State Rep. Deanne Mazzochi, R-47th, Elmhurst, who has supported Oak Brook’s efforts to have red-light cameras at 22nd Street and Route 83 removed, has introduced a bill that would ban all red-light cameras in Illinois.

House Bill 1718 was filed Feb. 11 and assigned March 9 to Transportation: Vehicles and Safety Committee. The Bill amends the Illinois Vehicle Code by repealing a section providing authority to use automated traffic law enforcement systems at intersections in which cameras are used to photograph or video record a motor vehicle’s failure to stop and yield as required by traffic control signals. The Bill also imposes limits on the power of local governments to use automated speed enforcement systems to provide recorded images of a motor vehicle for the purpose of recording its speed. Home rule communities would not be exempt from the provisions of the Bill.

Oak Brook Village President Gopal Lalmalani has contended for some time that the process that led to the Illinois Department of Transportation granting a permit for the cameras on southbound Route 83 and eastbound 22nd Street in Oakbrook Terrace was corrupt. His first letter at the end of January 2020 to Omer Osman, acting secretary of transportation for IDOT, was sent three days after former state Sen. Martin Sandoval pleaded guilty to bribery and tax charges.

Those charges stemmed from his involvement with a red-light camera operator. Sandoval admitted in federal court to taking more than a combined quarter of a million dollars in bribes in exchange for his political influence or official action, including at least $70,000 in government-supplied cash from a SafeSpeed representative who was working with authorities. SafeSpeed installed and operates the cameras just outside of Oakbrook Center.

Lalmalani sent a second letter to Osman on May 22, 2020, about a week after receiving a response from Osman that failed to mention anything about the corruption charges. Instead, Osman wrote that crash data for the Route 83/22nd Street intersection was being reviewed, along with data from other red-light intersections, before IDOT decides which red-light permits will continue and which will be revoked.

Mazzochi joined the cause for Oak Brook when she sent a letter to Osman April 20, 2020. She received the same response letter as did Lalmalani and there has been no update from IDOT.

“We have repeatedly called on Gov. Pritzker’s Illinois Department of Transportation to revoke the permit that blessed their installation under dubious circumstances,” Mazzochi said in a statement. “Those pleas have fallen on deaf ears for almost two years running.

“When red light cameras are not about motorist safety, but cynical revenue grabs; when red light cameras are implicated in pay-to-play practices, and those with the power of oversight like IDOT cannot be counted on to keep the players honest; and when our residents insist over and over again that they want them gone, but local elected officials either won’t listen or can’t help; then the only solution is either red light camera reform, or to end them altogether.”

Mazzochi said red-light cameras have been emblematic of Illinois government.

“They’re riddled with corruption and shine a light on slow bureaucratic processes,” she said. “Under the prior General Assembly leadership, the Senate would pass repeal bills, knowing (former Speaker of the House Michael) Madigan wouldn’t move them in the House and Madigan would allow repeal bills, knowing they would never move in the Senate, which is what happened with the last bill House bill I sponsored to ban red light cameras, which overwhelmingly passed the House with bipartisan support, only to die in the Senate”

Lalmalani said he was very appreciative of Mazzochi’s continued efforts.