A statewide program to encourage drivers to pay off old traffic tickets by drastically reducing fines appears to be working.
Los Angeles Superior Court alone collected nearly $3 million in outstanding fines in just over two months and 30,000 licenses were restored in Los Angeles through mid-December, according to a court spokesman on Thursday. ‘
Prior to the launch of the program, nearly 4 million Californians had their driver’s licenses suspended due to unpaid traffic fines, which disproportionately affected the poor, according to a report co-authored by the Western Center on Law and Poverty.
“Oftentimes, people lost their jobs or they couldn’t get a job,” said Michael Herald, a legislative advocate with the center who helped draft the ticket amnesty legislation.
