A visit to Annapolis during the General Assembly session is usually good for a surreal moment or two. Last week's brought a doozy.
During a hearing on the O'Malley administration's bill to expand the use of speed cameras in Maryland, Sen. Alex X. Mooney of Frederick was pressing State Highway Administrator Neil J. Pedersen on the details of the legislation. How, Mooney asked, do you avoid paying a fine when you lend your car to your buddy and a camera-generated $75 ticket ends up in your mailbox?
Simple, Pedersen answered. You submit an affidavit stating that you were not the driver at the time and identify the culprit. Then the state cancels your ticket and reissues it to the speedster who actually blew past the camera at more than 10 mph over the limit.
Not good enough for Mooney.
"You don't want to snitch on your friends," the senator objected.
Having served an eight-year term covering the Assembly, I've met a lot of wonderful Republicans of all stripes. Conservative Republicans. Moderate Republicans and even, before their extinction, liberal Republicans.
But Mooney is, without a doubt, the first gangsta Republican I've encountered. Can't wait for the video to come out.
(Now before GOP readers get all offended, let me assure you that Mooney is a delightful guy with a great sense of humor and no fear that anything written in The Sun can hurt him in his district. Betcha he posts this on his Web site.)
Mooney is a flat-out opponent of speed cameras. Even though a half-dozen high-ranking police officers testified that they need cameras to protect public safety, he wasn't buying it.
"It's a terrible bill. The whole idea's awful. I don't really buy that it's not a revenue source," Mooney said after the hearing.
The senator confirmed that he believes that in many cases "snitching" is wrong. In particular, he said, many parents love their children and wouldn't want to tell the authorities that it was little Johnny behind the wheel when the car went roaring past the school or through the work zone.
"A lot of parents aren't willing to turn their children in," he said.
Some of us less permissive types, on the other hand, would have no problem ratting out our flesh and blood on a traffic offense committed with our vehicles. First, we would give thanks for the camera that tipped us off to the kid's lead-footed ways. Then we'd insist that the little darling own up and pay up. It's what old-timers used to call a character lesson. And a pretty easy one because the camera-generated tickets don't lead to points.
As for lending a car to a pal, Mooney was out of the hearing room when Laurel Police Chief David Crawford spoke to that point: "If I had a friend who did that and wouldn't give me $75, I'd look for a new set of friends."
Crawford and his fellow police officers - representing departments from Montgomery, Howard and Baltimore counties as well as the city - agreed that cameras are needed to make up for persistent manpower shortages. They would allow more officers to focus on street crime.
"Cameras can be a force multiplier. That's why we support them," said Capt. Howard Hall of the Baltimore County Police Department.
Hall said speed was a factor in 21 percent of all crashes - but 49 percent of fatal crashes - in Baltimore County in 2006. He said the No. 1 complaint police hear at community meetings is about cars speeding through neighborhoods.
The administration's bill would not force any jurisdiction to post speed cameras. All it would do is enable any county that wanted to join Montgomery in the world of 21st-century traffic enforcement to do so.
Some legislators from the more conservative outer suburbs have made the assumption that their constituents wouldn't accept speed cameras. They may be calculating wrong. Slowing down the traffic on the streets where your kids play isn't a Democratic vs. Republican or conservative vs. liberal issue.
Joe Siegmund lives on Schuster Road in Jarrettsville, Harford County, hardly a bastion of the left. He was interested in last week's column describing the success of Montgomery's speed camera program in reducing violations.
Siegmund wrote that in his neighborhood, speeds that double the 25 mph limit are "all too frequent."
"Unfortunately, the Harford County Department of Public Works Traffic Engineering unit doesn't feel we deserve a safe neighborhood, and refuses to do anything to curb speeds," he wrote. "For some reason, the rural neighborhoods are considered less deserving when it come to traffic safety."
Most of the time, the elected officials who hear these complaints are the folks in local government - county commissioners, council members and small-town mayors. These local elected officials, Republican and Democrat, deal with such nitty-gritty problems. That's probably why the Maryland Association of Counties and the Maryland Municipal League like the bill.
So here's a modest suggestion to state lawmakers who are inclined to rant about Big Brother and label truth-telling as snitching: First talk with your elected county and municipal officials. Talk with your police chiefs. And think about how you'd explain your vote to the Joe Siegmunds in your district.
gettingthere@baltsun.com