ATLANTA – An unexpectedly early end to the 2025 General Assembly session left a bid to put some restrictions on school-zone speed cameras in Georgia on the shelf until next year.
While the Georgia House of Representatives was debating a substitute version of House Bill 651, the state Senate abruptly adjourned “sine die” shortly before 9:15 p.m., calling an end to the legislative session. The General Assembly usually works until midnight on the last day of the session.
The House went on to pass the substitute 140-29, but with senators gone home, final action on the bill can’t take place until the 2026 session begins next January.
“This is the first time in my 30-plus years that I tried to pass a bill, and there was no one left to receive it,” veteran Rep. Alan Powell, R-Hartwell, the measure’s chief sponsor, said on the House floor.
While school-zone traffic cameras have reduced the number of speeders and possibly the number of student injuries and deaths, supporters say, the resulting tickets have frustrated many motorists. That tension explains why House lawmakers introduced two bills this year to regulate or even do away with the devices.
Powell’s House Bill 651 sought to strip school boards of the authority to install the devices, leaving that decision to cities and counties. The other measure, House Bill 225, sponsored by Rep. Dale Washburn, R-Macon, called for prohibiting new contracts with the companies that install schoolzone speed cameras starting in July 2027 and repealing the law allowing them starting in July 2028.
The opposition stemmed from the rapid expansion of the cameras, driven at least in part by the revenue generated for local governments.
One lawmaker said the cameras produced 120 tickets per day in one small city, or about 22,000 over the 180-day school year.
“And at the current price of $75 per ticket, that’s over $1.6 million for one location, for one city,” Sen. Timothy Bearden, RCarrollton, said during the Senate debate on HB 225.
The money, said Sen. Ed Setzler, R-Acworth, during the debate on HB 651, is like “crack cocaine for government.”
But Sen. Bo Hatchett, RCornelia, said the automated enforcement has had the intended effect. A little girl was killed by a speeder in front of her school in Banks County before a camera was installed there, he said. There have been no fatalities there since the cameras were installed, Hatchett said, adding that the number of crashes in front of the school has declined despite an overall increase in the county.
Some local governments are “bad actors” just trying to make money from the cameras, he said, but other communities are using them the right way
