San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Jailings for minor traffic citations needs to stop
The lawsuit filed last month by the ACLU of Northern California and other advocacy groups calling for San Mateo Superior Court to end its use of civil assessments describes the court’s process of imposing additional fines in traffic infraction matters as “a hidden tax on those that can least afford it.”
But was it ever really hidden? Californians who miss payment or court deadline for traffic violations have been getting hammered by civil assessments since the 1990s. Those disproportionately impacted by the fees, which can be as high as $300, are poor Black and brown folks.
“California can’t be talking about racial justice ... and then have all this data that shows the problems with the way our courts operate.”
The state only recently took steps toward lowering the fee. But it should be done away with completely, as should the courts’ power to turn minor traffic infractions into jailable offenses.
Courts are able to do this by issuing a bench warrant for someone who has unpaid traffic tickets or has missed response deadlines. Like civil assessments, bench warrants are a relic of the state’s mass incarceration past. And ensuring they aren’t a part of the court system’s future is the only path to true equity.
“California can’t be talking about racial justice and reparations and then have all this data that shows the problems with the way our courts operate,” said Brandon Greene, the director of the racial and economic justice program at the ACLU of Northern California. “It’s not enough to eliminate fees themselves. The question is what are we going to do next?”
Next should be having a more honest conversation about what enforcement tools courts have at their disposal, and whether they’re still needed.
It was in 1996 that the state Legislature instructed courts to use civil assessments as a way to upcharge people whenever they missed a traffic court hearing or payment deadline. But this was a remedy to a self-inflicted wound.
The state’s tough-oncrime approach in the 1990s, which included California enacting its “three strikes” law in
For too long California’s courts have weaponized the fear of debt and incarceration against Black people.
1994, pushed the prison system to a breaking point. Court budgets couldn’t keep up with the skyrocketing judicial caseloads. Yet, instead of pursuing sustainable funding efforts at the state level, lawmakers decided fees against struggling Californians would be the crutch that kept the system upright.
This remains the case almost 20 years later.
According to the ACLU lawsuit, California courts raked in more than $750 million through civil assessments on traffic citations over the past decade. The revenue goes into the state’s Trial Court Trust Fund, which the Judicial Council of California then allocates to courts throughout the state.
The money comes mostly from the cashstrapped pockets of Black and Latino people, who are overrepresented in traffic enforcement stops, according to state data. In San Mateo County, where a 2017 Stanford University study showed Black drivers were twice as likely to be pulled over than white drivers and where the ACLU lawsuit alleges the courts automatically impose the maximum $300 penalty for every missed payment or deadline, it’s added up to millions in extracted wealth.
As my colleague Carolyn Said reported, the lawsuit says the San Mateo Superior Court raised more than $9 million through civil assessments over the
past three years, and was able to keep $3.4 million.
More equitable options exist.
The San Francisco Superior Court has relied on means-adjusted fines based on income levels and better communication to actually improve “collections on delinquent debt” from recipients of traffic citations, according to a recent Financial Justice Project report.
Gov. Gavin Newsom’s 2022-23 budget proposes cutting the maximum $300 civil assessment fine in half, which would be progress. But legislation to eliminate civil assessments was gutted last year and bench warrants remain an untouched topic, despite
how disproportionately they’re used.
In a 2016 report by the East Bay Community Law Center, Black drivers in San Francisco accounted for “48.7% of arrests for a ‘failure to appear/pay’ traffic court warrant,” despite making up just under 6% of the population at the time.
California removing traffic-related bench warrants would be new territory. Other bolder states have already charted it.
Nevada passed multiple pieces of legislation in 2021 that decriminalized most traffic offenses, including AB116. According to the bill’s text, on Jan. 1, 2023, Nevada courts will have to cancel outstanding
Brandon Greene, director, racial and economic justice program at the ACLU of Northern California bench warrants issued to anyone who failed to appear in court for a traffic citation. The equity-focused legislation was championed by Black-led groups, including the Free Black Mamas Initiative, a national campaign that pays cash bails for Black mothers and caregivers.
For too long California’s courts have weaponized the fear of debt and incarceration against Black and brown residents. Eliminating civil assessments is one step in a slow march toward racial and financial justice. The next has to be bigger: Stopping courts from using bench warrants to lock up people for non-jailable traffic infractions.
Or, as Greene said: “California does a good job of talking and making policies that look good on paper, but now isn’t the time to be skittish when we could be bold.”