What if someone offered you $1.5 million to bolt a digital camera and a radar gun to a pole? Meet Redflex Traffic Systems, Inc., the for-profit company that makes about $90 each time the City of Scottsdale collects on a photo radar ticket.

Scottsdale attorney Susan Kayler alleges that the Redflex profit motive poses a conflict of interest. “The same company that testifies to your speeding in court makes money off the verdict,” she said. “That’s a conflict of interest.”

But money isn’t the only issue that may slow photo radar down. Kayler, nationally recognized as a legal expert on photo radar, questions the legality of its existence in Arizona in the first place. What’s more, a band of police officers and highway patrolmen say it could be lethal, particularly on the Loop 101, and the Arizona chapter of the Automobile Association of America (AAA) agrees.

In addition to the coalition of highway patrolmen who oppose the use of photo radar, particularly on the Loop 101, a number of citizens are concerned by the sudden braking often caused when drivers spot the cameras.

“Almost everyone who sees photo radar slams on their brakes,” Kayler said. “One federal safety study showed that speed itself isn’t dangerous. Speed variance is dangerous,” she added. “The danger is when vehicles slow down. What we’re finding with photo radar is that everyone hits their brakes.”

But city officials insist the photo radar program, including the non-photo, electronic sensor units, are intended for safety and safety alone. For years, the City of Scottsdale has produced statistics showing the cameras are slowing drivers and that the overall number of collisions is decreasing. The city’s conclusion was that collisions decreased as a direct result of photo radar.

Skeptics pointed out that the correlation of the statistics did not imply causation. To date, the City of Scottsdale offers no direct proof that the photo radar program has directly saved lives in Scottsdale. But city officials point to documentation that proves their point literally around the world.

A study in Britain, citing years of records, concluded that both collisions and fatalities at camera locations had decreased by 40 percent. A similar study in Australia found a 23 percent decrease in fatality crashes.

From Britain and Australia to Paradise Valley, photo radar has often been flogged for the significant revenues generated by speeding fines. The City of Scottsdale collected $1.7 million in fines last year, but city officials insist Scottsdale’s photo radar program is all about safety. In fact, they say the program has lost money in recent years.

One mathematical speculation of the two cameras on Frank Lloyd Wright Blvd. concluded that one location alone could yield $15 million in fines annually. Bruce Kalin of the Scottsdale Police Department said that such formulas were flawed and overly-simplistic.

“A reduction in collisions, deaths, injuries and property damage is the City of Scottsdale’s one and only goal [for the program],” Kayler said. “Photo enforcement technology has been in use throughout the world for 30 years. Everywhere it is used, it has the desired effect of reducing speeding and collisions,” he added.

Opponents say safety has not been directly tied to photo radar in the Valley. Similarly, they suggest that photo radar programs around the world make money, and therefore Scottsdale’s will too. The same British study that found a decrease in fatality accidents concluded that the government made roughly ___170 million (roughly $306 million USD) on the program.

Statistically, the city should eventually turn a profit on its photo radar program. But Kalin points out that each fine is divvied up between the subcontractor, the state and then the city. He cites this as the reason Scottsdale lost $36,000 on photo radar last year.

But most opponents agree. The value of life cannot be measured in dollars. Should Scottsdale prove a direct causation of lives saved by the photo radar program, the protestors will doubtlessly recant their crying. Until then, brakelight-leery commuters, large-government skeptics and heavy-footed drivers will continue crying “foul photo.”