Hamilton and Middletown police hand out the most traffic citations in the area, but a five-year analysis shows the number of motorists cited has declined in most communities.

Police said the poor economy and less officers on the streets because of budget cuts has caused the decrease, including some by double-digit percentages and by more than half with the Butler County Sheriff’s Office.

Revenues from the citations also have dropped, meaning contrary to popular belief, police are not ticketing motorists to fill a ticket revenue quota, local law enforcement officials said.

Hamilton’s Traffic Commander Lt. John Nethers said setting quotas to try and capture revenue is counterintuitive to the goals of traffic enforcement because the police officers are supposed to be the neutral party and their credibility could be questioned in court. If there were quotas, a citizen might be able to claim they didn’t run a stop sign, the officer just needed the ticket, he said.

“In theory, juries or the judge are supposed to believe us over a citizen in that kind of situation,” he said. “We’re a truly impartial party, it doesn’t make any difference to me whether you ran that stop sign, or whatever the case may be, I’m just out there working. I don’t have anything to gain or lose.”

Hamilton police gave out the most citations in the area last year with 9,231. Middletown followed with 6,010.

Butler County Sheriff Richard Jones agreed with Nethers that there is no direct incentive for law enforcers to step up ticketing.

“We don’t get the revenue at the sheriff’s office,” he said. “If you depended on the revenue, you might have a tendency to write more citations, but we have no quotas here.”

The municipal and area courts take in fines and fees for traffic citations and other case types, but they are just a pass through. Middletown Municipal Court Clerk Steven Longworth said monies they collect are disbursed to the city, Butler and Warren counties, Trenton, Madison and Lemon townships and the state of Ohio.

In 2011, Longworth said the city received 69 percent of the revenue or almost $1.7 million; the state received 22 percent of the money for $537,100; Butler County was given 8 percent at $198,166 and the remaining entities shared $12,937. The clerk said the percentages change every year depending on what types of offenses filter through the court each year and who is designated to receive those funds.

Fairfield doesn’t have quotas per se, but Police Chief Mike Dickey said patrol officers are required to make 15 traffic stops a month which works out to about one stop per shift. But not every stop turns into a ticket. Someone speeding 10 miles over the limit or less will usually get a warning, 10 to 15 miles over, it is at the officer’s discretion whether to issue a citation or not, anything over that a ticket will be likely be written.

“We want officers to pay particular attention to that (traffic issues) so we put a work standard out,” he said. “We’re saying, in support of the total mission of the police department, traffic enforcement is a significant part it and you ought to be doing at least one a shift.”

Personnel changes at police departments have changed the way many work their traffic patrols.

Nethers said in 2008 — when Hamilton issued the most citations over the past five years — the force was 127 officers strong. By 2011, their numbers had dropped to 107 officers.

Oxford has two less officers than it did in 2008.

“It’s a function of personnel or the lack there of,” Oxford Police Chief Bob Holzworth said. “I would anticipate if you look at us a year from now, you’ll see those stats start to tick back up to where they used to be.”

Mason Police Chief Ron Ferrell said they are down four officers in their traffic unit and when other duties call, they pull people off traffic enforcement.

“Typically what happens when we are running short on shifts, the first people we draw from is our traffic unit,” he said.

Middletown experienced a 24 percent increase in traffic citations between 2007 and last year. Police Sgt. Jeff McGuire attributed the increase to two grants that fund extra traffic enforcement.

Revenue numbers were not available from all of the jurisdictions because the courts there don’t track traffic citations separately. Collections for tickets in Hamilton and the Butler County Area 1 Court were down 13 percent over the five year period, Area 3 Court was about even and Area 2 Court experienced a 23 percent revenue boost.

Nethers said money is not the bottom line where traffic enforcement is concerned.

“Traffic safety in and of itself is unbelievably important. We talk about the fact that more people die every year in traffic crashes than we lost in the entire Vietnam conflict, traffic safety is just a huge deal,” he said. “In addition to that, all the studies show the best way to reduce all criminal activity and violent crime in your community, is to increase traffic enforcement.”

Contact this reporter at (513) 696-4525 or dcallahan@coxohio.com.