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The Hagerstown City Council gave final approval Tuesday night to two ordinances to allow the use of speed cameras in city school zones. The five-member council passed both measures 4-1, with Councilman Forrest W. Easton voting against them. The ordinances will allow cameras to be set up in designated school zones to ticket motorists who drive 12 mph or more over the speed limit. City and police officials have said the cameras will increase safety for children and reduce police workload.

MARTINSBURG, W.Va. - Six months ago, the Martinsburg City Fire Department responded to a basement fire on Church Street. In the dark and smoky house, two firefighters passed by a man lying on the floor. Luckily, a third firefighter literally stumbled into the man and got him to safety. "It was so smoky, they just couldn't see him," said Capt. Brad Waldeck. "We're just lucky they found him as quickly as they did. " Searching for unconscious victims will no longer be a problem with a $25,000 infrared imaging camera purchased last month, which illuminates heat - from people, light fixtures or fire - in complete darkness.

A gift of 185 hams was delivered Friday to Food Resources Inc. at 220 McRand Court in Hagerstown. The delivery represented a portion of a larger gift of nearly 10,000 hams from Martin's Food Markets to food banks across its four-state market area. The first-time distribution of the hams will be in the form of Easter dinner boxes to several food banks in the area that will make sure they are in the homes of families in need by the Easter holiday, said Ruth Anne Callaham, executive director of Food Resources.

julieg@herald-mail.com Kids in front of the camera, kids behind the camera. Some favorite photo subjects are children and animals. Here are some pictures taken by Tri-State area residents, one by a 5-year-old. Other amateur photographers can share their talent with Herald-Mail readers, too. Quality is key - image and content. If you have captured a spontaneous and beautiful moment between a parent and child, send it to us. If you've got an interesting exposure of the moon, we'll take a look at it. If it's just some crazy moment, send it in. We do not have space for family portraits, posed scenes or news photos that are published elsewhere in the newspaper.

A speed camera that is designed to address speeding vehicles around Smithsburg's three public schools on North Main Street will start monitoring traffic Jan. 14, according to Smithsburg Police Chief George Knight. But there will be a 30-day grace period before the system starts issuing tickets, which will be mailed to motorists, Knight said Monday. Tickets will be mailed to motorists who are exceeding the 20 mph school zone speed limit by 12 mph or more, Knight said. The fine for speeding in the school zone is $40 and Optotraffic, the company operating the system, will get 40 percent of the proceeds from each ticket, Knight said.

scottb@herald-mail.com Hagerstown City Councilman N. Linn Hendershot said Wednesday his assumption that televising council meetings and work sessions would have an adverse effect on the meetings was incorrect. Hendershot in January opposed televising the work sessions, where most deliberation occurs, saying he preferred that only the monthly voting sessions be televised. Hendershot had expressed concern that some speakers, including council members, might be less open if all meetings were televised.

CHAMBERSBURG, Pa. - The Pennsylvania Department of Transportation will install traffic camera poles next week at several sites along the Interstate 81 corridor in Franklin and Cumberland counties, according to a department announcement. Weather permitting, the work is scheduled to be done between Monday and Thursday from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Work is not expected to interrupt traffic at most of the locations, although it might be necessary to shift or restrict the right lane of travel on southbound 1-81 at Exit 16. Walker Road traffic also might have to be shifted in the area of Exit 17 in Greene Township, according to PennDOT.

Tyler Reese, 7, left, uses a camera to zoom in on his father who was at the concession stand Wednesday evening during the Hagerstown Suns game at Municipal Stadium. Tyler's mom, Heather Reese, helps hold the camera. Evan Reese, 4, and Colby Reese, 2, also are pictured.

A 14-year-old who admitted stealing a camera from Williamsport High School in March will be detained at the Noyes Detention Center in Rockville, Md., until he can be placed in a suitable juvenile facility. Housed at the Cedar Ridge Children's Home near Clear Spring for about 17 months, the teenager has amassed more allegations of delinquency while there, it was learned during a Washington County Juvenile Court hearing Wednesday. Assistant Washington County State's Attorney Bill Hayden said there was a burglary allegation and a possible attempted escape.

Berkeley County Council on Thursday passed over the lowest bid for security cameras and instead awarded the contract to a local firm offering a warranty. On a 3-2 vote, the council awarded the contract to Inwood, W.Va.-based RCS Security Inc., which bid $40,273 for 45 cameras and mounting brackets for the new public safety building. County Council President Anthony J. “Tony” Petrucci joined council members Jim Barnhart and Elaine Mauck in voting to award the contract to the Inwood firm.

A surveillance system operated by the Hagerstown Police Department will have “smart-camera” technology featuring motion-activated capabilities and will allow officers to view the department's more than 100 cameras on laptop computers in their cruisers, Hagerstown Police Chief Mark Holtzman said Tuesday. The enhancements were made possible after Hagerstown City Council members Tuesday night approved a $162,043 expenditure for the new system. The money comes from a $900,000 COPS Tech grant that previously was awarded to the police department.

In theory, Americans have the fundamental right to confront their accuser. But what if the accuser is an inanimate camera lens? It is difficult to cross-examine a photograph. As a community, we have generally decided that speed cameras have value, particularly in school zones where all else has failed. The wellbeing of our children tops all. And if speed cameras slow down the flow of traffic and make them safer, they have our support. Of course there are a whole lot of issues involving speed cameras that transcend safety, the most obvious being revenue.

The company that provides speed cameras to the City of Hagerstown will pay $27,100 in refunds to 713 motorists who paid citations from three cameras that were not certified under the guidelines mandated by state law. Hagerstown Police Chief Mark Holtzman said Wednesday that the problem came to the attention of police on Monday, when a Washington County District Court judge threw out three citations that were issued in January to the same vehicle by...

First, let me offer the regular disclaimers: 1). My wife is a Washington County Commissioner; 2). I was a paid advocate for a company that sold photo enforcement systems. That advocacy ended in January 2012. I still absolutely support photo enforcement of speed limits in school and construction zones. Well, it had to happen. Several people have said it verbally and finally someone put it in writing. The following written comment appeared under a Herald-Mail website posting of a letter to the editor published April 27 regarding speed cameras: “When was the last time a child was hit in a school crossing in Hagerstown?

A reader inquired about the operation of speed cameras near Smithsburg schools. Blue Ridge Summit, Pa., resident Elizabeth Farmer, who frequently drives through the school zone on her way to work in Washington County, had questions related to the signs notifying motorists about the cameras and the posted speed limit. Signs placed a short distance away from the schools along North Main Street show that the school zone speed limit of 20 mph is photo-enforced between the hours of 7:30 a.m. and 4 p.m., Monday through Friday.

Speed cameras have been placed on the I-70 bridges over Md. 63 (Greencastle Pike) near Williamsport, and traffic is being shifted to the outer edges of the bridges as work crews prepare to begin demolition work on the inner sides of the bridges as part of the Maryland State Highway Administration (SHA) project to reconstruct and widen them, according to an emailed release from the SHA on Friday. The Maryland SafeZones Automated Speed Enforcement system went into effect over Md. 63 last week, according to the release.

Speed cameras that were installed to monitor school zones in Hagerstown have generated nearly $1 million in revenue over eight months. City spokeswoman Erin Wolfe said speeding tickets issued as a result of the cameras amounted to about $979,606 in total earnings from April 2012, when the first cameras were installed, to November 2012. Of the amount raised from the 11 cameras that monitor 10 school zones in Hagerstown, the city through November received about $587,764, or roughly 60 percent of the money taken in from the tickets, Wolfe said.

Del. Neil Parrott, R Washington, is stepping up his campaign to increase the maximum speed limit in the state to 70 miles per hour. Parrott, who is a traffic engineer, has introduced a bill in the current session to increase the speed limit on interstates and state expressways from 65 mph to 70 mph, and raise the maximum speed on the Inter-County Connector - a toll road that connects I-270 in Montgomery County to I-95 in Prince George's County -...

Beth Johnston has attended all the previous Art of Cooking fundraisers at Fountain Head Country Club. She has enjoyed watching fellow club members prepare a dish on camera and savored the delicious dishes served by the country club's executive chef, Todd Reynolds. Johnston is attending Art of Cooking again this year, but she'll be a little more nervous. She's going to be in front of the video camera. "It will be good they (the audience) are not in the room," Johnston said with a laugh.