The Virginia Police Benevolent Association, representing 750 state troopers, are working with the members of the general assembly to make ticket quotas illegal. WTOP reports that the union is seeking the ban due to the negative interactions that the quota imposes on the public.
“Eliminating quotas, the union said, would decrease the number of arbitrary tickets written and improve relations between police officers and the community.”
State police officials deny that they impose quotas on troopers. But the Richmond Times-Dispatch obtained an email in which a supervisor told his troopers they should write at least five tickets a day.
The agency acknowledged the email was accurate but said the supervisor was talking about benchmarks — not quotas. Another supervisor — a senior state police commander — also recently told troopers in an email they should be writing at least five tickets a day, or else their evaluations would be poor.
The union claims troopers could even be fired.
Ticket quotas are illegal in California, New York, Florida, Texas and other states.
