Albany County agreed to settle a lawsuit it brought against the City of Albany over school zone speeding tickets, according to New York State court documents filed in late October.
Under the terms of the settlement signed Oct. 16, the county will pay $6,801 to the city, and the city will mark all of the county’s 122 tickets from school zone speed cameras — as well as two from red light cameras — as paid. Neither government will accept any liability, and the case was dismissed.
WAMC has reached out to City Treasurer Darius Shahinfar and a spokesperson for Albany County Executive Dan McCoy. The Albany County Department of Law referred an inquiry to McCoy’s office.
The county sued the city in August, alleging that Shahinfar withdrew an offer to void one in four of the county’s tickets.
Court records show Shahinfar made the offer to void 25% of the county’s then 45 tickets in April 2025, but instead offered to settle for $5,000 in March 2026. County attorneys sent in a check for $3,675, arguing that that total represented the cost of the county’s then 98 tickets at $50 each, minus the original 25% reduction promised to them.
Shahinfar rejected the $3,675 check and “rescinded” his $5,000 counteroffer in a letter to county attorneys, writing that the county instead owed him $7,375 for its 98 outstanding tickets. He argued in court documents that “the one-in-four arrangement was a discretionary settlement offer, not a legal entitlement, and the County did not accept it within the time offered or satisfy the conditions associated with it.”
“Unfortunately, the County Executive has elevated personal grievances against me into ‘lawfare’ against the City,” Shahinfar wrote in an affidavit in September. “I also recognize that this is an egregious waste of this Court’s, the County’s and the City’s employees’ time and by extension our taxpayer dollars.”
In an effort to curb speeding by county employees, Albany County has since spent tens of thousands of dollars on a system to track their drivers, according to Shahinfar’s affidavit.
The City of Albany installed its first school speed zone cameras in 2024. It now operates speeding cameras at 20 school zones with a speed limit of 20 mph on school days, according to the city’s website.
The cameras issue $50 tickets to drivers recorded traveling at least 31 mph and charges $25 late fines.
