Culver City Docs - Main Page - Red Light Cams

If you haven't already done so, please read the Home page

Culver City Contacts
City Hall, 9770 Culver Boulevard, Culver City, CA 90232
(1/2 mile east of the courthouse - plentiful free underground parking, entrance ramp on Duquesne)
Councilmembers' email addresses at:
http://www.culvercity.org/citygov/gov_council.html
Council meetings: Most Mondays, 7 p.m. Opportunity for public to speak: Promptly at beginning of council meeting. Call (310) 253-6000 to confirm council meeting date or to leave a message for mayor or councilmembers.

Culver City Chamber of Commerce
4249 Overland (one block south of the courthouse)
Culver City, CA 90230
Chamber President Steve Rose is also a member of the city council.
email: ssssteve@culvercitychamber.com
(310) 287-3850

Culver City Docs Set # 1
Public Records Request for Camera Stats - Reply of 10-31-02
Here are 12 pages provided by the City in response to my Public Records Act request for information (1) regarding the reasons (accident rates, etc.) for installation of the cameras at the intersections chosen, and (2) the intersection-by-intersection breakdown of revenue, citations issued, the disposition of those citations, and citations not issued. For more details about citations issued, see also Set # 13, below.

Culver City Docs Set # 2
City's Revenue and Expenditure
At an October 2002 City Council meeting I presented a graph showing that, the previous fiscal year, red light camera program expenditure ran 42% higher than budgeted, and revenue flattened out.
Updated 3-15-03: My projection, using figures from the first eight months of the current fiscal year, indicates that the profit flowing from the program to the City's General Fund could be 57% less than expected.

Culver City Docs Set # 3
Request to Court to Allow Public to See TV Display
Here is the correspondence, to date, on my request to re-orient the courtroom TV so that the public may again view the ticket photos.

Culver City Docs Set # 4
Was Culver City's "mistake" an "inadvertent" one?
The evidence shows that they were aware of the new law prescribing minimum yellow times(VC 21455.7, effective Jan. 1, 2002), but failed to bring their cameras into compliance with it.

Culver City Docs Set # 5
Map of Culver City's Camera Locations
&
A Possible Explanation Why Just a Few Locations Produce Most of the Revenue
The map shows the location of the seven cameras that are presently operating, plus two more that are under construction.
On Mar. 27 and 28 I had a chance to review the speed surveys that the City used to determine what speed limits would be posted on the streets where camera enforcement is used. These surveys revealed a close match between high ticket production and, at those same locations, Posted Speed Limits substantially below the 85th Percentile* Speed (thereby allowing the City to set a shorter yellow time).
*For an explanation of 85th Percentile Speed, see Defect #3 on the Home Page.

Culver City Docs Set # 6
Transcript of Culver City Trial
The transcript is provided to show the standard testimony that occurs during Culver City red light camera trials. It is also an example of the Settled Statement that is written as part of the appeals process.

Culver City Docs Set # 7
Culver City's Contract with the Vendor
The contract, effective March 2002, shows that the vendor still is paid on a per-conviction basis, and that the vendor owns the system while the city owns the data from it.

Culver City Docs Set # 9
Culver City's "Certificate of Mailing"
This is the official-looking "Certificate of Mailing" form Culver City formerly used. See Defect #8 on the Home Page for more details.

Culver City Docs Set # 10
Council Fiddles While Police Department Burns
This website , containing video of an incident of negligence by the Culver City police, suggests that the department lost sight of its mission, public safety, and that the city council failed to take action to bring it back on course.

Culver City Docs Set # 11
Rumors about a Culver City Refund
On June 12, 2004 an LA Times story about the Costa Mesa refunds (see Costa Mesa section on the Camera Towns page) erroneously stated that there had been 2000 refunds in Culver City. The city where the refunds happened (actually amost 3000 of them) was East LA (see the East LA section on the Camera Towns page). The Times supplied their story to the AP, so the incorrect story will be in hundreds of papers, worldwide.

Culver City Docs Set # 12
Left Turn Camera Not Justified
New 7-17-04
Culver City's Jefferson / Overland intersection with its recently-installed - and very lucrative - camera enforcement on left turns, is an excellent example of an intersection where there is scant safety justification for the use of the camera. Set # 12, a ten-year accident history for the intersection, shows a total of 41 accidents, but only one of those (9 years ago) was caused by a driver running the left turn light.
The accident history was provided by the City in response to a Public Records Request.
See also "Churning Left Turn$" in Defect # 9 on the Home Page.

Culver City Docs Set # 13
Ticket Counts
New 9-3-04
Most cities receive, from their camera vendor, a monthly tabulation showing, among other things, how many tickets were issued that month at each intersection or "Approach." While I have twice asked Culver City for a copy of their intersection-by-intersection tabulation, so far they have not provided it. They have provided some overall totals of tickets issued and collected, and that information is listed in Set # 13, a table of Ticket Counts.

Culver City Docs Set # 14
Sequence of Installation
New 10-20-05
Per a CCPD internal memo of Nov. 28, 2001, and the CCPD's monthly reports to the city council, the "inception dates" of the cameras were:

Washington / La Cienega 2-26-99
Jefferson / Duquesne 1-13-00
Sepulveda / Green Valley 3-10-00
Washington / Beethoven 7-26-00
Sepulveda / Machado 8-14-00
Jefferson / Cota 8-24-00
Slauson / Buckingham 12-23-01
Washington / Sawtelle 2-5-02
Jefferson / Overland 8-03
Sepulveda / Centinela 8-03
Washington Place / Centinela 8-03

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RED LIGHT CAMERAS
www.highwayrobbery.net
www.highwayrobbery.net