In case there was any doubt: State Senator Marty Golden does not care if speeding drivers kill more New York City children, mothers, and fathers.
Forget the lies Golden told about supporting more speed cameras for New York City. Forget the idiotic proposal floated by Golden and his Republican colleagues in the State Senate to substitute stop signs for cameras. It's all just a smokescreen.
Without the cameras, Golden and his law-breaking PBA buddies will once again be able to speed through school zones without paying $50 fines. That's the endgame if the Senate doesn't reconvene to renew and expand the speed camera program in the next few weeks.
Golden's Cadillac has racked up 14 violations for speeding in school zones since 2014, for a total of $700 in fines. Three of those violations have come in the first half of 2018.
Golden's rap sheet of reckless driving predates the speed camera program, which went live in the second half of 2013. In 2005, he killed 74-year-old Hariklia Zafiropoulos with his SUV. Last December, he was caught using his parking placard to impersonate a police officer to bully a cyclist out of the bike lane he wanted to be driven through. Afterward, queries of New York's open data portal revealed that Golden's Cadillac had been tagged by cameras for a dozen speeding and red light violations in a three-year span.
A normal person would be shamed by such a record coming to light. But not Marty Golden. While safe streets advocates were lobbying to get speed camera legislation passed this session, Golden was racking up more speed camera tickets. In March, April, and May, his car was tagged for traveling 11 or more miles per hour over the speed limit in a school zone, during school hours.
The most recent violation occurred on May 10, two days before the Daily News quoted Golden dismissing proposals to expand and extend NYC's speed camera program as "non-starters."
Golden has accumulated more speed camera violations than 97 percent of the car owners in New York City. Under City Council legislation proposed after a habitual reckless driver killed two children in Park Slope, he would be well on his way to having his car impounded.
The impunity that people like Marty Golden used to enjoy before speed cameras went live is the reason New York needs unbiased, automated enforcement. Before the cameras, Golden could always get out of a traffic stop by flashing his placard. Rather than change his own behavior, Golden means to take away the only meaningful speeding enforcement tool the city has.
Don't let him get away with it. The city is united against state legislators who are prepared to let people die to spare placard-holders from $50 speeding fines. You can help by calling Governor Cuomo to demand that he bring lawmakers back to Albany to pass S6046C/A7798C.
