The $1.5 Million Timeout

When Cities Collect Speeding Fines Faster Than They Can Legally Spend Them

I get the occasional question regarding camera tickets, “Do I have to pay this?” Well, depends what you mean by “have to.” And occasionally, I’ve suggested sending a picture of one’s money—or of one’s anatomy. A recent Vindicator article suggests that way more than otherwise unwanted photos are coming back in the return envelopes.

According to a thoughtful and thoroughgoing article by Vindy writer, David Skolnick, Youngstown sits on a growing pot of school-zone speed camera money—$1.5 million and counting—but state law has wrapped it in so much red tape that nearly all of it remains untouched. While the city collected nearly $917,000 in fines just this past school year and $598,000 the year before, it has only spent about $51,000 total—mostly to pay the out-of-town camera vendor, Blue Line Solutions, for a surveillance trailer. The rest sits idle in a municipal account, waiting for ideas that satisfy strict legal parameters: the money can only be used for narrowly defined school safety improvements like crosswalks, lighting, and infrastructure near school buildings. The city tried to buy police cruisers for the school district, but a legal opinion nixed the plan, citing auction laws and municipal use restrictions. Another proposal to buy metal detectors got council approval but hasn’t yet materialized.

In the meantime, Blue Line—an out-of-state private company—gets 35% of all collected fines with zero restrictions on how it spends the funds. Of the total $2.3 million in fines issued since the program’s start, Blue Line has already pocketed over $800,000. While the city’s chunk remains frozen in legal limbo, enforcement continues: 37,367 citations were issued in just 8.5 months during the 2024–25 school year, yielding a modest 38% collection rate. Mayor Tito Brown insists the goal is safety, not revenue, but with nearly a million dollars raised per year and very little to show for it, the political optics blur. Most of the money came from drivers going at least 11 mph over the limit near 21 public and private schools, with no points issued and limited consequences for non-payment.

What emerges isn’t just a fiscal stalemate—it’s a real-time lesson in bureaucratic contradiction. A system designed to enforce child safety now drags behind itself, unable to convert capital into infrastructure without a legal maze and council disagreements. Meanwhile, enforcement rolls on, citations pile up, and the revenue collects interest. In this theater of intentions, private firms profit cleanly, the city stalls legally, and students still cross the same streets. Whether this becomes a model for future civic funding or a cautionary tale in policy design depends not on how much money gets raised—but on whether the city ever figures out how to spend it.

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Before we pretend this all makes sense, let’s acknowledge the glorious absurdity: the city caught tens of thousands of speeding drivers in school zones, collected over $1.5 million, paid a chunk to an out-of-state company called Blue Line, and then got legally constipated trying to spend any of it. The money can’t fund general education, can’t buy cop cars (unless they get auctioned first like cursed objects), and can’t be given to the school district like a birthday gift in a fancy envelope. So what can be done? If we take the current rules, twist them into post-logic pretzels, and squint through a cracked monocle of systems theory, five (possibly insane, possibly genius) ideas emerge:

1. Build Crosswalk Cathedrals
   Since state law allows “crosswalk improvements,” the city could construct elaborate, ceremonial school-zone crossings complete with theatrical lighting, fog machines, and motion-triggered choirs of children’s voices singing “SLOW DOOOOWN.” Imagine LED-embedded sidewalks that change color based on driver speed or giant inflatable ducks that scream at 26 mph. Functionally legal. Spiritually divine.

2. Install Hyperlocal Weather Domes
   If “safety” remains the benchmark, then install climate-controlled domes over each school’s perimeter. Children would never face black ice again. Snow days become obsolete. Speeding drivers who enter the dome get sprayed with peppermint mist and existential dread. Tie the project to "lighting improvements" with enough creative grant language and a big enough printer.

3. Create the School Safety Theater Corps
   Fund a troupe of performance artists trained to reenact near-miss traffic accidents in front of schools. Every morning. Every afternoon. Funded by speed cam revenue, these drama kids in orange vests shout “LOOK BOTH WAYS” and hurl plush cars past startled drivers. Artistic, educational, and probably deductible under “public engagement infrastructure.”

4. Buy 3,000 Inflatable Crossing Guards Named Steve
   The law allows “safety measures near schools,” so why not distribute hundreds of inflatable humanoid figures (all named Steve) dressed as crossing guards, placed in random positions along school sidewalks? Program them to wave slowly at passing cars. Add reflective vests and blinking bow ties. Drivers slow down, children giggle, and Steve becomes legend.

5. Turn Speed Cameras into a Citywide Arcade Game
   Lean into gamification: install interactive signage that tracks daily driver compliance and rewards neighborhoods with absurd digital badges like “Most Improved Stopper” or “Least Fatal Intersection.” Use fines to fund absurd prize boxes: foam fingers, traffic cone hats, commemorative plaques that read “I Lost $100 But Kept My Humanity.” Wrap it in an app. Add points. Sell merch.

In a universe where reality operates on patch notes and public funds require ritual decoding to deploy, the only sin greater than inefficiency is taking it too seriously. The city can’t give away cop cars—but it might just build the weirdest, safest school zones Ohio has ever seen. And if the kids grow up remembering a sidewalk that sang to them, maybe the whole thing worked. Or didn’t. Either way, it beats letting the money rot in neutral.