Flashing Lights, Hidden Costs: Miami-Dade’s Bus Camera Debacle Feels More Like Communist China Than Constitutional America

This is the first of what is likely to be two or three posts about efforts to expand a super-surveillance police-like sector in South Florida. Last year, Miami-Dade County launched Florida’s most extensive school bus surveillance and safety program. With much fanfare, county and school officials rolled out a fleet of buses equipped with high-powered cameras, artificial intelligence software, internal monitoring systems, and panic buttons for drivers. The mission: protect children from reckless drivers who illegally pass stopped school buses.

The initiative’s logic was straightforward and politically bulletproof: keep kids safe. However, as with many aspects of modern public safety, the details reveal a different story. In partnership with a private Virginia-based company called BusPatrol, the county received no upfront cost for outfitting over 1,000 buses with surveillance systems. This was a no-bid contract. Really? That makes about as much political sense as a trap door on a canoe.

From what I could find online about the BusPatrol, contract, and it was not easy (a red flag for voter accountability), the $10 million installation was supposedly financed entirely by the company, which reportedly secured a 50% cut of all fine revenue generated from violations, each carrying a $200 to $300 plus price tag.

From day one, this program wasn’t just about safety. It carries with it the whiff of the surveillance state, similar to the systems currently deployed in Communist China, and, of course, money for the government. And this is not the only no-bid contract billed under the “do it for the children” mantra. The school board also awarded another no-bid contract to another company to install license plate reader cameras with speed detection on public roads adjacent to public schools. It “polices” speed limits around the clock, not just during school zone times.

The technology is impressive on paper, and in concept, it has the potential to do a lot of good. Each bus can surveil up to eight lanes of traffic. Internal and external cameras capture student behavior and motorist infractions. The AI system, dubbed “Ava,” flags potential violations for review by the police. Drivers can view the footage online and either pay the fine or contest the citation, although reports quickly surfaced that contesting the fines was opaque and often futile.

Then the penalties started pouring in.

According to news reports, approximately 100,000 citations were issued in under six months, resulting in nearly $20 million in fines. At that point, the program appears to have collapsed under its own weight.

Fortunately, the recently elected Miami-Dade Sheriff suspended the enforcement of stop-arm camera citations last week. Why? Because the system was flawed.

Thousands of drivers reported being wrongly ticketed. According to the Clerk of the Courts, even the dollar amount fined was wrong in many tickets. Too high? No, too low! Some alleged violators never received proper notice. Others couldn’t navigate the appeal system. Many were simply caught off guard by a fully automated enforcement regime with little human oversight. What began as a safety program quickly morphed into a digital dragnet—one that prioritized ticket volume over constitutional safeguards.

Why would Miami-Dade Public Schools launch this without running all the necessary checks—especially given the red light camera debacle of the past few years? Across Florida, small cities like West Miami have turned red light enforcement into a revenue stream, with fines making up as much as 15% of their municipal budgets. That’s not safety—that’s dependence. Cities like Doral and Sweetwater have already pulled the plug after residents demanded accountability. Now, state lawmakers are stepping in, pushing laws that require greater transparency and oversight. Miami-Dade’s school bus camera program isn’t the exception—it’s the latest chapter in a broader trend where public safety is being outsourced, monetized, and stripped of basic due process.