Stop-arming reckless driving with Scotia-Glenville cameras
SCOTIA-GLENVILLE, N.Y. (NEWS10) -To tackle reckless driving, Scotia-Glenville Central School District has installed stop-arm cameras on 30 of its 46 school busses. Local officials met outside the district’s bus garage to explain the new system.
“Route 5 and Route 50 are our highest penalty place but I will say there’s not a road that has not had a bus stopped and had a car go through it,” stated Clara Bisaill, the district's transportation supervisor.
According to the Glenville Police Department, illegal school bus passings happen more than 50,000 times a day in the state. Chief Stephen V. Janik said his officers can't solve this problem on their own. “With limited resources, the amount of school busses, the amount of stops, the amount of miles and roads that they travel, we can’t have a police officer behind every school bus. So this now is a great way to have those stops monitored on a daily basis.”
The 4K camera system costs $10,000 per bus. Each was paid for by an investment from BusPatrol, who also makes the cameras.
“By looking at that license plate, even if we can’t make out every letter, we’ll be able to make out the majority of that and also know the make and the model of the vehicle and basically match that across multiple databases that look up register owner information,” explained Ryan Monell, Senior Vice President of BusPatrol.
Once AI determines if someone illegally passed a school bus, the footage is sent to the police department who will then decide if a ticket will be issued or not. Below is a chart thats lists the difference between getting a ticket from an officer via BusPatrol and in-person:
| BusPatrol ticket | In-person ticket |
| Zero points on your license. | Eight points on your license. |
| $250, $275, $300 per offense in an 18-month period. | $250-$400, $600-750, $750-$1,000 per offense within three years. |
| No jail time. | Up to 30 or 180 days of jail time. |
These camera systems are issuing warnings between March 31 and April 30. BusPatrol tickets will be issued from May 1 and on.