Fellow attorneys: I have located and read 47 O.S. Sec. 2-117 E.(2)(b), discussing revenues of the town from law enforcement exceeding 50% of revenue needed for the operation of the municipality. I have a new vice police of police who is arguing with me, that no limit exists.  This particular town has two State highways that come through town.  (One of them is actually Main Street.) Do any of you have a cite to any other statute that ties in with this, or any AG opinions?  Seems like I am missing something, and there should be another statute, or ????? Thanks so much, Kay Wall

Kay, This may be a situation where you both are right. The statute provides that DPS can essentially enter an Order removing local authority to enforce their ordinances on State and Federal highways for a period of time. I don't read it as saying that it is unlawful, just that it is essentially saying *if you want to write tickets on our highways, then you can't make it your primary revenue stream*. Another point I'd make is that the statute speaks to traffic-related enforcement practices. I know I've talked to a couple of Towns who DPS tried to hit with a special enforcement order where DPS only looked at the Town's total fine revenue rather than parsing through to see how many of the citations were traffic related. The last Town I talked to had been just under 50% of revenue coming from Municipal fines but then one year they creeped over the 50% mark (based on their audits). In my opinion, there may be some ambiguity about whether non-traffic fines that result for citations that themselves resulted from a traffic stop (e.g. possession charges where we found the drugs during a traffic stop) are to be included in the figure, I think there is no way DPS could argue that fines collected on charges that were wholly unrelated to traffic stops should be included in the total. The other issue I've had is the verbiage "for the purpose of generating" more than 50% of the revenue needed to run the City. Purpose implicates an intent or design. If a City just happens to have a bunch of traffic tickets one year, does that mean they are doing so "for the purpose of" making the money? Or could it just be that they have more speeders that year? Again, what I've been told is that DPS just looked at total fine revenues against total revenues based on recent budgets. I just do not see how that can pass muster. But the two Towns I've talked to about this in the last couple of years never sought to appeal DPS' designation (because they didn't have the money to do so...perhaps because of the downturn in revenues because of the Order). I guess the question would be - do you have State or Federal highways running through the municipality and, if so, are we righting very many tickets on those roads? If the Chief persists and the fine revenue crests 50% then the municipality could find itself in a rough position if DPS enters a special enforcement order. On Wed, Feb 9, 2022 at 11:23 AM Kay Robbins Wall <lkrw@sbcglobal.net> wrote: > Fellow attorneys: > > I have located and read 47 O.S. Sec. 2-117 E.(2)(b), discussing revenues > of the town from law enforcement exceeding 50% of revenue needed for the > operation of the municipality. > > I have a new vice police of police who is arguing with me, that no limit > exists. This particular town has two State highways that come through > town. (One of them is actually Main Street.) > > Do any of you have a cite to any other statute that ties in with this, or > any AG opinions? Seems like I am missing something, and there should be > another statute, or ????? > > Thanks so much, > > Kay Wall > -- > Oama mailing list -- oama@lists.imla.org > To unsubscribe send an email to oama-leave@lists.imla.org >