Minneapolis Police Near End Of Body Camera Testing Program
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- The Minneapolis Police Department is in the final stages of its body camera test program.
Thirty-six officers from three different precincts volunteered to test and evaluate the cameras.
Lawmakers are still trying to figure out whether the footage should be available to the public, or restricted to law enforcement and people in the videos.
Officer Marshall Collier has patrolled the streets of Minneapolis for 17 years. For the past four months, he has had a different kind of partner.
He is one of 36 officers wearing and evaluating body cameras.
"This particular one I'm wearing is pager size," Collier said. "Juries want to see it, judges want to see it, attorneys want to see it."
The Minneapolis City Council gave $400,000 to fund the pilot program. Officers evaluated two different types of cameras from two different companies.
For Minneapolis Police, it's all about transparency.
"I think it's also important for accountability on both sides," Chief Janeé Harteau said. "It holds both police officers and citizens accountable."
MPD hopes to keep videos from the cameras for a year, at a cost of $300,000.
Some issues with the technology include the expense to store the video and privacy issues.
"To redact juvenile information, evidentiary information in the video, to try and get what's public, is going to present challenges," Harteau said.
She says technology should not be relied upon to fix problems between police and those they protect.
"It's not a fix, it's a tool," Harteau said. "We still need to hire and train people of high integrity, and I think some people believe that if you simply put a body camera on somebody, that's going to change who they are, and I don't believe that."
Harteau says she also worries about camera technology becoming quickly outdated.
The pilot program comes to a close in weeks, and MPD will then evaluate the information before making that decision.
Officers could be outfitted with the cameras by the end of the year.
