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Will San Fransisco adopt our police surveillance strategies? Not likely, according to this comparison. The biggest difference right now is that SF police are just recording the action; Chicago police are actually moving the cameras, too.
In an emergency operations center one recent Saturday night, a civilian former police officer sat in front of four monitors and 16 larger screens covering a wall, conducting "missions," whirling and zooming cameras in eight neighborhoods that had seen recent spasms of violence."Someone has to watch (the footage)," said Garbauski, who runs missions once a week. "If there were no arrests, people would say, 'There's no one watching this. It's just for show.' "
Well? Are they just for show? The CPD says that between February 2006 and September 2007, they've made 1,407 arrests, including at least five homicides. But Jonathan Schachter, a public policy lecturer at Northwestern tells the Chronicle, "'I haven't seen any evidence that cameras are reducing rather than displacing crime.'"
AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast.
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Having one of these things at the end of my block has done very little to affect crime on my block. Of course, it is positioned such that it can't actually get a view down this block. I can't help but think that if the police actually spent time in the neighborhoods rather than racing by on the main streets, that might have an impact. Although the police don't bother showing up if you call, the locals with scanners do, usually with rocks to throw through your windows.
I also find it intersting that the camera at the end of my block has a flashing blue light and a CPD logo, while the almost identical setup at Rush and Chicago is painted the same black as the lightpole on which it is mounted. Is it a different system, or just a different way of handling the "bad" hoods?
i'd guess that the camera in your neighborhood is used as a deterrent as well as to solve crimes. where as the one at rush/division is more likely used to solve them. the city also doesn't want tourists to think they're in a dangerous area that needs police cameras.
also, the cops drive down side streets in violent neighborhoods all the time
San Francisco. Not San Fransisco.
"they've made 1,407 arrests, including at least five homicides"
That's what I like. Just cause the guy's dead doesn't mean he should get away with breaking the law. Arrest him!
The "second generation" of cameras do not have the big CPD box and blue light. It just so happens that the second generation also expanded into the slightly-less dangerous neighborhoods.
Please report to the Ministry of Love for reeducation.