In 2010, Senate Bill 949, championed by the late Jenny Oropeza (D-Long Beach), was signed into law to stop municipalities from creating their own courts to adjudicate moving violations and then collect the revenue. But Edmiston, who has good relations with many legislators, wangled an exemption. Oropeza's law reads: "To the extent permitted by current state law, this section does not impair the current lawful authority of the Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority."
As a result, those who fight their ticket must attend an administrative hearing controlled by MRCA employees. Baylis calls this hearing "a loser. You have to go to a citation hearing held by an MRCA employee at the MRCA office. The results are predictable. If you lose — when you lose — then you have the right to go to [Los Angeles Superior] court."
ILLUSTRATION BY PETER HOEY
Courtney and Ted Balaker are infuriated by what Ted calls "these shakedowns."
PHOTO BY SIMONE PAZ
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MRCA data obtained by the Weekly show that only a small slice of motorists get out of their tickets at the hearing controlled by the authority. In 2011, 5,357 visitors to Temescal Canyon Gateway Park were ticketed by the stop-sign camera in the park's lower parking lot, for example, and 282 of those violatinos were dismissed by the agency. Of 2,813 violations issued at the tiny Top of Topanga parking lot, where a stop-sign camera snags visitors as they exit, 160 violations were rejected. At Upper Franklin Canyon Reservoir, of 1,517 drivers issued violations by the stop-sign camera on the northbound nature drive next to the dam, 85 were dismissed.
Once in Superior Court, Baylis says, drivers often challenge the fact that the cameras don't photograph the driver's face. "Can the MRCA hold the registered owner responsible for the acts of the unknown driver?" he asks.
Baylis says many park visitors ignore the ticket, and he's "never heard anybody say their credit report was damaged."
Baylis urges ticketed park visitors to take aim at the mountain authority's pocketbook by making it as costly as possible for the agency to collect the $175. "It costs them more than $175 to fight the case when they send in an attorney — often two attorneys — a ranger and a rep from the camera company," he says. "If everybody challenged or ignored the citations, those cameras would be gone in a month."
But authority spokeswoman Stolarz warns that if you don't pay, "The tickets go to a collection agency, which collects on it. I assume it affects your credit rating."
In 2008, the Pacific Palisades Community Council had doubts about Edmiston's motives for installing $175-per-violation automated stop-sign cameras in pastoral Temescal Gateway Park.
The irascible Edmiston told the grumbling neighbors: "Sue us. Maybe the court will settle this clearly. This body [the Palisades group] doesn't have adjudicatory authority. I invite people to sue us!"
He was answered on March 29, 2010, with a class-action lawsuit filed on behalf of motorists Fareth Estwick, Jody Bice and Phillip Robbins Jr. by the Braun Law Group. It claims the authority's rules are inconsistent with the California Vehicle Code.
The Braun Law Group did not return calls from the Weekly, but its lawsuit argues, among other points, that it is unconstitutional to rely upon photos that do not show the driver.
Edmiston also told the Palisades neighborhood group in 2008, "It's true that this isn't done according to the Vehicle Code — and for a good reason. That is an internal road or driveway, not a state roadway. Because this isn't a public road, we're held to a different standard."
The class action has proceeded slowly. In late 2010, Superior Court judge Carl West ruled that the case by motorists Estwick, Bice and Robbins could proceed, writing, "The court is not persuaded by MRCA's position that it may, carte blanche, enforce its own ordinances where those ordinances would otherwise violate the [California Vehicle Code]."
Edmiston and the authority have delayed the case, switching law firms and getting an extension. There's been little apparent movement. At the Oct. 5 public meeting of the MRCA, a closed session was convened "to discuss the matter of Estwick vs. Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority, Case No. BC434783." Four minutes later, the MRCA's board reconvened, the minutes show, and "announced that instructions were given to counsel."
Without a court decision to the contrary, the seven cameras remain turned on, annually transferring $2 million to $3 million from the pockets of 15,000 to 20,000 unsuspecting hikers and nature lovers into the coffers of the mountains authority.
