The cameras cost $40,000 per year, plus a $5,600 installation fee.
Once that 30 day window is expired, that data is gone.Chadbourn Police have a new tool for finding stolen cars and suspect vehicles.Ĭouncil approved an $85,600 contract with Flock Safety to install and maintain 12 license plate reader (LPR) cameras in the town. “There is a 30 day window where this information is maintained and then it’s gone. Whenever an officer or an investigator goes into a system, they have to put in why they’re going into this system,” said the Chief. “For example, you can only access this system if you are investigating a crime. Hughes said internally, there is policy in place on how the cameras and the data can be accessed and used. “We don’t want people afraid to go out of their houses we don’t want people afraid to travel throughout their cities,” he said. He also believes community buy-in is important for this technology to be successfully implemented. What we don’t want to see as well, is not only everybody being surveilled, but where we have the cameras being used with regard to particular communities unfairly.”ĭaniels said the organization would like to see policy legislated at either the state or local level to regulate how the cameras are used and how the collected data is stored, distributed or used. “Many times (departments) will target communities of color, communities of poverty, or the two combined. No matter where they go, peoples’ license plates can be surveilled throughout there,” said Gary Daniels, chief lobbyist for the ACLU of Ohio. “It really doesn’t take that much time or imagination, where you’ve got the entire city covered. Still, there are some concerns that the cameras could lead to over-policing or over-surveilling certain people in the township. But, in some ways for us it’s like having 20 more police officers out on patrol,” he said. “These cameras are basically doing the exact same thing as the officer would be doing sitting there. Hughes said having the cameras throughout the community is like having more officers on the street. “There’s no facial recognition, these are not traffic enforcement cameras, these are not speed cameras, these are not red-light cameras,” said Hughes.Īccording to Flock Safety, 109 communities in Ohio and 81 law enforcement agencies already deploy the technology.Ī spokesperson for Flock said the cameras were successfully used to identify a suspect in the 2021 murder of off-duty Cleveland Police Office Shane Bartek. Hughes said the cameras will not be used to go after parking tickets, minor infractions or to track people. Same holds true if it’s a stolen vehicle, stolen license plate."
If someone has an Amber Alert or a Silver Alert, we will be notified when that vehicle drives past that camera. “Flock is actually able to capture an image of a vehicle as opposed to just a license plate,” explained police chief Scott Hughes.
The cameras, which are stationary around the township, capture photos of cars, including their license plates, that pass by. HAMILTON TOWNSHIP, Ohio - The Hamilton Township Police Department has purchased and installed 20 automatic license plate reading cameras from Flock Safety.