Two Stories of Government Greed

Today we have two stories for state government greed:

1. First off, we have this story from California (via the Consumerist) which talks about how the State of California has been seizing assets from people's safety deposit boxes and selling them at marginal value on eBay if the owner of the box hasn't visited in as little as 3 years. To add insult to injury, any paperwork seized is shredded, so grandma's birth certificate, the deed to your house, you know, the important paperwork you put in the box to keep it safe from....destruction, is being destroyed by the State. Adding further insult? The State of California made sure that they were protected from litigation during these activities by passing a law giving them immunity.
2. Secondly, we have news from the Commonwealth of Virginia that they will begin instituting traffic fines over $3500 for residents in the name of public safety. They're calling the additional fines "Driver Responsiblity Taxes". You will get taxed for every point on your license for up to five years, up to $700 per year. The law also forbids judges from reducing the fine OR other penalities.

The rationale behind the Viriginia is supposed to be about doing something to make the roads safer. I'll agree that in Northern Virginia the traffic can be a little scary. Well, a lot scary, and people aren't respecting the existing traffic laws, so maybe this law was originally born out of an attempt to scare people into compliance. But they've morphed into a source of revenue for the State. The article I linked to talks about how the lawmakers are already budgeting their expected income from the increased fines. If this law were truly about justice, respecting the law, and making the roads safer than Virginia would have given their magistrates the ability to reduce fines as they see fit. There are times in everyone's life where speeding is appropriate. I don't have to enumerate them for you, you can think of at least a dozen scenarios where you'd be willing to let someone speed down the highway.

But instead, the lawmakers wish to provide additional money, which, while they claim it will go to maintaining the roads, will end up in other people's coffers too.

This situation is all to like the uproar amongst the alderman of Chicago who are upset that there's now a radar detector that warns motorists of traffic cameras. If the only purpose of the traffic cameras were to save lives, and people were warned ahead of time about the location of a camera, then these detectors are a good thing.

But the alderman interviewed at least had the guts to state the truth:

Revenue from the $90 fines at camera-guarded intersections "is budgeted in our annual appropriation ordinance," the alderman said. "That is why all these cameras are being installed. ... The reality is that people blow through these intersections and they are going to be caught and they are going to be fined. It has become a big revenue source, absolutely."

Which brings us back around to the actions of the State of California. They're seizing people's assets without any intention of notifying the original owners and selling WHAT IS NOT THEIR'S to generate money for their own purposes. It is not the job of the State to seize property willy-nilly and turn itself into the largest pawn shop in the world. It is not the job of the State to knowingly shred people's personal documents without concern for the people they're impacting. But they're doing it anyway. They're doing it because they can make money doing it and again, fill their coffers with ill-gotten money that they spend on pet projects, pork, and largess. The highway named after that State Senator's family? Paid for by stealing people's prized possessions. That museum built in a town of 500 people in the mountains of Northern California that no one will ever visit or care about? Paid for by breaching a sacred trust between the people and the government they established to protect them from the very actions the State is perpetrating on its citizens. It's a disgrace that this kind of thing has ever happened, but it's a perfect example of the politics of greed in this century.