By Tashi McQueen
AFRO Staff Writer
tmcqueen@afro.com
Washington, D.C.’s shadow representative, U.S. Rep. Oye Owolewa (D), is condemning the U.S. Department of Transportation’s (U.S. DOT) reported plan to ban automated traffic safety cameras in the District, calling it a federal overreach on local authority.
Photo Credit: Photo courtesy of Meta (Facebook)/Adeoye Owolewa
Owolewa said the move threatens traffic safety while undermining D.C.’s autonomy.
“It’s an overstep, because if we were a state they wouldn’t be able to do this,” he said. “For Congress to say they just don’t like traffic speeding cameras and are going to get rid of them locally is a huge overreach. This comes as they are reversing the decoupling of our taxes, creating a $700 million shortfall, and threatening to take away our Home Rule, which allows us to vote for our mayor and council.”
According to POLITICO, the proposal would prohibit speed, stop sign and red-light cameras. It is part of a surface transportation bill Congress is drafting to replace the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), which expires Sept. 30. The IIJA, signed in 2021 by then-President Joe Biden, provided $1.2 trillion for transportation and infrastructure, including $550 billion for new programs over five years.
A U.S. DOT spokesperson told AFRO that the department is still reviewing its legislative options.
“U.S. DOT is constantly examining a broad set of preliminary policy options on transportation matters,” said a U.S.DOT spokesperson. “Many policy options are currently under internal review.”
Owolewa said banning cameras could worsen traffic safety, particularly involving out-of-state drivers who are harder to penalize. “When it comes to where the majority of these accidents are occurring it is based on these out-of-state drivers who come to D.C. who don’t even pay parking tickets or speeding tickets,” he said. “They are running red lights, stop signs, turning right on red in places where you can’t, because they know they have immunity. In D.C., you owe a ticket, you can’t get your car registered or your license renewed without paying for those penalties, but Marylanders and Virginians don’t have to do that in D.C.”
The D.C. Council recently passed the Strengthening Traffic Enforcement, Education, and Responsibility (STEER) Act of 2024, allowing the Attorney General to pursue penalties across state lines. On Sept. 25, 2025, Attorney General Brian L. Schwalb secured his first court judgment under the law. Owolewa warned that the U.S. DOT proposal could undermine such progress.
Photo Credit: Unsplash Photo/Christian Lue
He urged out-of-state residents to contact Congress to oppose the measure and support D.C. statehood.
The District Department of Transportation data highlights automated cameras’ safety impact: red-light cameras reduced injury crashes by 30 percent and fatalities by 100 percent at monitored intersections, while speed cameras cut injuries by 21 percent and fatalities by 80 percent at camera locations.
U.S. Rep. Scott Perry (R–Pa.-10) has reintroduced legislation to ban cameras, arguing they primarily generate revenue and disproportionately affect low-income, predominantly Black communities.
“In 2006, you had 43 traffic fatalities, but in 2023 and 2024 you had 52 each of those years,” said Perry to D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser (D) during a House Oversight Committee hearing on Sept. 18, 2025. “The traffic cameras are not making your people safer. Particularly, in Ward 7 and 8 where there is predominantly a Black population 20 percent below the poverty line, these fines imposed on them hurt the worst for them.”
Perry asserted that the cameras serve more to generate revenue than to enhance safety, to which Bowser denied.
Perry’s bill remains under review in the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.