If you’re driving with South Dakota license plates, you will soon be able to whiz past red-light and speed-enforcement cameras in other states with impunity.

Gov. Dennis Daugaard, R-S.D., signed legislation Monday that bans his state's government from unmasking residents being pursued by other jurisdictions for traffic-camera-related civil fines.

The bill soared through the state legislature earlier this year with support from lawmakers fed up with a speed trap across the state line in Iowa.

“People came forward saying they were receiving tickets two or three weeks after they went through a particular zone… [with] nothing other than this crazy blanket information that came with a $200-$300 fine,” says Republican state Rep. Anne Hajek, the bill’s primary sponsor in the South Dakota House of Representatives.

Hajek, an attorney, was particularly irked that drivers were unable to contest the penalties and by companies’ apparent profiteering at her constituents’ expense.

“They should be able to have due process and address the charges against them,” she says. “For a paltry fee - it was under $5 - we were sharing [identifying] information, and they would collect their fines. We have to look at the individual and their rights and how they’re impacted … for some people a couple-hundred-dollar fine is a lot of money.”

TheNewspaper.com, an online publication that covers driving-related news, notes that Arizona and California may be exempted from the new law because those states treat traffic camera tickets as criminal charges.



“We’ll see what the courts say, I suppose, but unless it gets challenged, I think we’re pretty good," says Hajek.



Matt Konenkamp, an adviser to Daugaard, says the reform was needed to shore up the due process rights of South Dakota residents.

"The State of South Dakota cooperates with other states for law enforcement purposes by sharing information through an electronic system. Our current agreement with other states does not allow for the information to be used to collect civil fines,” Konenkamp says. “Sioux City, Iowa was using the electronic system to collect civil fines, and were not providing due process of law to citizens who were issued a ticket. Therefore, this bill disallows the use of this data for purposes other than the legitimate law enforcement purposes permitted by our current agreement."

Daugaard also signed legislation banning in-state use of red-light cameras, but that bill did not ban state speed cameras, the Rapid City Journal reported.