With the use of body-worn cameras growing in importance for both police and the public, the Santa Barbara Police Department is in the process of purchasing the devices for all of its sworn officers out in the community.
“Officers currently have mobile audio/visual recording devices, and have for years,” Lt. Shawn Hill told Noozhawk. “Body-worn cameras are merely an expansion of our capability to record interactions.”
SBPD officers already have video cameras mounted in patrol cars and mobile audio recorders on their uniforms, and the body-worn cameras will provide additional recorded evidence.
Hill said the policy for the body cameras will mimic the current policy surrounding vehicle cameras and audio recorders. He added that the cameras will be activated for police contacts with individuals involved in actual or potential criminal conduct or law violations, or in circumstances where the contacts become more adversarial.
Officers can self-activate the cameras, but the devices also have the ability to capture video of recent incidents that occur during a shift when the camera was not activated, according to Hill.
He said the data will not be uploaded to a cloud storage system, but will be kept at police headquarters using the same system that stores the in-car camera video.
“The challenge has been storage and how to adequately store data for public record,” said Anthony Wagner, an SBPD spokesman. “We just have to buy more apparatus, more hardware and software in order to make it work with expanding the system of cameras.”
Footage from the body-worn cameras will not be made available to the public unless it is required by law or specified by the police chief.
In 2015, SBPD conducted a body-worn camera pilot test program that included industry-leading manufacturers to evaluate the ease of use of overall video management, according to the department’s report to the City council. Through the pilot program, the department determined that having the same WatchGuard camera system for both in-car and body-worn devices would be the best choice.
“Having one vendor-supported system that integrates both the body-worn camera and the in-car video system delivers efficient management of all videos captured by in-field personnel,” the report states.
The City Council on Tuesday approved a $220,000 purchase for the police cameras. Hill said he expects the acquisition and implementation process to take between three and six months.
Aside from the Santa Barbara County sheriff’s and Guadalupe police departments, no other law enforcement agency in the county utilizes body-worn cameras.
The Sheriff’s Department owns 33 body cameras that have been issued to deputies who don’t have in-car video, such as the Isla Vista Foot Patrol, criminal resource deputies or role crime deputies, according to sheriff’s spokeswoman Raquel Zick.
“It’s a very useful tool for law enforcement,” she told Noozhawk. “We’re happy to have the ones that we have.
“As much as there is a concern about accountability for law enforcement, it also works the other way where it does capture a perspective of what really happened.”
A 2017 Santa Barbara County civil grand jury report found that while the cost of cameras and supporting technology is expensive and the implementation is complex, body-worn cameras have the potential of providing greater transparency for both the public and law enforcement.
“I am supportive of this new program,” Mayor Cathy Murillo told Noozhawk. “Our council wants our police department operations to be open and transparent to the public.”
— Noozhawk staff writer Jade Martinez-Pogue can be reached at jmartinez-pogue@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.
