Hempstead town wrote 36,000 school bus camera tickets last year in districts that didn't join program

The Town of Hempstead last year issued roughly 36,000 school bus camera tickets in and around school districts that don’t participate in the town’s program, continuing a controversial practice decried by the districts and initially questioned by the town itself.

Those tickets are worth more than $9 million if paid.

Most of these citations, 20,711, came within Hempstead Village, according to ticketing data from the town provided in response to a public records request. There were also 7,656 in Valley Stream, 5,433 in Baldwin and 3,079 in Lawrence.

The 36,000 tickets in 2025 are on top of 80,000 written in 2023 and 2024 — worth $20 million if paid — within the districts that never agreed to school bus cameras.

Newsday reported last year that Hempstead town was likely issuing these tickets improperly, since the districts didn’t authorize the program as required by state and local law. Nassau County’s Traffic and Parking Violations Agency, which adjudicates bus camera tickets, briefly paused hearings on those cases last year, but has since resumed.

The town has not provided information on how many of the tickets in question have been paid. A class-action lawsuit over their legitimacy is being litigated in federal court.

"The district has not reversed its stance or changed course," Austin Graff, an attorney representing Hempstead Union Free School District, wrote in an email. "The district has not joined the [Town of Hempstead] school bus camera program."

Baldwin, Lawrence and Valley Stream district officials also confirmed they never authorized participation.

Both Hempstead Town and its school bus camera vendor, BusPatrol, declined to comment.

The town, following Newsday’s initial report in January 2025, called for the throwing out of citations issued in non-participating districts and the refunding of fines. The town attorney even wrote to BusPatrol executives, questioning the legality of ticketing in these districts.

"This is troubling and indicates that in its current state, the program is potentially overreaching its legal authority," Hempstead Town Attorney John Maccarone wrote to Karoon Monfared, BusPatrol’s chief executive on Jan. 23, 2025. Maccarone added he was concerned the ticketing "contradicts State and Town law."

However, four months later, the town told Newsday that BusPatrol had determined none of the tickets were improperly issued. According to the contract, the town keeps 55% of the ticket revenue and BusPatrol gets the remaining 45%.

Ticketing picked up late in year

In the first quarter of 2025, as questions of the program’s legality swirled, the town issued just 7% of its total bus camera tickets in Baldwin, Hempstead, Lawrence and Valley Stream, town data shows.

But by the end of 2025, the ticketing in and around those districts had returned to previous levels, totaling 32% of what was issued last year.

Shortly after Newsday’s investigation, ticketed drivers filed three lawsuits questioning the legality of the town issuing citations in the non-participating districts.

Those suits were combined into a class-action lawsuit and moved last year to federal court.

Both the Town of Hempstead and BusPatrol have asked the court to dismiss the case, arguing while the law does require school district agreement, it does not stop them from ticketing drivers anywhere in the town from buses either belonging to or being operated by districts that do participate in the program.

"I suspect that they are still issuing them in those districts because they have taken the position ... that they can use buses from other districts that have signed up even in districts that haven’t signed up," Jonathan Neuman, a Garden City-based attorney for the plaintiffs, wrote in an email to Newsday.

Baldwin and Hempstead district officials previously said school buses contracted by their districts were equipped with cameras and that those cameras were being used. Both districts contract with buses also used by other districts that have joined the program and already are equipped with cameras.

Education officials also said it’s rare for buses from one district to make stops to pick up or drop off children in another district. According to the law, the bus camera tickets can only be issued to drivers passing stopped school buses when children are getting on or off the bus, not when a bus is just passing through another district.

As Newsday reported last year, BusPatrol offered Hempstead school district $1 million to join the program, which district spokesman Ron Edelson said the district rejected. The company countered with 10% of the revenue generated by tickets issued within the district. Hempstead also turned down that offer.

Edelson had said district officials felt the offered sum wasn’t worth the headache of joining a program that’s been unpopular with the public since it launched in 2022.

A spokeswoman for Baldwin also previously said that district rejected an offer of 10% of ticket revenue from BusPatrol in exchange for joining the program. Newsday previously reported the districts that already joined the program did not get a cut of the proceeds.

Paul Sabatino, an attorney and former Suffolk legislative counsel, said "it’s mind boggling" the town is still issuing tickets in the four districts.

"I’m pretty jaundiced after spending 31 years in municipal government, but as jaundiced as I am, this is one for the record books," Sabatino said. "I always knew that it was a revenue grabber. It was never about safety."