Letters: Red-light fees going elsewhere

With Nassau and Suffolk county taking every step they can toward cutting their budget deficits, whether through tax increases, layoffs or service cuts, can someone tell me why they are still paying out-of-state vendors to operate their red light camera systems? With Suffolk splitting their "profits" 50-50, no less ["Suffolk to vote on traffic cameras," News, Aug. 16]. Are there no local companies willing or able to handle this work? Were these multimillion dollar contracts even open to competitive bidding? Are things going so well that we can hand our money and jobs over? At least when they just raise taxes, our money stays in our own state.

Joe Zaffuto, Hicksville
 

Reading the deal our county leadership made with this very lucky firm located in Dallas, one has the answer as to why we can't trust these elected leaders to spend our hard-earned cash.

Let's face it, these cameras were not put in for our safety, as they want you to believe. They were put in for revenue, in a time when the economy was producing very little.

Why is Newsday not investigating why these contracts were shipped out of state? Why is Newsday not investigating whether or not these programs work?

Stephen Vella, Ronkonkoma