1/11/2022
On Monday’s Bloomington City Council meeting, one item placed on the consent agenda was pulled and tabled until next month. The agenda item was a contract between the City of Bloomington and Flock Safety for the purchase of ten Automatic License Plate Readers (ALPR). The cameras are able to track license plate data using algorithms to detect the plate number and cloud computing to store and search for the information.
This would be an addition to Bloomington Police Department’s Public Safety Camera Systems (PSCS), made up of 18 cameras. The contract would be for 24-months and cost $31,500 initially, followed by recurring annual payments of $27,500.
Ward 8 Alderperson Jeff Crabill pulled the agenda item and asked it be tabled until more community involvement can occur and so the Public Safety and Civilian Review Board can give their recommendation on the proposal. Crabill moved to table the item until the February 14th, 2022 Council Meeting. His motion was seconded by Ward 7 Mollie Ward. The motion to table passed 6-2 with only Ward 3 & 5 Alderpersons, Shiela Montney and Nick Becker respectfully, voting no, and Ward 1 Alderperson Jamie Mathy abstaining.
City staff stated in the Agenda Packet:
The great majority of crimes in the City involve the use of a vehicle. Because of this, the Police Department has been building and deploying PSCS since 2012 to aid in investigations. The addition of Automatic License Plate Readers (ALPR) in Bloomington will be used as an additional technology tool that can assist the department in enhancing public safety in areas impacted by violent crimes and near locations of frequent vehicle crashes. The City’s current PSCS has been utilized to solve numerous crimes including homicides, sexual assaults, and major traffic crashes, but the PSCS is not designed to capture the license plates of vehicles visible to the existing camera(s).
CITY OF BLOOMINGTON COUNCIL MEETING AGENDA PACKET JANUARY 10, 2022
During current major crime investigations, an employee(s) is specifically tasked with manually reviewing hours of video footage from our existing PSCS looking for evidence in an incident. This is an inefficient, expensive, and time-consuming process. Current developments in Automatic License Plate Readers (ALPR) hardware allow for cloud-based machine learning processes. These processes allow agencies to instantly compare vehicles seen on their PSCS systems and compare that footage with still images recorded on pole-mounted ALPR systems. Using this automated matching process would significantly reduce investigative time and associated employee costs while focusing investigative efforts. Use of ALPR technology will also improve the City’s crash investigations, assist in missing persons/abduction cases, and reduce potential bias in departmental traffic stops.
However, many local civil rights organization expressed concern about the new equipment and the lack of community involvement in the conversation on the issue.
Black Lives Matter BloNo stated a number of questions on their Facebook page, and encouraged the community to speak out on the issue:
There are major concerns with the use of automatic license plate readers, but many questions stem from the lack of policies around the collection and use of this data.
Black Lives Matter Bloomington-Normal
Should there be more surveillance of residents without discussion and input from stakeholders in the community? How does BPD plan to use these cameras? Where do they plan to put them? How will they know if they actually reduce crime?
Carol Koos, president of the ACLU of Central Illinois, made the following statement during her public comment at the city council meeting:
The community needs to receive more information before the agreement with the Flock Safety System is approved. The agenda item to purchase the cameras states that after the cameras are installed “the department will engage with residents in these areas to discuss the use of the ALPR cameras, discuss their impact on public safety and address privacy concerns.” This discussion needs to happen before, not after any consideration of camera purchases is made. Communicating with residents after the fact increases their lack of trust in the police.
The community needs to know what the goals of the police are with the use of this technology. The community also needs to know what evidence police have that this technology actually reduces crime and specifically what types of crime. The community should have the opportunity to ask questions and give their input in a public forum before the contract to install the system is approved or considered for approval.
The agenda item states that “staff will be speaking with members of the Public Safety & Community Relations Board (PSCRB) in January, however, this committee did not meet. Delay of consideration for approval will allow this committee to discuss this issue with the Bloomington police.
During discussion of the proposal, Deputy City Manager Billy Tyus stated the City will gladly share those locations and there will be limitations on data storage, including purging of unused or irrelevant data. Tyus said these will not to be used for traffic stops or petty crimes, but for for major crimes. The City believes this will be a vital tool for protecting community.
