Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Automated Speed Enforcement topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Council hears appeal of school speed camera procurement; vote on award tabled
Summary
An applicant challenged the city’s ranking of Vera Mobility for a school‑zone speed camera contract. After hours of testimony from procurement staff, vendor representatives and traffic operations staff, councilmembers split and tabled a final decision to allow additional review.
The Orlando City Council on July 14 considered a formal appeal from Red Speed Florida LLC challenging the city procurement committee’s decision to rank Vera Mobility (doing business as American Traffic Solutions/Vera Mobility Corporation) first in a solicitation to install and operate automated speed enforcement at 26 school‑zone approaches.
Mitch Davis of the city attorney’s office summarized the procurement process for council, saying the solicitation set a point formula that weighted price and other technical categories and that the scoring panel had delayed final scoring while procurement sought clarifying financial and affiliation documents from Red Speed. Davis told the council, “staff recommends that the council deny the appeal and award the contract to American Traffic Solutions, Vera Mobility Corporation, in the following new business item.”
Red Speed’s representative, Greg Parks, urged the council to consider “best value” rather than lowest price, saying, “our technology is superior,” and argued the scoring undervalued some features of Red Speed’s laser‑based and video‑centric system. He also said his company’s proposal included legal support and other elements he contended reduced the city’s long‑term exposure.
Wayne Jenkins of Vera Mobility described the company’s radar‑based approach and secondary speed‑validation method, saying it can “capture up to 6 lanes of traffic” with a single installation and that radar is less affected by rain. Vera mobility representatives and traffic operations staff emphasized the importance of capturing the school‑zone flashing beacon in the recorded evidence; Ray Rodriguez, operations manager for the city, said, “When you look at the video, you're gonna see the beacon flashing.”
Councilmembers questioned procurement and operations staff about financial due diligence, long contract terms, technology tradeoffs (LIDAR vs. radar, strobe vs. infrared), and whether the contract could be split among vendors. Staff said the solicitation included a financial evaluation (including Dun & Bradstreet reports), and that it would be difficult to split a single solicitation among multiple vendors without departing from procurement rules.
After public presentations and council discussion, a motion to deny the appeal and proceed with the committee recommendation failed on a split vote. A subsequent motion — to uphold the appeal, cancel the solicitation and return to the drawing board — carried on a divided voice vote among members present; however, council leadership later clarified and the item was tabled to the next council meeting to allow additional review and to avoid finalizing an award amid divided council sentiment. Chair remarks on process emphasized urgency to move the program forward to increase school‑zone safety, while other members urged a revision to the RFP to make preferences and financial safeguards clearer before a long‑term contract is awarded.
No final contract award was made at the July 14 meeting; staff were directed to return the item for further consideration so that funding, procurement language and operational details can be revisited.
