Timing is everything
Monmouth County Assemblyman Declan O’Scanlon is making statewide waves and generating statewide headlines in his quest to prove that red light cameras are not safety devices, but revenue generating ripoffs.
O’Scanlon makes a compelling case, backed up with engineering, that yellow lights should be timed for actual speeds that motorists are driving, rather than by the posted speed limits. He convinced MMM that’s he’s right on the issue, and that might be the subject of a future post. Read one of these articles if you want to bone up on that issue now. What prompted my call to O’Scanlon was politics, not policy.
There are no red light cameras in O’Scanlon’s legislative district, the 13th in Northern Monmouth County.
As the Assembly Republican Budget Officer, O’Scanlon has one of the highest, if not the highest, statewide profile of his fellow Republicans in the Assembly.
The last time O’Scanlon made statewide headlines on a issue not related to the budget he was speaking out in favor of medical marijuana and against towns that were using zoning laws to keep happy medicine dispensaries and farms outside of their boundaries. MMM’s unscientific poll indicated that his position on 420 could cause a 180 among his supporters in the 13th.
I wondered if O’Scanlon might have political ambitions that, in addition to his commitment to doing the right thing, are motivating his activities outside of his district.
Posted: August 4th, 2012 | Author: Art Gallagher | Filed under: Declan O'Scanlon | Tags: Amy Handlin, Anna Little, Bob Menendez, Charlie Cocuzza, Chris Christie, Declan O'Scanlon, Gerry Massell, Gerry Scharfenberger, Joe Kyrillos, Medical Marijuana, Peter Doyle, Red Light Cameras, Selika Josiah Gore, Tony Fiore | 8 Comments »