Traffic scofflaws owe provincial municipalities more than $1 billion in unpaid speeding tickets and it is time to pay up, says the Ontario Association of Police Services Boards.
The drive by heist of revenue from lead foots, red light runners and illegal turners on roads in this province - actually $1,048,607,020.80 and counting – appeared to catch the cash-strapped Liberal government off guard.
“It’s a heck of a lot of money,” said Attorney General Chris Bentley, whose government is $19.7 billion in the hole and looking for ways to climb out from under the historic debt load. “Any amount of money that is owed by somebody is money we obviously want to collect for revenue reasons and for good enforcement reasons.”
Surprisingly, there is simply no mechanism to make people pay their speeding fines – especially those living out of the province, said Alok Mukherjee, president of the board, which governs local police departments. You can’t get arrested for getting a slew of speeding tickets, he added.
“You lose points … you can have your license suspended but you get it back,” he said. “Unless the consequences create a deterrent there is no incentive for people to pay because the consequences are pretty limited right now.”
The problem of unpaid fines was brought to the attention of the attorney general and Minister of Community Safety Rick Bartolucci by the police services boards at Queen’s Park on Monday.
There is no effective measure to get people to pay other than using a collection agency, said Henry Jensen of the Ottawa Police Services Board.
“If there is a lack of teeth in a statute to enforce collection, people are not going to pay,” he said.
That is not the case with unpaid parking tickets in Toronto. If motorists don’t pay those they can’t register their vehicle annually. The same holds true for those who do not pay outstanding Highway 407 road toll charges.
“We have a mechanism to deal with people who don’t pay for the 407 – they don’t get their plates,” said Mukherjee who is also chair of the Toronto Police Services Board. “So why should it be otherwise in terms of municipal bylaws and the provincial offences act and so on?”
Many who owe are vacationers from out of province or the United States who ignore the tickets when they leave, he added.
“You could get a speeding ticket in one part of the 401, you ignore it and keep driving,” he said. “You get a second one and ignore it, you could get three tickets, keep driving and throw them out and leave the province. How is anyone to collect it?”
Some U.S. troopers have the ability to charge foreign motorists and demand payment on the spot. That could be a method of collection used here.
The total value of uncollected fines is continuing to rise to unacceptable levels and lax laws undermine traffic enforcement and highway safety, board members say. Not to mention municipalities are without a lot of money, which translates into higher taxes.
“Who is losing out?” asked Jensen. “The taxpayer - you.”
The attorney general says the government has given the municipalities a number of tools to deal with unpaid tickets, said Mukherjee. But the government has also asked the association to further study the issue, try and find solutions and report back.
Transportation Minister Kathleen Wynne was surprised by the $1 billion amount. “It is unacceptable, obviously,” she said.
Wynne admits she is figuring out a better way for the province to get their hands on the dough. “I’ll be working with my colleague ministers to determine if there is anything else we should be doing,” she said.
NDP MPP Peter Kormos (Welland) called the figure “remarkable.”
“It is shocking licences aren’t being suspended for unpaid fines,” he said.
Out of province offenders need to be dealt with by way of reciprocal agreements with other jurisdictions, he said.
But Progressive Conservative MPP Bill Murdoch (Bruce-Grey-Owen Sound) wonders “who is going to shoot all the bad dogs?”
While he is not supportive of speeding, he said the province is awash with laws – over 500,000 laws and regulations – and there is simply a lack of people around to enforce them all.
“Who will you hire to do it?” he asked. “There should be some laws, there is no doubt about that, but we’ve become a province of too many of them.”
A red-tape commission is needed to clean up all the unnecessary laws before other issues are dealt with, he said.
Delegates from the police boards also spoke to MPPs and opposition parties to discuss other public safety issues such as the need to update the Police Services Act, court security, police governance and training and the illegal use of prescription narcotics.
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