Humble man continues fight to eliminate red light cameras

Byron Schirmbeck founded Trash Your Ticket group to fight red light cameras. Byron Schirmbeck founded Trash Your Ticket group to fight red light cameras. Photo: Courtesy Photo Photo: Courtesy Photo Image 1 of / 1 Caption Close Humble man continues fight to eliminate red light cameras 1 / 1 Back to Gallery

An effort to ban red light cameras statewide was killed in the Senate in the most recent legislative session, but one Humble man isn't giving up.

Byron Schirmbeck founded a group called "Trash Your Ticket" to encourage recipients of red light tickets to throw their citations away and call on the City of Humble to dismantle the cameras.

Outside the City of Humble photo enforcement office, Schirmbeck stood in protest and held a sign directed at drivers to never pay a camera light ticket.

"State law says failure to pay a camera ticket cannot go on your license, insurance or credit. You can't be arrested or have your vehicle impounded for not paying either," Schirmbeck said.

Originally created in an effort to improve accountability and safety, the tickets are issued to the owner of the car and not to the driver, and drivers have expressed the inability to act quickly enough to slow down and stop to prevent passing a red light.

A year ago, Schirmbeck recorded a conversation with an Humble law enforcement officer who stated a driver's vehicle registration would be withheld if the city placed a hold on the account.

Humble City Manager Darrell Boeske said people have come into the Humble office with a letter stating the scofflaw is being upheld, which means people have to pay outstanding red light camera tickets in order to receive their registration stickers.

But Leah Olive-Nishioka, director of media and outreach relations for the Tax Assessor-Collector's Office, said the office does not act as a law enforcement agency.

"We only process the registration renewal. If there is a law enforcement entity that has something like that, it is up to them to enforce that. We are not a law enforcement agency," Olive-Nishioka said.

Olive-Nishioka said the only thing the tax assessor's office looks for is an up-to-date insurance policy and a passed inspection.

"We do not have any current agreements or memorandum of understanding with any municipalities within Harris County regarding red light camera blocks," Olive-Nishioka said.

This means that each law enforcement agency with a red light camera program in place must work independently to receive payments for those issued tickets.

Schirmbeck said he plans to use his site as a platform to inform more citizens about the issue.

"The only thing they could do is try to block the registration renewal, but we just proved that you can still renew your registration with outstanding camera tickets, so there are no enforcement mechanisms left," Schirmbeck said.

Sgt. Jack Burt, traffic unit supervisor of Humble Police Department, said because this is a civil penalty, recipients of a red light ticket will not receive a negative mark on their a driving or insurance records.

However, the city has the option of suing to collect the fines.

"Once we send out a violation, they have 30 days to pay it," Burt said. "After that, we add a late fee of $25 and it goes up to $100, but doesn't go up any higher. After 90 days, I believe they send it to a collection agency saying, 'You have an unpaid red light ticket.'"