Since it was put into service a little over a year ago, technology that reads automobile license plates of passing motorists has reaped incredible law enforcement dividends and helped make driving safer for those who travel Salisbury Township roads and highways.

That’s the assessment of Cpl. Bryan Losagio who coordinates Salisbury Police Department’s traffic safety enforcement unit.

“This technology has helped enforce traffic safety laws, apprehend fugitives and remove unsafe vehicles from our roadways,” Losagio said, “while allowing a single officer to complete assignments that before would have taken multiple officers and patrol units to accomplish.”

Salisbury Township Police Department’s Traffic Safety Enforcement Unit is equipped with a state-of-the-art two-camera mobile registration plate reading system, Losagio said. The system was installed in February 2016 and was purchased by funds the department received from the Lehigh County Gaming Grant.

The grant is funded as a part of the Bethlehem Sands gaming resort license requirement to compensate municipalities for the impact of policing roadways in corridors seeing impacts from traffic to and from the Sands. The grant provided $20,000 for the plate reading system and also paid for a new SUV patrol unit added to the police department fleet this year.

Losagio said the mobile plate reading system is designed to read up to 900 vehicle registrations per minute, per camera and provide real time data to assist police in finding a multitude of public safety offenses. When the cameras on the police car pass a moving or parked vehicle or are passed by a moving vehicle, the plate is instantly checked for several things.

The data can provide information on such offenses as fugitives from justice, missing or endangered persons, Amber alert vehicles wanted for missing or abducted children, immigration violations, sexual offenders, stolen vehicles and registration plates or unregistered vehicles, suspended or uninsured vehicles and wanted vehicles tied to local crimes, Losagio said.

This system has changed the way police locate vehicles, or people, who disregard the laws. For example, Losagio said, “I don’t think people realize just how many vehicles are being driven without insurance on our local roads.”

The statistics and resulting law enforcement results are impressive.

“In just the first 10 months after the system was put into service in February 2016, we stopped, cited and impounded 210 vehicles just for no insurance,” Losagio said. “That is more than we cited in all of 2013, 2014 and 2015 combined for no insurance violations.

“The system also has been a great tool in finding unregistered vehicles. In 2016, we stopped and cited 729 vehicles for not having a valid and current registration which is up more than 100 percent over 2015. We have also located and cited 318 people for operating their vehicle with a suspended or revoked registration. That is up from 67 in 2015, 54 in 2014 and just 28 in 2013. In the past 12 months, this system has also located multiple stolen vehicles in which arrests were made,” Losagio cited.

The system is capable of reading up to 1,800 registrations per minute at speeds of up to 120 mph, and is able to read registrations in the dark.

“A few months ago there was a hit and run crash which took place on a busy roadway which is shared by our township and Allentown City. The offending vehicle and the victim’s vehicle had just passed a plate reading camera within this system moments prior. Through the use of this system we were able to determine the registration of the offending vehicle and the hit and run crash was solved,” he said.

To save money in Pennsylvania, the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation, at the end of 2016, eliminated the annual registration sticker required to be put on registration plates when they are renewed. The plate reading system replaces the visual determination of legal registration. The system shows whether a vehicle was insured at the time it was registered and or renewed.

“Without that sticker, police would have no sure way to decipher which vehicle is legal versus which vehicle is not insured,” Losagio said.

“This camera system eliminates this problem and is a true game changer. It is certainly taking a lot of illegal vehicles off of our roadways that end up costing citizens a lot of grief and money,” he said

Losagio said the camera system resulted in 1,016 motor vehicle stops, which resulted in a total of 1,697 citations issued and 218 vehicles impounded. Four stolen vehicles were located and 22 people with active arrest warrants or fugitives from justice were apprehended.

Fourteen citations were issued to drivers who operated a vehicle after removing a registration plate from a different vehicle and putting it on their vehicle illegally.

The system resulted in six drug arrests made as well as other misdemeanor arrests and multiple summary non-traffic citations issued as well, Losagio said.

Most of the results cited for the system’s effectiveness resulted solely from Losagio’s traffic safety patrol duties and reinforced the value of the system in reduced manpower and patrol duty costs for the Salisbury Police Department.

“Our department was one of the first departments in Lehigh County to receive this type of system,” Losagio said. “In the past few months several other departments have added them to their fleet. In time I think you’ll see every department using this technology. It allows the officer to patrol and keep an eye on things while the system figures out which cars shouldn’t be on the road or are registered to wanted or missing people.”

With additional Lehigh County Gaming Grant funding, the Salisbury Police Department procured a second system which has been installed on another police department vehicle earlier this year, which will extend the usefulness of the technology, Losagio said.