Tonight, Avondale City Council sat through an hour-long update on its “Speed Safety Program.” No vote was taken.
The program, run under a five-year contract with third-party vendor Verra Mobility, has been in place since May 2024. My previous reporting shows Verra Mobility operates photo radar in eight Arizona cities and 30 states.
Cameras were installed based on crash-trend data and Verra Mobility’s own site assessments.
PROGRAM EFFECTIVENESS
Avondale’s own data tells a different story than the sales pitch.
Police ran a one-week test using a covert box on Dysart Road, posted at 45 MPH. Verra Mobility only cites drivers going 11 MPH or more over the limit. The average speed? 59 MPH — before, during, and after deployment. No change.
Pre-deployment, 5.36% of cars were speeding 11+ over.
Post-deployment, that number dropped to 2.85%.
Speeding remained at 59MPH throughout.
The city presented this as a cut in speeders, even though the average speed never budged.
Accidents told a starker story. During the evaluation period, crashes jumped from 15 before deployment, to 12 during, and 24 after — a 60% increase.
From August 2024 to July 2025, the cameras recorded 45,082 violations. Just 12,356 became tickets. Another 32,726 were tossed out — 72.6% lost — because Verra Mobility or Avondale police flagged problems like poor image quality, glare, or calibration verification issues.
TAXPAYER COST OF MORE THAN HALF A MILLION DOLLARS A YEAR
Avondale’s photo radar program comes with a hefty price tag—$17,457 a month just to operate two units, on top of additional fees for citations, court costs, and process servers.
The city also learned it needed four employees, not two, to keep the program running. Total taxpayer cost: $561,482 a year.
Challenges stack up too. Cameras facing east or west produce glare, images require significant staff time to review, and vandalism remains a constant problem. (Verra Mobility covers the costs associated with vandalism.)
The courts add another layer: of 12,356 cases filed, the caseload reportedly totaled 19,280. 9,585 were completed. Another 2,504 drivers went to defensive driving schools, while 3,161 cases were tossed for lack of service, dismissals, or liability transfers.
The court explains…
“Lack of service. Once these are filed in the court, they have to be served on the person within 90 days. And so, a lot of people, when they get that initial notice in the mail, they will contact us or they’ll come into the court or they’ll call, and tell us, ‘hey, I received this,’ and we count that as an acceptance, right? And so they don’t have to be personally served. We know that they’re in the system, that they’re engaging us, right?”
Another crack in Avondale’s photo radar program: if a cited driver never acknowledges the ticket, the city simply waits. Verra Mobility is then required to serve them. But if service isn’t completed within 90 days, the citation is dismissed.
So far, 3,920 cases have been resolved as “responsible.” Another 2,771 remain pending.
Court Sanctions: Revenue of $743,665
Between 45% and 51% of every photo radar ticket in Avondale flows straight into the city’s General Fund. A ticket for driving 10–15 mph over the limit costs $255, with $115.64 pocketed by the city. At 16–20 mph over, the fine rises to $270, and Avondale keeps $124.03. For 21–29 mph over, $325 is assessed, $154.74 goes to the city. At 30–39 mph over, tickets climb to $408, with $201.12 earmarked for the General Fund. And the steepest penalty — 40 mph or more over — carries a $510 ticket, half of which, $258.10, stays in Avondale’s coffers.
“Our goal at the court is not to generate revenue. That’s not what we do. That’s not our goal. That’s not our function. We’re a bastion of neutrality. We are an unbiased forum. We are where our citizens can resolve issues with each other. And when they have received allegations filed by the state, whether a civil or a criminal allegation, we’re there to protect people’s rights, protect victims’ rights, and to ensure that law enforcement are acting within the law.”
Revenue records show Avondale’s General Fund pulled in $391,269 from photo radar sanctions alone. When court enhancement fees and defensive driving schools are added in, the total climbs to $743,665.
Council Comments: Mixed Results, Mounting Doubts
Councilmember Tina Conde reminded colleagues why the program was approved in the first place: to change driver behavior. “And based on the data you shared today, I’m not sure that was achieved,” she said.
Councilmember Maxine White pointed to the reported drop in drivers speeding 11+ mph over the limit, calling that cut “impactful.” She says, “Our spirit in the courts is not to make money, and it should never be. However, it looks like you made some money,” she added, noting the program has become “low-hanging fruit” for city revenue.
Councilmember Garcia, who tells us she opposes the cameras, called the cameras a financial burden on residents that don’t change behavior. She revealed that Avondale’s busy Van Buren corridor may be mis-zoned — suggesting that raising the posted speed limit to reflect the number of lanes could have prevented thousands of citations. Garcia went further, calling the program unconstitutional and asking the cost to cancel the contract. The city manager said it would take a six-figure penalty, with three years left on the five-year deal. He emphasized engineering fixes — roundabouts, medians, traffic lights — as more effective speed solutions.
PROFIT TALLY BY MAYOR’S MATH
Mayor Mike Pineda, who once supported the cameras, questioned whether the data justifies their use. He noted average speeds stayed locked at 59 mph before, during, and after deployment: “Behavior change is not sustainable by cameras.” While acknowledging revenue brought in a $183,000 surplus, according to his on-the-spot-math, he weighed that against civil liberties, labor costs, and long-term accident trends that “are not improving.”
The mayor’s remarks stand in sharp contrast to a May 2022 council meeting, when members predicted little pushback on photo radar because they believed the public was already accustomed to new technology. Take a listen.
Most notable from last night’s meeting was what wasn’t said: the lack of serious debate over mass surveillance and privacy. Records from Paradise Valley show Verra Mobility’s cameras don’t just ticket speeders—they record faces, helmets, vehicles, and license plates. That data is stored and can later be cross-matched with social media to identify suspects.
Avondale’s council stopped the discussion short of a decision. With a grant-funded study now underway, the city manager will return no later than November with more data for a possible vote on whether to keep or cancel the program.
AROUND ARIZONA: THE DEBATE TO PAUSE OR CONTINUE LICENSE PLATE READERS AND PHOTO RADAR
Sedona – Cameras paused. Council will decide tonight, September 9th, whether to cancel the contract, form a resident working group, or restart Flock Safety’s 11 installed units.
I spoke exclusively with Sandy Boyce, a longtime Sedona resident who helped lead the push to turn those cameras off. She now heads the Live Free AZ movement, which is fighting mass surveillance in Arizona.
Flagstaff – After a 4+ hour meeting on September 2nd, council held off on a $112K expansion. Instead, they opted for more facts, more community input, and more debate before moving forward.
To Be Named Today — One of the largest cities in the state applied the wrong judge’s signature to photo radar citations for several months. It’s an exclusive story I’ll be releasing later today.
Jen’s Two Cents.
The cat was out of the bag this spring. In a March 26, 2025 email, Rep. Walt Blackman told Sen. Wendy Rogers he wouldn’t schedule SCR1002 for a hearing, citing “unintended consequences” in its current language. Chief among them: the financial hit to local governments, especially smaller municipalities that rely on photo radar revenue to fund road maintenance, traffic safety programs, and even general operations. He warned that cutting that revenue could mean budget shortfalls, service cuts, or higher local taxes.
Avondale Councilmember White’s remarks about photo radar “making the city money” were about as blunt as it gets.
“I’m not sure, those of us remember our budget constraints going forward. But, in ‘27 our revenues and our expenses are gonna come flat… We have to make money in the City of Avondale. I think, no, it’s low hanging fruit to do this.”
Speeding behavior stayed the same—59 MPH before, during, and after the deployment of cameras. Yet the city and some councilmembers pointed to the numbers below as proof of “behavior change.”
The reality: the count of drivers going 11+ MPH over dropped from 3,239 to 1,694. But when you factor in the total volume of traffic—60,448 vehicles pre-deployment vs. 59,381 post-deployment—that’s only about a 2.5% overall drop.
And we don’t know what other factors might have influenced that decline: traffic fluctuations, weather, enforcement elsewhere, or even natural week-to-week variance.
So the question remains: is a 2.5% dip enough to justify the city continuing to pour more than half a million taxpayer dollars into this program? Even when crashes increased 60%?
The reality is clear: the city doesn’t appear to be willing to swallow a six-figure penalty to end the contract. Instead, it’s signaling it will keep spending six figures every year — more than $1.5M taxpayer dollars over the next 3 years — to keep the cameras running.
Meanwhile, my upcoming investigation shows speeding over the speed limit isn’t even in the Top 10 causes of crashes in Arizona—yet AI-driven mass surveillance continues to scan and track Arizonans across the state. I’ll also show you why.
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