Tag: revenue generation

Cops Forced to Create Crime in Quota Scheme of 4 Tickets Per Hour or Face Discipline

Most people reading this article know what it is like to have the blue and red lights pop up in your rear view mirror. The last thing going through your mind at this point is the feeling of ‘being protected.’ This feeling comes from the fact that the overwhelming majority of the time a driver sees police lights in their mirror is because they have been targeted for revenue collection—often the result of a quota system—and they are about to be given a ticket, or worse.

Police, we are told, are here to keep us safe and protect us from the bad guys. However, public safety all too often takes a back seat to revenue collection. Time and time again, the Free Thought Project has exposed quota schemes in which officers were punished for not writing enough tickets or making enough arrests.

The most recent ticket writing scheme to be exposed comes out of Hawaii and it implicates the Federal Government in the driving force behind it. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) holds “traffic safety” grants throughout the year, which essentially require departments to meet certain numbers or they get no grant.

Though quotas are illegal in many states, they are just fine in Hawaii and the department has no problem implementing them to receive their federal handout.

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‘On the Table’ – Pete Buttigieg Says Gasoline Tax Hike Possible

A hike in the tax on gasoline is one possible revenue burden facing American motorists, President Joe Biden’s secretary of transportation nominee Pete Buttigieg told a Senate panel on Thursday.

The revelation came after former South Bend (Indiana) Mayor Pete Buttigieg was asked by Republican Sen. Rick Scott of Florida during his confirmation hearing about possible tax hikes.

“I think all options need to be on the table,” Buttigieg said, according to Roll Call.

“As you know, the gas tax has not been increased since 1993, and it’s never been pegged to inflation, and that is one of the reasons why the current state of the Highway Trust Fund is that there’s more going out than coming in.”

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What’s Worse Than Pumpkin Spice? Cops Pulling People Over To Give Them Gift Cards

The coronavirus pandemic has changed a lot about the Christmas season. Travel plans have been cancelled. Family gatherings have been reduced in size and scope. There won’t be nearly as many dinners at fancy restaurants.

But one terrible tradition persists. Police pulling people over as though they had committed some sort of traffic infraction, then giving them a gift instead.

This week WACH, a Fox affiliate in South Carolina, reports that deputies in Richland County are turning on the lights and sirens, pulling people over, and then giving them gift cards to Outback Steakhouse rather than citations or warnings. It is presented, as usual, as an uplifting story for the holiday season. A WACH reporter joined the cops and got happy interviews from people who thought they were getting tickets. The sheriff’s department then gets to give itself the gift of a pat on the back for handing out free bloomin’ onions to people instead of disrupting their lives and saddling them with fines.

This anxiety-inducing crap should not be rewarded with fawning press coverage. The police are abusing citizens’ Fourth Amendment rights. Cops cannot simply pull people over with no suspicion of infractions, even to give them gifts.

Reason has criticized this behavior repeatedly. As Jacob Sullum noted back in 2016, these “supposedly heartwarming interactions are still abuses of power. If police would not have stopped drivers for these minor violations unless they had gifts to hand out, they are deliberately inconveniencing people and causing them needless anxiety for the sake of a publicity stunt.”

WACH reports that the deputies pulled people over for speeding before giving them the gift cards, which if true might suggest that the sheriff’s department is trying to avoid Fourth Amendment concerns by selecting people they would already have been stopping. But WACH’s footage also shows deputies giving a gift card to a man on horseback walking along the side of a road, so I’m not so sure about that.

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