The day of reckoning could arrive July 1 for scofflaws who have made a habit of breezing through toll plazas without paying.
That is when state officials can start suspending drivers’ licenses and removing the license plates of toll cheats.
A state law that became effective Jan. 1 applies to drivers whose acts are captured on video cameras at toll plazas and who are found guilty in an administrative law hearing of ignoring five or more violation notices.
The suspension process, which for the first time provides some enforcement teeth for toll officials, was held up until this week when officials of the Illinois State Toll Highway Authority got word that the Illinois secretary of state’s office had finally worked out the mechanics of the suspension process.
This week, a second notification will be sent to 112 people whose violations since Jan. 1 range between 5 and 28 a person, said Joelle McGinnis, spokeswoman for the authority.
Last year the toll authority lost an estimated $8 million in unpaid tolls. That works out to about 20 million unpaid toll transactions by slightly less than 3 percent of all tollway users, McGinnis said.
Toll violations at some plazas, such as the North-South Tollway’s (Interstate Highway 355), last year ran as high as 16 percent of the 79,000 motorists who passed through the plaza daily.
The problem has grown with the expansion of I-PASS, which has gateless lanes. As many as 28 percent of the violations occur in I-PASS Only and I-PASS Express lanes.
Each violation carries a $50 fine, plus a $20 administrative fee if the fine remains unpaid. When a toll cheat reaches the requisite five unpaid violations, totaling $350, and is found guilty at an administrative law hearing, the driver is eligible for license suspension.
Before the new law, the only option for tollway officials was to pursue violators in small claims court, said David Wilson, senior assistant Illinois attorney general at the toll authority. It was a costly process that consumed large blocks of the legal staff’s time. “We were left with no choice,” he said.
Now, once someone found guilty of toll cheating receives notice of license suspension, they still have an opportunity to request an administrative hearing with the secretary of state’s office.
“Or they can pay the tollway,” Wilson said.
