The fine line: Should low-income drivers pay less when they break the law?

Last fall, I got the dreaded envelope in the mail from the D.C. Department of Motor Vehicles. I didn’t even have to open it to know what it was: a ticket from one of the city’s many traffic cameras. 

I had been caught going 36 in a 25 mph zone. I repeated every possible excuse to myself: It was a new camera and on a wide roadway, and there were no pedestrians or cyclists around, and I swear I’m a great driver! But at the end of the day, the truth had been caught on camera. For my transgression (one that’s infrequent, I swear), I had to pay a $100 fine. It sucked, but it was manageable. Both my wife and I work, so a rare $100 ticket isn’t going to break the bank.

But it’s also true that for someone else, it very well might. The median household income among D.C.’s white residents is close to $170,000, outpacing every other racial group. (For Latinos it’s $119,000, for Asians $112,000, and for the city’s Black residents $60,000.) At the city’s prevailing minimum wage of $17.50, that $100 is almost six hours of work. That fine could be groceries for the week or school supplies. And if it isn’t paid within 30 days, the fine doubles — only compounding the financial pain.

In an attempt to bring some equity to the fines doled out by D.C.’s growing army of traffic cameras, the city will test a new concept this spring: offering low-income drivers a 50 percent discount on the fines. When a person gets a ticket for the full amount, they can apply for the reduction if they meet the requirements. 

The thinking goes that what a $100 fine might mean to me in the form of punishment and future deterrence, a $50 fine could be the same to someone of more modest means. 

“Certain people make less money, and the same fine amount could be more of a financial burden for some households than others,” says Charlie Willson, the director of the Vision Zero traffic safety office in the D.C. Department of Transportation.

As outlined by the D.C. DMV, which issues the tickets and collects the fines, the city’s test program would be simple: Any D.C. driver who qualifies for food benefits (for a family of four, that’s a household making less than $3,250 a month) and gets a ticket from a traffic camera could apply for the 50 percent discount on the fine. 

But it’s also not an open-ended offer. Drivers can only apply for the discount once, and it only counts for tickets that have fines of $100 or less associated with them: speeding 11-15 mph over the limit, turning right on a red light where it’s forbidden, rolling through a stop sign, parking in a bus zone, and driving in a bus-only lane. The city plans to run the test for 120 days or until they get 3,000 takers, after which the results will be studied — looking specifically at ticket payment rates and the number of re-offenders — and future options assessed. 

D.C.’s pilot is a relatively novel concept: only Washington state does something similar, while in California and Portland, Oregon, low-income drivers are allowed to opt for traffic safety classes or community service in lieu of paying a fine. An alternate model made famous in Finland – where the fine increases the wealthier the driver is – was passed over for D.C., since it would be more logistically complicated.

The idea for D.C.’s pilot was first floated last year in a report from a mayoral task force on equity in D.C.’s traffic camera program. And it ties into growing concern nationwide that as more cameras are used to catch traffic scofflaws, the fines associated with them – which produce some $250 million in annual revenue for D.C. coffers – could be disproportionately harming low-income residents.

“You don’t want a road safety tool to be inadvertently exacerbating another harm or inequity,” says Leah Shahum, the executive director of the Vision Zero Network, which works to end traffic fatalities and recently produced a 32-page report on how equity considerations should be factored into traffic camera programs like D.C.’s.

Still, there are concerns that absent other efforts to change dangerous driving behavior, simply cutting certain drivers a break on their fines won’t do enough to make the city’s streets safer. 

“This recognizes the disparity in the cost of a ticket for a low-income household. But it does not focus on safer driving, and that’s where it doesn’t go far enough,” says Ward 6 Councilmember Charles Allen, who chairs the D.C. Council’s transportation committee. “It focuses on paying the ticket and moving on, not having a safer driver.”

What’s fine anyhow?

D.C. has had traffic cameras for more than two decades, starting in 1999 with a small network of cameras to catch red light runners and growing into what’s now almost 500 cameras targeting all manner of bad behavior: speeding, running, or rolling through stop signs, driving in bus-only lanes, and so on. (They now spit out more than 1.5 million tickets every year.)

The city wasn’t only an early adopter of the technology but has probably expanded its use more aggressively than many other cities and states across the country. “D.C. has had one of the longest-standing programs in the U.S.,” says Jessica Cicchino, a senior vice president for behavior and infrastructure research at the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS). “It’s well-established and robust.”

At the same time, the conversation on traffic cameras and equity has been percolating in D.C. for years. As far back as 2012, local officials and experts were debating what fine levels would best deter bad driving while not seeming excessively punitive, and in 2018 the D.C. Council passed a bill to stop fines from doubling if not paid within 30 days – largely because of the disproportionate hit that can have on low-income households. (The bill never went into effect because it was never funded, though.) And in 2022, the council changed the law so that outstanding fines wouldn’t stop someone from renewing their driver’s license. 

Cicchino and other experts agree that traffic cameras improve road safety, but she notes one unresolved issue: “There’s not a magic number” for the ideal fine amount to both deter bad driving and ensure fairness.

In D.C., fines start at $100 for speeding 11-15 mph over the limit, turning right on a red light where it’s forbidden, rolling through a stop sign, parking in a bus zone, or driving in a bus-only lane. The fines for speeding increase thereafter depending on how fast you’re going – topping out at $400-$500 for 25 mph over – while running a red light gets you $150, and passing a school bus with flashing lights is $500. 

In New York City, though, any speeding or running a red light caught on camera is a flat $50 fine. In Montgomery County, just north of D.C., speeding is $40, and running a red light is $75. (Denver is the same.) In Arlington County, running a red light is $50, while speeding is $100 – but only in school zones. In San Francisco, fines for speeding are roughly half of what they are in D.C.

Experts say that in setting fines, localities are trying to enact some meaningful form of punishment and deterrence at once: how much would make someone think twice about speeding or running a red light again? But there is a flip side: If a fine is set too high, would that prevent someone from being able to pay it and potentially cause them to see the cameras as little more than a cash grab by the government?

“Public acceptance is really important for safety cameras. There’s the perception they are there to line the city’s budget instead of safety. Trying to put some safeguards in place for equity could improve public perception of the cameras,” says Cicchino.

“We know that a $100 ticket for someone with a $100,000 salary is dramatically different than how it hits someone with a $30,000 salary,” adds Shahum. “It makes common sense to think about that.”

‘It’s about using all the tools’

Allen, the Ward 6 councilmember, appreciates the intention behind the city testing reduced fines for low-income drivers. But he says that alone won’t go far enough in targeting the worst offenders and helping drive down the growing number of roadway deaths in D.C. – which have been disproportionately felt in low-income neighborhoods with majority Black residents.

“For the person racking up tens of thousands of dollars in speeding tickets, there’s no one-time reduction in a ticket that will change their behavior,” he says. “We need other tools for accountability. That person is a dangerous driver and it will take more extreme measures to change their behavior.”

Last year, the council passed a bill authored by Allen that he says takes a step in that direction. One provision allows D.C.’s attorney general to sue out-of-state drivers who rack up tickets and don’t pay the fines. The first lawsuits were filed last week, targeting three Maryland drivers with a combined 226 traffic tickets worth more than $90,000 in fines. The city will soon be able to start installing speed governors – devices that limit how fast a car can go – on the vehicles owned by people convicted of criminal reckless driving. 

But other provisions of Allen’s bill remain unfunded. One would have assessed points on a driver’s license for getting traffic camera tickets, similar to what happens if a police officer pulls you over. Another would allow drivers to take driver safety classes in lieu of paying up to $500 worth of fines.

Allen says he’ll continue focusing on making D.C.’s traffic camera program more efficient. “It matters a lot less how much the ticket is. It’s the certainty you will get one and how quickly you will get it. That’s what changes behavior,” he says. (D.C. now allows drivers to sign up for real-time notifications of any tickets they have gotten, instead of having to wait for the dreaded envelope in the mail.)

For its part, D.C. has started more aggressively booting and towing cars with a large number of unpaid tickets. And just this week, it created two designated safety corridors on New York Avenue NE and South Capitol Street, where additional steps (including more police presence) will be taken to prevent dangerous driving.

For Cicchino of the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, reducing fines for low-income drivers can be one step towards emphasizing equity in traffic safety – but it should be one of many.

“When it comes to equity,” she says, “It’s about using all the tools to stop speeding: looking at roadway design, having more separated bike lanes, looking at roads in parts of the city with the most speeding and prioritizing fixing those.”