Some worry about loss of privacy. City council committee to discuss the proposal today.
View full sizeSyracuse is considering using $125,000 in stimulus money to erect its first police security cameras on South Geddes Street near Seymour Street. Sam Alharbi, who works at the NY Sports Wear & Sneakers store in Sakran Plaza, likes the idea of having security cameras in the area. Syracuse, NY -- If they get the go-ahead from city lawmakers, Syracuse police will introduce the city’s first around-the-clock surveillance cameras on the Near West Side, a neighborhood targeted because of the high number of gunshots reported.
Police plan to use $125,000 in federal stimulus money to put nine cameras atop utility poles and traffic lights in an area between South Geddes and Oswego streets.
Syracuse would join Rochester, Schenectady, New York City and many other cities around the country making use of surveillance cameras to deter crime. Chicago has a network of 10,000 public and private security cameras, with plans for more.
Many police agencies say the cameras help to reduce crime, but academic studies have found mixed results. And critics worry about the effect on privacy.
Solvay Police Chief Richard Cox has used a pair of video cameras in his village for two years. Cox said they have helped to deter crimes such as vandalism in parks, and they have helped in investigating crimes such as shoplifting.
Cox said he wishes he had another couple of cameras — but he also said there’s a limit. “I think you have to be very, very careful that we don’t go too much into ‘Big Brother is watching,’” Cox said. “And I think that you need to be careful that you don’t replace good old-fashioned police work with technological equipment.”
The cameras will be the subject of a public meeting at 5:30 p.m. today at City Hall, where common councilors want to hear from Near West Side residents before voting on whether to approve the project.
“I’m really interested in what everybody has to say, but in particular the good law-abiding citizens of the Near West Side. I want to hear what they have to say,” said Councilor Bill Ryan, who chairs the public safety committee.
Mayor Stephanie Miner, who voiced support for surveillance cameras during her election campaign last fall, said many residents are eager to have them. “I have heard overwhelmingly from the Near West Side support for any sort of increase for tools for police officers to use to fight crime,” she said Monday.
Carole Horan, who has resided for 38 years on Tully Street, about two blocks from one of the proposed cameras, said she doesn’t feel the cameras are necessary. Horan said the council should gather extensive community input before moving ahead. “I feel safe,” Horan said. “I’ve raised my family here. I don’t feel the need.”
But others, such as business owner Elaine Sakran, said they would welcome the surveillance. Standing at her family’s car wash at the corner of South Geddes Street and Grand Avenue, Sakran pointed at various locations around the intersection where shootings had occurred. “There’s trouble here,” she said.
View full sizeAn area that includes South Geddes Street would receive around-the-clock surveillance from cameras perched above the street under a proposal by Syracuse police. Police picked the Near West Side because it is one of the areas of Syracuse with a high density of reported gunshots, said First Deputy Chief David Barrette. The area also has high-speed data lines available to connect the cameras to headquarters, police said.
Whether cameras deter crime remains open for debate. Police agencies often credit them with reducing crime in targeted areas, but several academic studies have found little or no statistical evidence of their value.
“There is not convincing research evidence that (the technology) aids in deterring, responding to and investigating crime,” researchers wrote in a 2009 report published by the Surveillance Studies Centre at Queens University, in Kingston, Ontario.
Another study, published last year by New York University, found that surveillance cameras “may be moderately effective in preventing minor crimes or in diverting them to distant areas.”
The researchers said the impact of cameras in deterring more serious crimes has not been well-documented, although one study in crime-ravaged East Orange, N.J., showed a 50 percent decrease in crime when police combined cameras with other tools, such as electronic listening devices.
NYU researchers David Greenberg and Jeffrey Roush said there is still a “paucity of research” on the topic.
A 2008 study published by the University of California, Berkeley, found that surveillance cameras had little effect on violent crime but helped reduce property crimes in areas near the cameras.
Without more evidence that cameras make a difference, Syracuse should pause before putting them in the community, said Barrie Gewanter, director of the Central New York chapter of the New York Civil Liberties Union.
Gewanter said she wants the city to adopt legislation to ensure that surveillance cameras cannot be used to violate the privacy rights of individuals. The city also should have rules for how long surveillance videos will be retained, who has access to them and how they can be used, she said.
“There need to be a lot of checks and balances in place before we just go ahead and install cameras all over the place,” Gewanter said. “In a lot of places, our laws lag behind our technology, and we grab for the technology because we think it’s going to give us a leg up in fighting crime.”
Cox, of the Solvay Police Department, said his cameras have been effective in preventing vandalism at a village park. They also have been used to catch shoplifters at a local grocery store, among other successes.
But Cox agreed that care must be taken with the cameras, which are powerful and can be manipulated remotely. From a utility pole in Solvay, a camera can zoom in on license plates about half a mile away on Interstate 690, he said. “You have to be very, very careful where you point these cameras,” he said.
Some Solvay residents have expressed concerns about privacy, Cox said, but far more have asked for cameras in their neighborhoods. “They call us on a fairly regular basis,” he said. “The residents like them.”
Contact Tim Knauss at tknauss@syracuse.com or 470-3023.