Oakbrook Terrace continues to rake in considerable revenue from red-light camera violations at 22nd Street and Route 83, while there has been no final ruling in a lawsuit filed in June 2022 by the city.
After being ordered by the Illinois Department of Transportation in May 2022 to deactivate, and then remove, the cameras, Oakbrook Terrace filed its lawsuit, claiming that IDOT overstepped its authority with the order for the cameras used for southbound traffic on Route 83 and eastbound traffic on 22nd Street, just outside of Oakbrook Center.
Oakbrook Terrace claimed it was issued a needed permit by IDOT for the installation of the red-light cameras, but that once the system was installed, IDOT has no authority to regulate operation.
Judge Craig Belford in August 2022 denied an IDOT motion to dismiss Oakbrook Terrace’s motion to stay the IDOT decision. Oakbrook Terrace was authorized to reactivate the red-light cameras, pending the final disposition of the case, which was continued in December 2022 to May.
Information in a response to a Freedom of Information Act request from The Doings to Oakbrook Terrace revealed that the city collected just under $278,000 from red-light camera violations for the months of September, October and November. The amount of revenue collected from violations in December 2022 and January wasn’t available because those violations have not yet been reconciled.
A breakdown of the revenue from those three months shows $8,298 collected in September, $124,411 in October and $145,284 in November. Oakbrook Terrace collected more than $12 million in revenue from violations in the just under five years of operation leading up to IDOT’s direction to deactivate.
The total number of citations issued for red-light camera violations between Aug. 22, 2022, after Belford’s order allowed the cameras to be turned back on, and Dec. 31, 2022, comes to an average of about 82 each day. Of those, two-thirds have occurred on the right-turn lanes.
The FOIA response noted that it wasn’t possible to determine whether a citation was issued for making a right turn on red without making a complete stop and that it can only be determined in what lane a violation occurred.
In total, there were 10,814 citations issued for red-light camera violations between Aug. 22 and Dec. 31, 2022. Of those, 7,210 occurred on the right turn lanes.
Village Board member Michael Manzo, who from the beginning has been the most outspoken Oak Brook official against red-light cameras, said it’s an obvious financial benefit to Oakbrook Terrace that the case is continued for as long as possible because the revenue from violations will far exceed the cost of litigation.
“That’s true, regardless of the final outcome,” Manzo said. “And it’s another reminder that red-light cameras are all about revenue and definitely not about safety.
“”The Oakbrook Terrace red-light cameras have always been about the money, with the specter of safety used as a red herring for the corruption used to line the pockets of a select few. Oakbrook Terrace claiming the red-light cameras are about safety is laughable.”
Oak Brook Police Chief Brian Strockis said his department’s data tabulation demonstrated that the red-light cameras do not make the Route 83/22nd Street intersection any safer for the motoring public, and in fact make it less safe.
“The red light cameras are obviously lucrative for Oakbrook Terrace, but the idea that they increase public safety is statistically invalid,” he said.
The corruption Manzo and other Oak Brook officials have talked about, regarding the red-light cameras, involved multiple people.
Martin Sandoval, former chair of the state’s Transportation Committee, pleaded guilty in January 2020 to bribery and tax charges. Sandoval died in December 2020.
The charges against Sandoval stemmed from his involvement with SafeSpeed, a red-light camera operator. Sandoval admitted in federal court to taking more than a combined quarter of a million dollars in bribes in exchange for his political influence or official action, including at least $70,000 in from a SafeSpeed representative who was working with authorities. SafeSpeed installed and operates Oakbrook Terrace cameras.
Others, including former Oakbrook Terrace Mayor Tony Ragucci, have been charged in connection with the red-light cameras.
According to federal prosecutors, the year before the cameras became operational, Ragucci was paid off as part of a scheme in which the red-light camera firm paid a 14% commission on revenue generated on the cameras to another firm it had hired as a “sales consultant” to get village business. That consulting firm’s officials then paid a portion of the commission to Ragucci, first $3,500 a month, then an amount based on how much cash the cameras generated, prosecutors alleged.
Ragucci also directly accepted $12,500 cash from an official of the red-light camera firm as contracts were renewed, unaware that the official was secretly working with federal investigators on a wide-ranging corruption probe, prosecutors alleged.
“These cameras facilitate the City of Oakbrook Terrace’s ability to fund their legal case through use of the ever accruing motorists fines, meanwhile the Village of Oak Brook continues to fight the good fight for removal without any such self-funding mechanism,” Village Manager Greg Summers said.
Chuck Fieldman is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.