Citizens caught on speed cameras will see black marks on credit ratings

CEDAR RAPIDS - Red-light runners and speeders who don't pay their tickets after being caught by the city's enforcement cameras will see their unpaid fines turned into black marks on their credit ratings.

In making that recommendation to the City Council on Tuesday, the council's Procurement Committee expressed surprise that the city had not in the past used the credit-rating threat to get those owing the city money to pay up.

Casey Drew, the city's finance director, said the city has been willing to send unpaid bills to collection agencies, but he said it has stopped short of allowing collection agencies to use the hit to a person's credit as a way to collect bills.

Council member Kris Gulick said the city should let the collection agencies it contracts with use “all the tools available to them.”

Drew said it's clear that the city's system of enforcement cameras, which have generated some $700,000 in fines this year, would result in many unpaid fines. It made sense, he said, to beef up the city's collection policy now rather than wait until the fresh unpaid fines turned into old ones.

Police Chief Greg Graham told the committee that the city's camera enforcement program is having plenty of success in reducing crashes and in generating speeding and red-light violations, but he agreed that “significant” numbers of people are not paying the fines. Other cities refer such unpaid fines to credit-reporting agencies, he said.

“If there's no teeth behind forcing people to pay the fines, there's no deterrent at all. So there's no sense in having the cameras up,” the chief said.

Council and committee member Don Karr said the city ought to do what it can to collect the fines.

“If you break the law in our community, you should be held accountable,” Karr said.

Gulick suggested that the city send those with unpaid fines a letter saying that the failure to pay will hurt their credit ratings. The the collection agency can be called in to repeat the message, he said.