No, you're missing his point. He's talking about safety, not avoiding fines. If lights go straight from green to red, but then wait 60 seconds before any other traffic goes from red to green, then it won't cause any safety issues, because even if a handful of cars can't stop in time when it goes red, there won't be any other traffic around. Off course it could cause problems with cars going in the same direction stopping too quickly, but the assumption is that cars won't just slam on their breaks as soon as they see the red light (and let's not forget this is also the hypothetical in which there is no orange light).
This line of discussion is unrelated to whether or not they should be trying to maximise fines.
This line of discussion is unrelated to whether or not they should be trying to maximise fines.