Lakeland Set to Finalize 27-Camera Red-Light Network in Monday Vote

Lakeland City Commissioners are set to cast a final vote Monday, Oct. 5, on an ordinance that writes all 27 red-light camera locations into city code, the last step in a network expansion that grew from 19 cameras to 27 over the past year. The 9 a.m. meeting is at City Hall.

The ordinance got its first reading Sept. 21, the same night the City Commission reviewed an annual report on how the cameras performed over the 12 months ending June 30. The numbers are the biggest reason drivers around Lakeland should care: the program brought in $3.39 million in fines, with roughly $742,500 landing in the city's General Fund.

Eight cameras were added to the system last year, and most went live in January. One piece is still missing. The southbound camera at Kathleen Road and 14th Street remains offline while it waits on permitting. The city expects it running this fall.

Who's watching, and how many tickets stick

Behind the cameras is a three-person review team inside the Lakeland Police Department. Sgt. Chad Mumbauer, who runs the unit, told commissioners his team reviewed 56,938 potential violations over the year and approved citations in 27,609 of them, about 48%. Every flagged image gets a human look before a ticket goes out.

Assistant Chief Hans Lehman said 15% to 20% of cited drivers get a second ticket. Framed the other way, roughly 80 to 85 out of every 100 drivers who pay a first fine never show up in the system again.

Mumbauer also pointed to one intersection as a sign the cameras are doing their job beyond the ticket count. Side-impact crashes, the kind that happen when someone runs a red light and gets broadsided, have dropped at Florida Avenue and Parker Street since a camera went in there.

Revenue versus behavior

Mayor Sara Roberts McCarley told commissioners the point of the program is changing how people drive, not filling city coffers. That argument gets tested every time the fine total comes up at a public meeting, since $3.39 million is not a small number for a city this size.

Here's where the money actually goes under current law: a cut covers the cost of running the cameras and the state keeps a share, and what's left after that flows to the city's General Fund. The roughly $742,500 that reached Lakeland's budget last year is a fraction of the total collected, not the headline figure.

Where the cameras are now

Monday's vote does not add new intersections. It folds the current list, already approved piece by piece over recent years, into one consolidated section of city code. Current and newly added locations include:

• Florida Avenue at George Jenkins Boulevard
• Massachusetts Avenue at East Parker Street
• Kathleen Road at 14th Street
• Harden Blvd at West Beacon Road and at North Parkway
• Memorial Boulevard at Florida Avenue, Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue/North Dakota Avenue, and North Massachusetts Avenue
• Bartow Road/US 98 at North Crystal Lake Drive
• Cleveland Heights Boulevard at East Edgewood Drive
• Socrum Loop Road at East Daughtery Road/Walt Loop Road and at Old Combee Road
• US 98 at Griffin Road

Drivers who get a citation can look up payment options, including extensions, through the city's red-light camera program page. The commission's Monday agenda and a video of the meeting are published through the City of Lakeland's red-light camera program page.

What isn't settled yet is a permitting timeline for the Kathleen Road camera, which the city has only described as coming online "this fall." Commissioners did not set a specific date at the September meeting, and no further public hearing is scheduled before Monday's final vote.

Want to weigh in on the camera program or Monday's vote? Head to Lakeland Community Website and join the conversation in our Community Forum. For more coverage of city decisions that affect your commute and your wallet, visit our government and politics section and our public safety section.

Header photo: Connor J. Williams / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 3.0)