The city of College Station, Texas is planning to spend thousands of taxpayer dollars on advertising that could save the city’s red light cameras. A citizen-led initiative has put the program’s future up for a public vote on November 3, but documents obtained under freedom of information laws by College Station resident Jim Ash indicate the city intends to spend thousands to saturate local television with pro-camera commercials and run full-page advertisements in the local newspaper. These ads would run in addition to those paid for by the for-profit companythat operates the cameras. “Could the City of College Station go so far with this voter eduction program they end up violating spirit or letter of the Texas Election Code, by the nature, size, timing, and aggressiveness of their planned ‘educational program?'” Ash asked. “Is this the same city that could not find even one more dime in spending cuts last week?”
Texas law allows government agencies to provide information to the public and to respond to requests for information and analysis, but it specifically states that “an officer or employee of a political subdivision may not spend or authorize the spending of public funds for political advertising.” Violating this statute is a Class A misdemeanor.
In an email to the local newspaper, the Bryan-College Station Eagle, the city’s assistant communications director, Wayne Larson, tied the advertising campaign directly to the upcoming election.
“Can you make some suggestions on what ad space we could purchase to promote our red light camera voter education efforts [in the] days leading up to fall elections,” Larson asked on August 10, 2009. “I would think a full page opposite letters to editor would be considered, and those front page footer ads… I’m open to your ideas.”
Larson’s suggestions, if approved, would give the newspaper at least $10,000 in taxpayer money. A cable television advertising proposal dated August 8, 2009 gave a pricetag of $10,004 on the desired campaign consisting of 874 pro-red light camera commercials with “approximately 1600 additional spots” thrown in “at no cost.” According to Larson, the commercials are designed to make photo ticketing an emotional issue to divert attention away from the independent studies that have shown red light cameras tend to increase the number of injury accidents where they are used (view studies).
“Yes, in dialogue with Troy and CMO, there has been discussion on using the funding invested into safety improvements as one of the talking points in framing this up as an emotional issue v. the technical arguments,” Larson wrote on August 23. “There is a strategic meeting set with CMO in a week to confirm.”
The amount of money discussed appears to be nearly seven times the amount spent, according to budget documents, to announce the program when photo ticketing began in February 2008. The public relations blitz may also be related to Mayor Ben White’s concern that the public distrusts city council actions. White described this sentiment in an email dated August 6 upon returning from a meeting with a local business owner.
“The feelings of many citizens is that the actions of the council are always negative and not transparent,” White wrote, describing the concerns raised at the meeting. “[The feeling is that] We are not interested in the citizens knowing what is going on.”
White tried, and failed, to block the referendum in August.
A copy of the city documents Ash requested are available in a 400k PDF file at the source link below.
Source: 
Pro-Red Light Camera Advertising Documents (City of College Station, Texas, 9/11/2009)
College station has to be democratic – right?
They’re spending our money to fine us for more of our money.
If this bothers you, you’d better brace yourself for what is about to come. You see, the Supreme Court is hungering to hear a case that, in its essence, presently forbids corporate dollars for elections. This case is trying to change that. Every Supreme Court from the past 100 plus years, regardless of the political position of the judges, has upheld this separation as necessary. Well, it is about to rear it’s ugly head again and this time it looks like the Court’s own precedence may be ignored and this may come to pass. If that happens, politicians will be total slaves to the dollars that follow. Industry will “buy” candidates that will be favorable to their demands. Any hope for good consumer protection or needed regulation will die before it ever gets a chance. It will be an interesting test for the Roberts-“Scalito” court..will they do the right thing (no pun intended)or will America become enslaved to corporate interests?
And that’s why I hate red light cameras…Robert, what happened to the “EDIT” function?
Kinda funny to spend all that money, considering 10 to 15% of the 40,000 or so registered voters ever turn out for an election. On a good day.
In other words, 4,000 people are going to decide this thing.
Also, to golden2husky, regarding corporate interests controlling our political proces: there are many who would argue this has already happened.
You see, the Supreme Court is hungering to hear a case that, in its essence, presently forbids corporate dollars for elections.
In that it also bans corporations from spending their own money to criticize a candidate. All corporations. Not just for-profit companies; it includes mutuals, co-ops, nonprofits, unions, etc.
This case is trying to change that. Every Supreme Court from the past 100 plus years, regardless of the political position of the judges, has upheld this separation as necessary.
While not every Supreme Court has ruled on the case, the ban on independent expenditures is much more recent than the ban on direct political contributions. The only thing that dates back 100 years is the ban on direct contributions to candidates from corporate entities. However, for a long time corporations have gotten around that by having PACs and by having lots of individual donations by people high up in the company or partnership. In addition, we can note that only twenty-two states closely follow federal law and ban direct corporate contributions. The other twenty-eight allow direct corporate contributions. New York and California allows direct corporate contributions; Texas and Florida do not. Do you get the sense that New York and California are more beholden to corporate interests?
The government initially argued that this regulation would give it the right to prevent publication of a book that criticized a candidate, if a corporation (for-profit or non-profit or co-op or charity) published it. That is what stunned the Court and caused it to consider pre-existing precedents from the 1970s. The Obama Administration argued that the government could censor books published by any publishing house in the country, if it criticized a politician. Ditto for websites, too, and perhaps even newspapers if published by corporations like The New York Times Company.
The only people who could publish books would be the independently wealthy like Rupert Murdoch.
The Court will probably keep the ban on direct contributions to candidates, but may allow independent expenditures, where a corporate body spends its money to argue something in its own name.
I suggest that for this year’s Aggie bonfire, rather than cutting down trees, a different species of noxious weed be harvested and burned.
It’s a win-win!
I suggest that for this year’s Aggie bonfire, rather than cutting down trees, a different species of noxious weed be harvested and burned.
I always thought of politicians more as pests than weeds. :-0
What the goverment of College Station is doing sickens me. How any one of the city councilmen or the mayor should remain in office after this has been brought to light is a mystery to me. I would gladly vote for anybody else, as I have done in the past in our own local elections for far less blatently dirty acts, than for this type of “leadership.” Unfortunately, the small time beaurecrats directly responsible for this campaign against the citizens they “serve” are probably untouchable due to union rules.