R.I. chasing $29M from old traffic fines

PROVIDENCE (AP) — A new agency is seeking to collect a total of $29 million in unpaid traffic tickets in Rhode Island.

With the state's backlog pushing up to 88,000 fines over a period of 20 years, motorists and companies are getting collection letters starting this month, The Boston Globe reported Thursday.

The Central Collections Unit will inform drivers that their privileges to drive in Rhode Island will be suspended until they pay off their fines.

"We don't go away. We're not going to send just one letter. We're going to do follow-up calls," said Kate Brody, chief of legal services for the collection agency. "It's kind of reminding them, you do have this outstanding balance and responsibility."

The first batch of letters from the agency went out to 101 motorists, nearly all for out-of-state businesses, that owe a total of $415,000.

The push is a cooperative effort between the Rhode Island Traffic Tribunal and the state's revenue department to resolve Rhode Island's history with unpaid traffic tickets.

The state's former traffic court was plagued with operational issues and so bogged down by political bureaucracy in the mid to late 1990s that an audit showed the court wasn't pursuing more than $23 million in traffic fines.

Thousands of unpaid tickets were placed in boxes and stacked to the ceiling at the court, according to an investigation by The Providence Journal at the time.