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If you haven't already done so, please read the Victorville  section on the Camera Towns page

Sheila "Kuehl Kams" Kuehl, in 2007

We need to watch Kuehl carefully, because as a Supervisor she will have a seat on the MTA/Metro board and she will be a vote to continue and expand their huge (101 cameras, so far) red light camera system.

Kuehl will be up for re-election in Nov. 2018 and Nov. 2022.

This table made by highwayrobbery.net using 2008-2009 data from a spreadsheet prepared by the sheriff combined with 2008-2012 RedFlex Customer Management Reports.

This table made using reports provided by the sheriff and City under the California Public Records Act.

2008-2009 spreadsheet, by sheriff

Mar. 2008 - Jan. 2012 RedFlex reports:

AMBE
BEAM
BVHE
BVIN
BVMA
BVSE
D701
D703
GTSE [13]
HEBV
HESI
INBV
LPSE
PAAM
PAPA
SELP

Feb. 2012 - Oct. 2012 RedFlex reports
Nov. 2012 - Apr. 2013 RedFlex reports
May 2013 - Mar. 2014 RedFlex reports
Mar. 2009 - July 2014 RedFlex reports
Aug. 2014 - Jan. 2015 RedFlex reports
Jan. 2015 - Mar. 2015 RedFlex reports
Apr. 2015 - June 2015 RedFlex reports

Footnotes:

[  ] indicates a footnote.
[1]  Except where noted otherwise, totals are as provided by the City.
[2]  The 2015 projection is based upon Jan. - May 2015.
[3]  Un-used columns are to allow for later expansion of City's system.
[4]  Except where noted otherwise, the figures given in the table are for the single calendar month indicated.  Any figures in red type (or, if you are looking at this table in black and white, the upper figure when there are two or more figures in a cell) are what RedFlex calls Total Violations, or all incidents recorded by the cameras.  The figures in black type are what RedFlex calls Notices Printed, and represent the sum of genuine citations issued (those filed with the court) plus any Nominations mailed (not filed with the court, a.k.a. Snitch Tickets). Due to time limitations data may have been posted to the table only for selected months or locations.  If there is sufficient public interest, the remaining months or locations will be posted.  Full official data has been received and is available at one of the links given above.
[5]  Monthly data was requested on:
[6]  The camera enforcement is believed to be on traffic on the first-named street, but the direction of enforcement (north, south, east, west, thru, left, right) is not yet available.
[8]  Data for this month, and the total for this month, is from a spreadsheet (see link above) created by the sheriff and received by highwayrobbery.net on 4-24-09.
[9]  The total for this month or year (or the projected annual total) was calculated by highwayrobbery.net.
[10] There is no total shown for this month as data was not requested for all cameras active during the month.
[11]  The title bar has been repeated solely for the convenience of the reader - there is no difference between it and the one at the top of the table.
[12]  Data for this month has not been requested.
[13]  In June 2012 a staff report in another city revealed (see bottom of page 2-3) that CalTrans had revoked an encroachment permit issued to the City of Victorville for a camera at D & 7th.  Later, CalTrans withdrew the revocation, and in March 2013 the City restarted the camera.
[14] The report for this month is available at one of the links above but there is no total posted for this month as the reports for some early months were not requested until 2014 - by which time six of the cameras had been shut down and evidently dropped from the database.

City of Victorville Docs Set # 2
"Late Time" Graphs

The City provided bar graphs of Late Times, etcetera.  Or, an equivalent table.
These graphs (or tables) track violations recorded, not tickets issued.
Where there is a large number of long Late Time violations in a curb lane, it is believed to indicate heavy ticketing on right turns.
(The curb lane will be the lane with the highest lane number.)


The picture above is an example from another city.

July 2008:

AMBE
BEAM
BVHE
BVIN
BVMA
BVSE
GTSE
HEBV
HESI
INBV
LPSE
SELP

July 2009 (big file)

July 2011:

AMBE
BEAM
BVHE
BVIN
BVMA
D701
D703
GTSE
HEBV
HESI

July 2014 (all cameras except BVHE)

Bar graphs are available for more than fifty other cities - see the list in the expanded version of Defect # 9.

City of Victorville Docs Set # 3
Short Yellows?  Short Greens?

This July 2009 article said that some of Victorville's yellows were set too short.  The follow-up article mentioned is not available on the 'net, but it said:
"The Daily Press has found that the majority are exactly at the legal limit, while a couple are a fraction of a second below what they should be.  The light for drivers heading south on Amargosa Road through Bear Valley Road, for example, repeatedly measures 3.5 seconds when it should be 3.6 seconds."
The Daily Press did not reveal how it measured the length of the yellows, or the identity of any other intersection(s) with short yellows.

This Mar. 2015 comment on an article in the Daily Press suggests that some of the greens are too short.

"I think the signal at Bear Valley and Amargosa is a joke. If you are leaving Walmart toward Palmdale Road on Amargosa and wait forever for the red light to turn green only two or three cars get through before it turns red again. I counted (I was there long enough) the light stayed green six seconds. GREEN! Thousand one, thousand two, thousand three, thousand four, thousand five, thousand six --> RED. You're stuck there again. Unbelievable, a four year old could do better at traffic engineering."




City of Victorville Docs Set # 4
Contract is Cost Neutral, Way Over-Priced, City Owes RedFlex $1.7 Million

Closed June 30, 2015

Like the cities of Baldwin Park, Capitola, Citrus Heights, Highland, South San Francisco and Walnut, Victorville failed to hold the formal public hearing required by CVC 21455.6 before it approved the original contract in Oct. 2007 - see the expanded version of Defect # 6.

The original contract would have expired in Mar. 2013.

On March 16, 2010 the city council approved a contract amendment ( signed copy ) to remove six low-performing cameras and to extend the term of the contract, making the new expiration occur in either March or June 2015.  During the extension the City will continue to pay $6000 per month rent for each of the ten remaining cameras - a total of $1.4 million over the (approx.) 24 months added by the amendment. 
Other cities which extended their contracts agreed to pay roughly $3000 per month per camera.  For example, Ventura renewed their 18 cameras at $1800 per month, Santa Clarita renewed their ten cameras at $4000 per month, Garden Grove renewed their 14 cameras at $2900 per month, South Gate renewed their 14 cameras at $2829 per month,  Escondido renewed their 15 cameras at $2833 per month, and Gardena renewed their ten cameras at $3500 per month. 

For more info about how much other cities pay, and how some of them negotiated their lower prices, see FAQ # 17.

It has been suggested that the City's agreement to pay the above-market rent during the extension was necessary to gain RedFlex' agreement to remove the six cameras.  In the original contract Section 6.2 (deleted by the 2010 amendment) allowed the City to terminate for convenience during the first year and set out a formula for calculating the exact cost of removal.  If we use that formula, the $146,287 payment to Redflex (provided for in the amendment) should have been enough to compensate Redflex for the removal, leaving no need to further compensate them by extending the contract, much less paying the above-market $6000 rent (an extra $700,000) during the extension.

The 2010 contract amendment did not remove the cost neutrality clause.  City invoices and spreadsheets received here in May 2013 showed that the City had underpaid RedFlex $1.3 million and owed the company that amount.  Later invoices and spreadsheets showed that by Nov. 2014 the amount underpaid had risen to $1.7 million.

The contract amendment includes the automatic renewal of the contract, in 2015. 
(Contract renewal should never be automatic!)


Closed June 30, 2015

At the council meeting of Mar. 17, 2015 the sheriff presented accident and financial figures claiming, among other things, an amazing 92% decrease in accidents.  Safer Streets LA submitted a report critical of those accident figures, highwayrobbery.net submitted a letter critical of the accident figures as well as the contract price, and some local residents spoke at the meeting.
The council voted 4 - 1 (Kennedy, nay) to cancel the contract. 

On Mar. 19 the Victorville Daily Press published an editorial in favor of the cameras.  In that editorial they repeated the sheriff's claim of a 92% reduction of accidents, without questioning it.

On Aug. 24 the Daily Press published an article saying that a contractor had taken out a permit to do the work to remove the cameras.  Prior to hearing that good news, here is the warning highwayrobbery.net posted here on this page:
 
"Despite that (4 - 1) vote, later on there could be another council discussion about negotiating a new contract, perhaps with fewer cameras.  Victorville area residents will need to remain vigilant, because red light cameras can be switched back on overnight, so long as the camera housings remain in place.  For that reason, and because visible red light camera equipment can cause rear-end accidents, Victorville residents should encourage the City to require RedFlex to remove the equipment immediately after the June 30 expiration date. "
"A recent example of a City which has been slow to remove its cameras is Oceanside, where the cameras continued to flash for at least a month after ticketing ended.  Oceanside's correspondence with RedFlex suggests that the company encouraged that slowness.  (See Set # 2 on the Oceanside Docs page.)"

Even with the removal of the camera equipment, Victorville's camera nightmare won't be over.  The contract requires that for a year after the June 2015 termination date, the City has to give RedFlex whatever fine money comes in from the court - to pay down the $1.7 million outstanding balance.

The listing of contracts and amendments above was up-to-date as of Mar. 2015.

City of Victorville Docs Set # 5
Who Gets the Tickets?

The sheriff's report for the Mar. 17, 2015 council meeting (available at link in Set # 4, above) included a pie chart showing that 73% of the tickets go to visitors to town.





City of Victorville Docs Set # 6
2011:  Class Action

The cameras were discussed (staff report) at the Mar. 1, 2011 Victorville City Council meeting, and private-sector attorney Brandon Wood agreed to work with the City to attempt to find a way for the City to end its contract with Redflex. 
  By April 27, the city attorney had made multiple attempts to contact Wood, to no avail.
On Dec. 14, 2011 there was an article indicating a possible class action suit by attorney Robert Conaway, and in Mar. 2015 that suit was dismissed by the court.





City of Victorville Docs Set # 7
Appeal Victories

In Dec. 2010 and June 2012 Victorville defendants won appeals on their tickets.  For more details, go here and see the Macias and Winters cases.




City of Victorville Docs Set # 8
More Coming?

There may be some more Victorville information posted in the next few weeks.  Mark your calendar to remind you to come back here and look!



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