Vroom — traffic fines could go up by $32

A word of warning to lead-footed drivers: Your speeding tickets are about to get a whole lot more expensive: at least $32 per ticket more expensive.

Same goes for tickets for rolling through a stop sign, failing to signal for a lane change, too slow in the fast lane and virtually every other traffic citation.

"I recognize it is a hefty jump," said Sen. David Gladwell, R-Ogden and sponsor of SB222, which places a $32 surcharge on all fines imposed by justice courts. "But there is an equity issue here."

The equity issue in this case is that district courts, which typically handle a wide array of misdemeanors and felonies, currently charge a $32 surcharge on their cases. But justice courts, which handle traffic violations and some misdemeanors, have not had that authority.

The Senate gave its approval Monday to the surcharges, which would raise about $9 million a year, with $3.6 million earmarked to beef up security at justice and juvenile courts, and $4.5 million to reimburse counties for the costs of inmates sentenced to county jail for violating city ordinances.

The remaining $900,000 goes for technology to link justice courts to the state court administrators office so the state can keep track of justice courts cases, in particular drunken driving cases that are falling through the cracks.

Senate Minority Whip Mike Dmitrich, D-Price, voted for the bill, but he has a lot of heartburn over the stiffness of the surcharge on minor traffic offenses. "I think it's heavy, real heavy," he said.

Dmitrich said justice courts need financial support, and this is one way to do it. But he finds it ironic that he proposed last year to impose a $20 surcharge on traffic fines to help pay for public safety retirement. "I was eaten alive" by the Republicans, he said.

This year, it is Republicans who are proposing the surcharge, one that is more than 50 percent higher than that proposed by Democrats last year.

Gladwell said funding justice courts has been a problem for years, and increasingly there have been concerns over security as people come in to argue their traffic tickets and they become angry and combative. The revenue will help hire bailiffs.

Currently, there are a handful of district courts around the state that also handle traffic cases, Gladwell said, and those are already collecting the $32 surcharge.