Put the brakes on bad-driving record in Glendale

Re: “City’s drivers rank last in state” in the Aug. 29 edition of the News-Press, covering the Allstate Insurance Co. survey comparing the frequency of vehicle accidents among the 194 largest cities in the United States.

Glendale was ranked 190 out of 194 cities. What has happened to cause Glendale to go from one of the safest cities for drivers 30 years ago to nearly the most dangerous in the country?

It’s nice to hear from a Glendale spokesman that the city has increased its enforcement efforts in recent times. Nevertheless, are these new efforts serious enough? Is the city going to continue to react in tepid fashion to appearing, once again, near the bottom of the barrel in traffic safety? I see a lot of traffic violations while driving in Glendale but very few tickets being written. Perhaps we need more officers assigned to traffic enforcement — even if it means hiring a few more police officers.

And what happened to the red-light-camera project? I know there was concern that drivers would contest traffic tickets generated by this program on the grounds that they were not behind the wheel when the car whizzed through a red light. I say assess the fine on the owner unless he identifies a different driver. Make the owner responsible for ensuring that the son, daughter or nephew who picked up the keys is made accountable for his or her action. And if the owner, instead, insists on contesting the fine, let him pay an attorney to represent him in a lawsuit against the city.

Fifth from the bottom calls for powerful action, not helplessly giving into the notion that changes in the city’s character render substantive improvement impossible.

Gerry Rankin
Glendale