The debate over whether to install speed cameras in town continued during a council meeting on Monday night, April 8.

Some members of the Barrington Bicycle Pedestrian Advisory Committee shared their support for the initiative while other residents pushed back against the idea. 

Members of the town council stopped short of voting on the issue. Instead, they decided to schedule a special town meeting focused on speed cameras — the meeting is set for June 10 at 6:30 p.m. inside the Barrington Town Hall council chambers.

Lisa Daft was the first to speak out during the public comment portion of the discussion. Daft said she completely opposed the installation of speed cameras. She also questioned why the council is jumping straight to speed cameras as a means to slow traffic when other measures could be implemented first. 

Daft also questioned whether speed cameras would solve the speeding issue along Barrington roads. She said speed cameras can only be installed in school zones, but they would fail to address other stretches of roadway where speeding is still an issue. 

Francisco Lovera is the chairman of the BPAC. He also works in traffic safety for his career, and is in favor of installing speed cameras in town. Lovera said the data surrounding traffic accidents at the state level, including fatal accidents involving motorists and pedestrians and bicyclists, is alarming. Lovera said he would not want to be in the police chief’s position, having to inform a resident that someone died in traffic accident because Barrington did not install speed cameras. 

Joe Merrill asked the council a question: Why aren’t we asking the police to do a better job? He said the town needs to install school zone signs on the roads around the high school. Merrill then recommended the police department conduct a new traffic study with valid parameters. 

Merrill was referencing an earlier presentation by Barrington Police Chief Michael Correia who said the previous traffic study offered by a speed camera company did not take into account the lack of school zone signs and an elevated speed limit on County Road near Barrington High School. 

An initial report by Blue Line Solutions, a speed camera company, showed that about 56 percent of vehicles driving through school zones in Barrington were traveling at least 11 miles per hour above the 20 miles per hour speed limit. 

On Monday night, Chief Correia said a closer look at the issue revealed that there are no school zone signs posted on the four streets surrounding the high school. He said that issue could have “skewed the numbers.”

Chief Correia said County Road accounted for more than 35 percent of all the speeding cars in the traffic report. 

“Common sense tells me that if those streets were zoned school zones we’d have less speeders,” Chief Correia said. 

The line separating those in favor of speed cameras and those opposed appeared to congregate closely to the BPAC committee. The residents who shared support for the speed camera initiative during Monday night’s meeting were members of the BPAC — Lovera, Dr. Joella Adams and Lisa Watts. 

Those who opposed the measure included Janine Wolf, Geoff Grove, John Conte and Tom Rimoshytus. 

Wolf questioned the report compiled by Blue Line. She said the company stands to make money on the venture and clearly has a conflict of interest. She said the data was created by Blue Line and there was no way of verifying it. She questioned Blue Line’s motives, adding that the operation of the speed cameras would be out of the town’s control.

“This is a recipe for highway robbery,” Wolf said.

Members of the town council had a number of questions for the police chief — what about working with a different speed camera company? Have we taken steps to add signs around the high school? Do we have the ability to experiment with other traffic-calming measures? 

Kate Berard said there has been some misinformation circulating about the issue. She said councilors are simply discussing issues that were brought forth to them by members of the community.

Council president Braxton Cloutier said the town has an issue with speeding cars and is looking for a solution. Officials then set the date for the special town meeting.