“The jury is still out for Inland law enforcement agencies embracing body-mounted officer video cameras on a related issue surfacing across the country: the cost of storing data from the cameras.”
Rialto, is more heavily invested. At community events in early 2015 Rialto Police Command staff were touting the camera program and the storage program saved the city money because it reduced the need to have a officer take files back and forth. Rialto Police and the DA are on the same system meaning the DA’s office has more immediate access to officer recorded footage according to commanf staff at a Coffee With The Chief event.
Rialto does have the newly aquired measure “U” revenues that the tank farms have not yet paid. They also now have a functional budget and have saved hundreds of thousands of dollars by removing City Attorney Jimmy Gutierrez and replacing him with Fred Galante early in 2014.
“That city’s police force was one of the first in the country to embrace body cameras in 2011. All 103 of its sworn officers now wear the cameras under terms of a contract due to expire in the next year.”
“That contract provides just under 3 terabytes (a terabyte is the equivalent of 1,000 gigabytes) of data storage by TASER International, the company made famous by selling stun guns used by police as nonlethal weapons.”
“When the contract expires, Rialto police Sgt. Josh Lindsay said, the city will have to decide how much data it wants to store under a different pricing system: a more expensive system that provides immediate cloud access and a cheaper cold storage system that would require about 24 hours’ notice to access data.”
“The cost of the cold storage system would be “pennies on the dollar” compared with immediate access, Lindsay said.”
“TASER spokesman Steve Tuttle said the 1,200 departments nationwide that contract with his company pay $15 to $95 per officer per month for storage.”
“He said he was not aware of the split pricing structure mentioned by Lindsay.”
“Demand for the devices is booming after the controversy in Ferguson and would accelerate further if Congress adopts President Barack Obama’s request for $75 million to help communities buy 50,000 more body cameras.”
“Already, cities are wrestling with whether they can afford to equip all their officers and how often the cameras should be turned off to reduce the video recorded.”
“With an average officer uploading several videos per shift, it doesn’t take long for data — and the associated expense – to add up.”
Portions in ” ” were taken from the Press Enterprise article http://m.pe.com/articles/cameras-762583-data-storage.html
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