Discussion continues on funerals and traffic tickets

Published 5:26 pm Saturday, July 23, 2016

In June we wrote about a family that was served traffic violations for driving through traffic lights while in a funeral procession. The tickets were handed out by a red-light camera and were a misunderstanding, but the family had a right to be upset.

The next day Selma Mayor George Evans said he wrote a letter to the family, apologizing that they received tickets. We wrote then that apologizing was the right thing to do, even if the tickets were not intentionally written.

City leaders took even more steps this week to ensure that tickets aren’t written during funeral processions.

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Selma Police Chief John Brock met with the director of many of Selma’s funeral homes this week about the steps needed to ensure funeral processions don’t lead to tickets.

Funeral home directors have been asked to notify the Selma Police Department of all funeral processions in advance.

This seems like an easy process. Anyone that does get a ticket should contact the funeral home they used, who then in turn will contact the Selma Police Department.

This process probably won’t eliminate traffic tickets considering the red light cameras operate 24/7. Even if all the steps are followed, a case or two will probably still slip through the cracks at some point.

However, this process makes it clear what to do to avoid getting ticketed and what to do if you happen to get a ticket.

This was an important issue to people in Selma and it’s clear the city realized that and made every effort to take care of it.