Photo radar contractor decides where most enforcement happens, Winnipeg police say

Category: Traffic Engineering and Safety

  • Photo radar contractor decides where most enforcement happens, Winnipeg police say

    The operators with for profit Traffic Safe Solutions who are contracted by for profit Conduent have regularly said ‘we only go where WPS tells us to go” when told they enforcing unlawfully in locations with missing signage, where no work being done on the actual lanes for traffic, the zone extended longer than permitted or required, speed limits artificially lowered or enforing unfairly when no workers present.

    The current an past Winnipeg Mayors, City Councils and Provincial Governments since 2003 have not enforced the Conditions of Authority for Photo Enforcement which is grounds for the program to be terminated.

    The elected and appointed officials that have allowed this or turned a blind eye seem to only care about the $70 Million or more per year taken from drives and be vehicle owners. The Province gets 50% of this “safety” revenue which is arguably unlawful taxation as fines. The City gets 25% and WPS gets 25% after paying its for profit partner.

    Many of the photo enforcement “safety” programs / schemes like this in other jurisdictions have been proven to be involved in corruption with serveral resulting in investigations and convictions including up to 10 years in prison for public officials.

    This and the fact the programs and technology have repeatedly been proven to not improve safety or make it worse is why it banned in many places.

    https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/winnipeg-photo-enforcement-locations-1.5617380

  • WPS pension changes and off topic but important comment and response

    Nov 6 2019 – Concerned Citizens of Winnipeg and Manitoba

    Find comment below from article and post about City of Winnipeg plans to change the police pension bylaw to make the pension more sustainable using the new Provincial public sector pension and benefits legislation. Mainly change City / taxpayers contributions from 18% to match employee contributions of 8%, require 20 years service and age 60 for full pension and remove pensionable overtime.

    For more info, comments and discussion see

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    “I would not mind nearly as much if:

    -They weren’t committing fraud with drawings in court.
    -They were on top of crime instead of sleeping in cars with photo radar.
    -They were properly testing their devices and ACTUALLY only interested in ticketing bad or dangerous drivers.
    -They would post people randomly in high theft areas, like grocery stores, liquor marts, etc instead of on busses and corners looking for phones (but even that is acceptable to me if it’s about safety and not revenue).”

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    Response

    , the hand written Designated Construction Zone diagrams, sleeping in photo enforcement vehicles is WPS’s for profit “partner” Conduent (formely Xerox / Lockheed Martin / ACS) but they claim to get direction from WPS on where to “enforce”.

    The breaches of charter, due process and other legal rights plus ignoring of codes of conduct, professional standards, sworn oaths, ethics etc… when issuing “violations” during pretrial and in Provincial “Offenses” ‘court” aka SCC / Traffic or kangaroo court” by the Crown, JJP’s, operators and officers is the result of the past Selinger led SpeNDP, current Pallister led PC governments, Katz and Bowman led City and Administrations, WPS Chiefs McCaskill, Clunnis and Smyth, the Police Boards plus the Judiciary (Chief Justices) choosing the 50% Province, 25% City and 25% WPS / Conduent shares / cuts in traffic “safety” revenue over proper engineering, safety, public trust, respect, confidence and econmic growth / legit tax revenue.

    This abuse, extortion or government sanctioned taxation as fines involves over $70,000,000 per year taken from mostly safety conscious drivers and vehicle owners.

    A similar sanctioned racket or flawed and biased “enforcement” revenue stream happening with for profit partner G4S and the Winnipeg parking “authority” which involves over $40,000,000 per year.

    Combined this equates to over $450,000,000 per year or 5,000,000,000 since 2003 (when the priority became more about revenue) taken from the economy and economic growth with velocity of money.

    Low income individuals and families hit the hardest with the fine option taken away to pay with community service and MPI in on the racket with officer issued “offenses” and licenses and insurance penalties plus suspension of license or preventing renewal till payment

  • Shout out to two WPS Officers

    WiseUpWinnipeg is a group of volunteer advocates for the public, for police officers and other public servants doing their job and helping restore the respect they deserve.

    Please thank these two officers and please share on your page. Link prefered so the public and officers can see all the praise and comments.

    https://www.facebook.com/groups/WiseUpWinnipeg/permalink/10155742276671222/

  • Response to ForASaferWinnipeg and CTV News coverage of more meth violence

    WPS Chief Danny Smyth said police doing foot patrols in Downtown Winnipeg skywalks are seizing more weapons – CTV News

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    Important call to all WiseUpWinnipeg members and the general public viewing that care about policing in Winnipeg and the high rate of serious crimes which are rising in Winnipeg while they drop in almost all of Canada.

    The Winnipeg Police Association run Facebook Page ForASaferWinnipeg is often posting about the issues in Winnipeg and WPS Chief Smyth like here is commenting about them but they are not reminded enough of how serious crime was allowed to get so bad in Winnipeg while it controlled in other jurisdictions with similar demographics, population, funding, less police officers and staff per capita and other factors.

    Has the meth crisis been made worse by the opioid epidemic which was also allowed to grow and get worse as a result of poor regulation, decision making and influence at the federal, provincial and municipal levels? When the restrictions on OxyContin and other opioids finally started being enforced and created it caused many addicts, dealers and organized crime to turn to more deadly fentanyl and dangerous Meth. Much of this was out of the hands of WPS but there was things they could have done and can do to try and reign it in while the other levels start taking for actions.

    Please see this post and my response. If you agree interact with it and add your own comments. Once this done more often and on more places those in authority will not be able to mislead the public.

    https://www.facebook.com/ForASaferWinnipeg/posts/401520900684193

    Officers seizing more weapons in Downtown Winnipeg skywalks due to meth: police chief
    Monday, March 11, 2019 5:24PM CST – Jeff Keele, Political Reporter – @jeffkeelectv

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    The meth crisis, the violence and serious crime associated with it is very concerning

    Would it have helped if there wasn’t years of diverting officers from community support and other important units to do traffic enforcement or volunteer to work pensionable OT to do traffic enforcement? Aka revenue collection to offset 85% of total police budget (Over $233 Million) going to salaries, pension contributions and other benefits. The over-staffing and inefficiency well documented in many FIPPA request results and Ombudsman complaints, in the 64 page detailed report from Fraser Institute in 2014 and annual compensation disclosure reports.

    These not only ignored but matters only got worse until the Province put pressure on the City and WPS in the last two years to be more fiscally responsible and restore spending to sustainable levels after years of double digit budget increases, pension bailouts, many CBA’s that didn’t consider what the City and Taxpayers could afford. False and misleading statements from the WPA and WPS leaders with the facts exposed via FIPPA requests and Ombudsman complaints. The response from WPS and the Police Board was lay off a few officers that were part of two serious crime units that were partnering with RCMP resources and had many successes tackling serious and organized crime which resulted in these being shutdown.

    It especially concerning that many officers directed to or choosing to aggressively enforce in locations with known, created and often dangerous traffic engineering deficiencies like short 4 second amber times in medium and high speed intersections with no Advanced Warning Flashers causing large dilemma zone and high number of rear end and related collisions. Missing, removed or obscured signage including dual signage on large or divided roads for speed limits, speed reductions and photo enforcement ahead signs on the blvd. Artificially reduced speed limits like Grant Ave, Kenaston, Panet Rd and others where were lowered or left lower against recommendations from City engineers and PWD Directors, national standards for safety and many calls from WiseUpWinnipeg and other public advocacy groups to correct.

    It also very concerning that Project Drive exposed via FIPPA results where officers diverted or asked to work pensionable OT on traffic duty with net loss to the public (over $1 Million in fines issues but over $1 Million in OT) plus more when considering pensionable OT doing traffic duty, for other units left short staffed after diverting and in traffic court.

    Then $.5 Million diverted to WPS from MPI overcharges in 2016-17 instead of refunding as required by the MPI act and mandate as part of the MPI, CoW, WPS and CAA Pilot “Safety Program” to do “enhanced enforcement” in Winnipeg’s most dangerous intersections like Bishop Grandin and McGillvary that diverted officers from community support and other important units to do traffic enforcement or volunteer to work pensionable OT to do traffic enforcement. Photos of WPS marked and unmarked cars parked unlawfully and unsafely on the meridian, crosswalk, meridian, bus lane, merge or exit lanes.

    The lighted board warning of dangerous intersections again only up for a couple weeks but enhanced enforcement went on for over a year until the FIPPA results exposed what the real priority was. Senior WPS John Burchill saying “the funds needed to counter the City trying to reduce our budget” (actually trying to reign in out of control spending) “and we hope the “data” will allow more funding in the future”. MPI program coordinator saying there wasn’t enough violations issued for the investment. In other words not enough demerit related revenue to even make up for the investment never mind the expected surplus.

    There is many more examples well documented and raised to the attention of those in authority at WPS, the City and Province. Who is influencing the decision makers that have the authority a responsibility to correct these serious issues?

    More here https://yaworski.net/2016/09/10/mpic-diverting-millions-to-police-for-safety-initiatives-most-of-which-are-a-waste-and-actually-putting-the-public-at-risk/
    , www.wiseupwinnipeg.com and www.facebook.com/Groups/WiseUpWinnipeg

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    Post on WiseUpWinnipeg
    https://www.facebook.com/groups/WiseUpWinnipeg/permalink/10155742518501222/

    Post on ForASaferWinnipeg – WPA run page
    https://www.facebook.com/ForASaferWinnipeg/posts/401520900684193

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    Comments:

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    I never mentioned photo enforcement operators as I was not talking about them. They don’t divert them, that is all they do 365 days a year. They have diverted police officers as I mentioned. There is up to 55,000 alleged traffic offenses issued by wps police officers per year and this has been trending up yet they claim enforcement reduces violations. The other 150,000 per year and trending up is from pe.

    I never said this was the cause of the meth crisis I asked it would have helped if these officers were not diverted.

    It is very concerning that there has been 911 calls for intruder or b&e and they told no officers available and it took up 36 hrs for response and even then often inadequate investigation. Yet during these times of calls the TrapSpy app showed over a dozen enforcement locations active with in a short distance and reported within 3 hrs or less.

    Also several cases of WPS officers responding within 15mins to peacefully protests by WiseUpWinnipeg members with $low Down signs at locations with deficient engineering and issuing parking tickets that later get tossed by the Crown for missing signage.

    The priority doesnt seem to be where it belongs in many cases.

    Every time alleged traffic offenses proven in court to be unlawful from missing signage and other issues the dismiss the tickets but refuse to refund those that paid in good faith.

    The vast majority of alleged offenses involve 42 or 43 in a artificially reduced 30 with no flashing lights as recommended by engineers and caa, 63 or 64 in an artificially reduced 50 also against engineering recommendations for safety or a few tenths of a second into red with dangerously short 4 sec amber time with no advance warning flashers.
    Correct these known and often created deficiencies and violation drop by 95%.

    This misuse of valuable and limited responses, abuse on the road, in court and by MPI of the average safe driver is resulting is loss of trust respect and confidence in police, the courts and government. This puts police and the public at higher risks of violence in heated situations. Many officers attending calls to domestic disturbances get verbally or physically assaulted by both parties. If they respected more would this happen less?

    The majority of this equates to unlawful taxation as fines and with the fines being up to six times higher than anywhere in Canada it resulting in up to $70 Million per year taken from drivers and vehicle owners before considering MPI demerit related penalties. That equates to $420 Million per year taken from the economy with velocity of money.
    That kind of money if spent in the economy would stimulate a lot of growth and legit revenue. This revenue before proper safety agenda and less focus on serious crime than is needed is costing in many other ways as well.

  • Traffic law changes exploit drivers

    By: Curt Pankratz
    Posted: 03/21/2019 4:00 AM |
    WINNIPEG FREE PRESS FILES
    With fines of $300 to $700 for traffic infractions, enforcement in Winnipeg generates $4 million per month in revenue.
    Manitobans generally do not see traffic enforcement as a serious legal issue, and we’re losing our rights because of it.
    Enforcement in Winnipeg generates $4 million per month in revenue. Such revenue generation depends on Manitobans to see traffic violations as simple matters. Simplistic publicity campaigns reinforce this belief by, for example, telling drivers to “just slow down.”
    But traffic is a serious issue. It is a leading cause of injury and death, and depending on how it’s done, enforcement can increase or decrease safety.
    Traffic infractions are no small matter, either. Manitoba has the highest traffic fines in Canada, and typical fines of $300 to $700 constitute a considerable expense to most people. It’s not acceptable to say “just slow down” because Winnipeg violates nearly every national engineering standard for traffic signage, amber light timing and speed limits, and has 173 missing school-zone signs that it refuses to replace.
    In this context, predatory enforcement can accumulate astonishing revenue because it can ticket people who are driving safely. The challenge for revenue-hungry police and government is that when large fines are given to thousands of reasonable drivers, there will be a lot of court challenges.
    In Manitoba, three main strategies have been adopted to deal with this, and they are costing Manitobans their rights.
    First, Manitobans have lost their right to be tried before a judge and to choose a representative. In 2006, the province created the Judicial Justice of the Peace (JJP) program. It hired several people and anointed them with judicial powers to preside in traffic court. The idea was to reduce the burden on provincial judges.
    However, JJPs do not require legal training and some are related to police officials or have historical connections with the Crown’s office. Importantly, JJPs have been more likely than judges to rule in favour of the Crown on key issues, even when evidence and submissions are the same. The Crown has therefore often sought to kick critical cases from judges to JJPs.
    Court transcripts also identify a range of legal misapplications by some JJPs, such as disregarding precedent, subjecting representatives to involuntary bag searches and preventing arguments from the defence.
    JJPs have also been essential to the recent efforts of the prosecution to restrict the accused’s right to appoint another person to represent them. This right is spelled out in the Provincial Offences Act, as well as on the back of each ticket. Although the ticket also states that a representative may be excluded based on the justice’s “opinion,” in the law there is a much higher standard for excluding a representative than the ticket suggests.
    Nevertheless, court transcripts indicate that the prosecution often moves to block representatives who win cases, and such motions have only been successful when a JJP is presiding rather than a judge.
    Second, in 2015 the province initiated what it calls the “pre-plea triage program.” Its roots are problematic from the get-go because it is based on an exclusive partnership between Prosecution Services and the courts, which are supposed to be independent of one another.
    This program requires anyone who wants to challenge their ticket to go to 373 Broadway in person. Once there, they are required to go through a series of lineups and meetings before they can request a trial date.
    It is a violation of the law to require this process. The law gives the accused the right to request a trial from the courts without these steps. The program is designed to whisk thousands of drivers through, offering fine reductions if necessary but avoiding legal entanglements associated with predatory enforcement and traffic engineering deficiencies.
    The third strategy is the transformation of the law itself. Under the law, which was adopted in November 2017, several key rights have been eliminated. First, the court now uses “certificate evidence.” This is where the accusing officer certifies their version of events and submits the certificate to the court. The content of the certificate is taken as proof until the accused proves their innocence.
    This is tied to a second problem, which is that the officer no longer attends the trial, and the accused no longer has the right to cross-examine them. By contrast, the prosecution has the right to cross-examine the testimony of the accused, as well as any witnesses they produce.
    Finally, the law eliminates the right to appeal decisions made in traffic court. Appeals now require permission from the court, and you cannot appeal the facts as interpreted by the presiding judge or JJP.
    Further exploitative polices are being planned, and if Manitobans continue to see traffic enforcement as a minor legal issue, our rights will continue to erode.
    Curt Pankratz is associate professor in the department of sociology at the University of Winnipeg.

  • Should the public allow known cash grabs to prevent unknown ones?

    Image: Winnipeg Sun

    Feb 25 2018 – WiseUpWinnipeg

    If an informed public are willing to allow what equates to unlawful taxation as fines and arguably breach of trust or unlawful enrichment to prevent another cash cow or raising taxes elsewhere we are heading in the wrong direction.

    Too many have fallen for the typical propaganda of we have to cut services or raise taxes. There is bloated bureaucracy, incompetence, unethical influence and corruption running rampant. The jurisdictions that have cleaned this up have more than enough legit revenue to provide great value for tax dollars without abusing their citizens with dial on demand taxation as fines.

    This isn’t even considering the harm the scameras proven to cause with dangerously short amber times, removed and inadequate signage, other known and created deficiencies and taking $70M a year from drivers, vehicles owners and their families every year in just Winnipeg. With velocity of money that equates to over $450M per year or $.5 Billion since 2003.

  • Serious issues with how photo and officer traffic enforcement used in Winnipeg

    Jan 17 2019 – Kevin Yaworski

    There has been many good articles by Tom Brodbeck about Photo Enforcement in Winnipeg. The Bowman led City and Pallister led Province have only allowed the many serious issues around it to get worse.

    Why does WPS, the City, Province and MPI include or depend on fine or demerit related revenue from photo or officer traffic “safety” enforcement in their budgets?

    Why are the conditions of authority for photo and officer traffic enforcement, court directives, charter and other legal rights not enforced or ignored?

    It has been suggested to elected and appointed officials repeatedly that this “revenue” should not be included in budgets and doing so plus the lack of enforcement of above conditions and rights has led to:

    1) Ignoring of MUTCD, ITE and other proven national traffic engineering safety standards for speed limit setting, intersection amber times, speed limit, reduction and photo enforcement and related signage. Removal of hundreds of the above public paid and engineering recommended signage with no valid reason. Just excuse that too much signage is confusing.

    2) Aggressive and predatory enforcement by photo and officers of zones with known and dangerous engineering deficiencies with low safety risks.

    3) Diverting officers from community support and other important units to work pensionable OT on traffic duty and targeting almost exclusivly deficient locations as mentioned above.

    4) Less availability or focus by officers, Crown, the Courts and other limited and valuable resources than is needed on preventing, investigating, solving and prosecuting serious crime (violent, property, blue collar, corporate and financial).

    5) Up to 150,000 photo and 55,000 officer issues alleged traffic offenses per year in Winnipeg with upward trend and up to 25% contesting rate by accused vehicle owners or drivers. This volume, contesting rate with fines up to 6 times higer than elsewhere in Canada are many times higher than the Canadian average per capita.

    6) Calls to police for B & E and other serious crimes taking up to 36 hours to get response or 911 callers getting told there is no officers available yet multiple peaceful protests by WiseUpWinnipeg members in Construction or School zones with unlawful setup and inadequate signage get response by WPS in under 15 mins. Other cases with no response while the TrapSpy app reporting many officers nearby doing traffic enforcement

    7) Undue pressure on Clerks, Crown, JJP’s, Justices and the courts in general from above volume and contesting rate and resulting in a well documented trend of bias and errors in transcripts, decisions and other court records.

    8 ) Backlogs and delays of up to 24 months to go to trial for simple traffic matters. These and other charter violations created as a result of the predatory enforcement and “safety revenue” schemes. They resulted in Court clerks, Crown and other valuable resources diverted from family court and other important courts. Clerks resigning after pressured into calling accused vehicle owners or drivers to discuss their options and actions they felt were unfair or underhanded.

    9) Ignoring or misinterpreting of court directives, due process, charter and other legal rights, legislation, sworn oaths, professional standards and MB Justice policies by photo enforcement operators, police officers, Crown, JJP’s and some Justices, Chief Justices, LERA commissioners, APEGM / EGM in order to reduce delays, get convictions, reduced fine plea deals and dismiss formal complaints.

    10) For profit TSS / Xerox / Conduent photo enforcement operators caught in many photos sleeping or distracted while “observing violations”. Operators or Officers making false statements, falsifying notes and other evidence, lying under oath / perjury about signage checked and present, that they were present at the time of the violation and others with little to no consequences. Trend of a lack of or last minute disclosure of officer notes, observation logs, zone and setup diagrams etc … Trend of lying, misleading or bullying of accused by Crown to reduce delays and get plea deals. Trend of Crown and JJP’s denying valid requests for adjournment like last minute disclosure, rights of the self represented ignored and others.

    11) Loss of public trust, respect and confidence in police, courts, elected and appointed officials and the system in general which has serious consequences.

    12) Anti-public interest legislation / acts, bylaws and policies put in place without due diligence, proper public consultation or debate that allow more breaches of due process, charter and other legal rights instead of dealing with the known and root issues mentioned above. This included but not limited to the option to plead not guilty removed from back of alleged offense notices and form removed from MB JUS website, the right to a fair trial, face your accused and to a proper appeal taken away or made very difficult to know about or stand up for.

    Once more of the public get informed of these abuses, misuse of valuable and limited public resources and then take collective and meaningful action things will change.

    This doesnt even go into the issue with unfair and unlawful parking enforcement by WPA / CoW and their For Profit partner G4S Tech (now has new name to try and dodge rap from trend of behavior against public interests).

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