, however, rear-end collisions noticeably spiked. Councilman Phat Bui said he has personally noticed a rise in rear-end collisions at the intersection near his home and attributed it to the behavioral changes motorists make at intersections with red-light cameras. The council has asked staff to respond to Mr. Beeber’s statistics, which we find speak for themselves and only confirm what we, and officials in almost every other city in the county, already know. Red-light cameras are a poor traffic safety tool, and, we surmise, were installed largely for their revenue-generating potential – but even that has proven spotty. Garden Grove would be wise to dump them as soon as possible. Copyright © 2016 The Orange County Register & Digital First Media