Panel: It's OK to hide your license plate
By Howard Fischer
Capitol Media Services
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 01.24.2007
PHOENIX — Foes of photo radar won a key victory Tuesday as the Senate Transportation Committee refused to block motorists from hiding their plates from cameras.
Legislators rejected a proposal by Sen. Ken Cheuvront, D-Phoenix, which would have made it illegal to put anything on a license plate that obscures the letters and numbers.
Cheuvront said it's a public-safety issue. He cited one incident in his district of a hit-and-run accident in which witnesses were unable to read the license plate of the fleeing vehicle because it had a
plastic cover obscuring it.
Tom Van Dorn, lobbyist for the Arizona Association of Chiefs of Police, agreed. But a majority of the committee said that's just a smoke screen. "The real issue revolving around this … is that cities are not getting
the revenues off the photo radar,"said Sen. Robert Blendu, R-Litchfield Park. And Sen. Pam Gorman, R-Anthem, called the use of cameras to enforce traffic laws unconstitutional.
Van Dorn told legislators license plate films that block photo-radar cameras interfere with new technology being used by the state Department of Public Safety, which quickly scans the license plates of passing vehicles and compares what it sees with a database of stolen vehicles. But Gorman questioned the propriety of the whole DPS program, saying license-plate covers provide "your only protection against Big Brother's watchful
eye." Cheuvront countered, "At the end of the day, people who put those things on their plates are trying to evade the law."
Another measure aimed at photo radar is awaiting House debate. A proposal by Rep. Kirk Adams, R-Mesa, would make it easier for motorists
caught by photo enforcement to escape fines and points on their licenses.
Adams' legislation would allow errant motorists to have three photo-radar tickets dismissed by going to traffic school within any 24-month period. The law now
allows one.
