The Lynnwood police chief concedes the department depends on traffic ticket camera revenue and probably would lose seven or eight officers without it.
Chief Steve Jensen previously downplayed the significance of camera ticket revenue and extolled safety benefits.
But The Daily Herald of Everettobtained e-mails through a public records request that showed a deputy chief had inquired about a job with the Arizona company that operates the cameras and a sergeant had offered to help market the cameras in the Northwest.
Jensen told the paper there was no collusion but that shouldn't have happened. He's asked for an outside ethics investigation.
Traffic cameras were installed in Lynnwood in 2007. They generated more than $4 million in revenue in 2010 and accounted for 16 percent of the city's spending.
