Get police out of the business of traffic stops

But while these approaches are improvements, we endorse a more radical response: Get police out of the business of enforcing traffic laws. Rather than continuing to allow weaponized police officers with a tradition of anti-Black violence to enforce traffic laws, we should create dedicated traffic agencies whose sole mission is road safety. As University of Arkansas law professor Jordan Blair Woods argues in a forthcoming Stanford Law Review article, new traffic safety agencies, staffed by unarmed employees, could enforce routine traffic laws with less violence and damage to communities of color. Police involvement would be limited to dangerous situations. These traffic safety agencies should rely on automation — including speed and red-light cameras. Although we must remain vigilant to ensure that these machines aren’t disproportionately placed in Black neighborhoods, at least we know cameras don’t demean, pepper spray, or kill. At least one city has moved in this direction. The city council in Berkeley, Calif., has approved a series of reforms, including deprioritizing traffic stops for minor offenses. The city is also investigating the possibility of creating a new Department of Transportation in which civilians, not police, would handle traffic enforcement.