Atlanta traffic court needs changes | www.myajc.com

If you come to court to fight a traffic ticket in Atlanta, you’ll have to make a second trek back on another day. If you don’t fight it, you might have to wait. And wait. And wait. If you decide not to show up in court at all, you’ll most likely get away with it.

Atlanta’s traffic court needs work. It needs upgraded computers. And it needs judges working outside the usual business hours.

These are the problems an internal auditor cites:

On any given day, the hours dozens of people spend waiting total in the hundreds. Even so, some have to come back, because they pleaded not guilty or because the court’s “over-burdened and breakdown-prone” computer system stops working; a problem that could be fixed with $500,000 to patch it or $2 million to replace it.

“The resentment felt toward Atlanta’s court by its own citizens and the contempt in which it is viewed by visitors is understandable given the standing-room-only crowds, the apparent ineptitude displayed in numerous resets and the factory-like atmosphere,” according to a report on the Atlanta Municipal Court’s workings written by the city’s citizens’ advocate, Stephanie Ramage.

via Atlanta traffic court needs changes | www.myajc.com.