Hooper stopped her and said that was only anecdotal evidence.

“I asked if you had any actual evidence, but it’s obvious you don’t,” said Hooper, who later voted against the bill.

Campbell and opponents argue that the cameras have one primary purpose: to make money.

Of the $158 collected from every citation, the state takes $83. The remaining $75 is split between the city and the camera vendor. If a ticket is unpaid after 30 days, the fine can increase by $110.

According to the Florida Department of Revenue, cities and counties collected $46.1 million while the state collected $51 million the last year. Miami’s red-light cameras produced more than $9 million in fines, the most in the state.

The claim that cameras make dangerous intersections safer is still up for debate.

A report last year of accidents compiled by the state from data provided by 73 Florida law enforcement agencies found that more than half of the agencies, 41, say accidents are less frequent at intersections using red-light camera technology.

Crashes were more frequent in 11 of the 73 jurisdictions while the rest saw no change or didn’t have enough information. Miami led the state in the number of violations, and reported a decline in the number of crashes.

Crashes at intersections with red-light cameras fell by almost a third during the year after Tampa officials installed the technology, police records show. Yet in St. Petersburg, city records show that rear-end wrecks at intersections with red-light cameras spiked 44 percent between November 2011 and October 2012. Also, the total number of crashes jumped 10 percent at intersections with cameras in the program’s first year.