Freshman Republican to Launch New Attack on Local Self-Government

WASHINGTON, DC – The office of Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) has learned that freshman Representative Kerry Bentivolio (R-MI) has been seeking cosponsors to a bill he has drafted, but not yet introduced, that would prohibit the District of Columbia, and no other jurisdiction, from using automated traffic enforcement systems, such as red light and speed cameras, which are used throughout the United States. Bentivolio's bill would apply only to D.C., but according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, hundreds of jurisdictions in 24 states across the country use such systems, including 521 jurisdictions that use red light cameras and 129 that use speed cameras. Republican attacks on D.C.'s local government have continued, but almost always fail to be signed into law.

"Representative Bentivolio has been in Congress barely six months, but, with this bill, has already violated his professed support for small government and local control of local affairs," Norton said. "Traffic laws here and everywhere else in the U.S. are local safety matters. In the District of Columbia, like everywhere else, local traffic laws are written by local elected officials, not members of Congress who are unaccountable to D.C. residents. If either Representative Bentivolio or his staff has received such a ticket, then they should pay it, unless he thinks that members of Congress who by law are already exempt from most ticket violations here should be excused even when public safety is at risk. Considering the major congressional issues affecting Representative Bentivolio's constituents, surely they will be concerned that he has diverted his attention and energy to trying to interfere with the local affairs of a local jurisdiction, instead of spending his time in Washington attending to the affairs of his constituents in Michigan. If Representative Bentivolio believes that automated traffic enforcement systems, which are used throughout the country, are bad public policy, why didn't he draft a bill that applies nationwide? He is singling out the District because he thinks he can. He is wrong if he thinks he can use the District for his own personal or ideological purposes. We will fight each and every congressional attack on our right to self-government, especially against congressional bullies who betray their own well-known views on federal interference in local matters by trying to use the big foot of the federal government against our local government. The revered all-American principle of local control of local matters applies to the District of Columbia as it does to all jurisdictions. If Representative Bentivolio wants to write local traffic rules, he should resign from Congress and run for local office in Michigan."

Published: June 27, 2013