Photo by Photos by Chip Py

While D.C. ramps up its automated speed enforcement program, Virginia seems to be going in the opposite direction. According to WTOP, the $85 billion Virginia budget that was approved yesterday includes a provision that discourages towns from setting up speed traps on interstate highways:

Buried in the $85 billion budget package approved by the General Assembly late Wednesday is a provision that bans local towns from setting up such interstate speed traps just to collect revenue.

The town of Hopewell, Va., south of Richmond, sits along Interstate 295. It was so good at enforcing speeding laws along the interstate that officers there generated $150,000 a month in traffic tickets.

The change doesn’t stop the local police from enforcing speeding laws.

“For all intents and purposes, this provision, tucked away into the state budget, should largely remove the profit motive from this type of enforcement,” says AAA’s Mid-Atlantic spokesman Lon Anderson.

The auto club lobbied to ban local towns from setting up speed traps on interstate highways.

The state police still patrol the Interstates for speeders.

According to the Richmond Times-Dispatch, the devil is in the details. The budget provisions largely removes the local profit motive for targeting speeders by mandating that a certain percentage of fines go to a state fund. Hopewell’s sheriff clearly wasn’t pleased by the move:

The assembly’s action infuriated Hopewell Sheriff Greg Anderson, who railed at what he described as a back-alley move to curtail his operation after similar efforts were defeated in Virginia House and Senate committees. He singled out Sen. John Watkins, R-Powhatan, and Sen. Ryan T. McDougle, R-Hanover, for their political “sleight of hand.”

“It stinks to high heaven,” Anderson said. “It’s nothing but political … and I am adamantly opposed to it and the underhanded political tactics that they have used in the Senate to get this through.”

“I think all the entities that are opposed to this bill are going to be putting a lot of pressure on Gov. McDonnell to veto that particular amendment,” the sheriff added.

In 2011, Hopewell issued close to 15,000 speeding tickets on a one- to two-mile stretch of I-295, taking in some $1.6 million in revenue.