Say Cheese: St. Paul Proposes to Make City Streets Safer With the Help of a Network of Closed-Circuit Surveillance Cameras.

By Jason Hoppin, Pioneer Press, St. Paul, Minn.

Feb. 25–Government eyes could soon be watching a neighborhood near you.

St. Paul officials are looking to install closed-circuit surveillance cameras throughout the city, giving police a real-time, remote look at what’s happening on the streets.

Common in England, where they helped capture suspects in the 2005 London subway bombings, the cameras are gaining a foothold in the Twin Cities and other U.S. communities. The plan has the support of Mayor Chris Coleman and Police Chief John Harrington.

“We see them in the neighborhoods. We see them in Highland Park. We see them on the West Side. The neighborhoods could really benefit from this kind of thing,” Harrington said Friday. “It’s a whole lot of extra eyes.”

The city hoped to kick-start the program through a $900,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security but recently learned it didn’t make the cut. However, that won’t stop St. Paul officials from looking for money to get it under way, soon. There is no timeline for when the cameras would be installed.

“We’ll put it in the hopper and keep working on it,” said Timothy Butler, who heads emergency management and communications for the St. Paul Fire Department.

The cameras are similar to 29 installed through a Target Corp. Safe Cities grant around the Block E entertainment district in downtown Minneapolis.

Minneapolis police Inspector Rob Allen said they have been effective, leading to 250 arrests since being installed 18 months ago. The most common offenses are drug-related, but the cameras have helped prosecute robberies, assaults and other crimes.

But do they actually prevent crime, or just help catch crooks?

Allen said he thinks cameras reduce crime. He noted that in a city mired in a rash of robberies, the downtown robbery rate has declined 9 percent — the only neighborhood in Minneapolis to see a drop.

Privately owned security cameras are common and regularly made available to law enforcement, as was the case during the investigation of last year’s murder of St. Paul police officer Gerald Vick. But other cities looking to install municipal systems have struggled with a host of privacy concerns.

“If it’s a regular camera and a police officer in that position could observe it,” then the cameras are legal, said Charles Samuelson, who heads the American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota. “Some people think that’s a great idea. Other people are troubled by it. We’re in the latter category.”

The Oakland, Calif., City Council rejected cameras in 1997 but last year installed a handful in crime-ridden neighborhoods. Larger cities such as Chicago and Baltimore also have installed them.

The Homeland Security Department allows cameras to be bought through state security grants, and several cities have used the money to install them, said department spokeswoman Branda Napper.

Initially, St. Paul envisioned the cameras along University Avenue. But city police spokesman Pete Crum said they likely would be installed in other high-traffic, high-density areas, such as downtown.

City Council Member Dave Thune, who represents the downtown area, said he would have to be convinced that the cameras are needed and effective.

“I’m not a fan of Big Brother,” Thune said.

Harrington said past undercover surveillance in the Frogtown neighborhood led to a drop in drug trafficking there once dealers learned of the police action. He said cameras could have a similar effect.

Eventually, Harrington would like cameras to be installed throughout the city.

“It would be a large number of (street) intersections,” he said.

Allen said the Minneapolis Police Department worked through neighborhood groups before installing the cameras. If they were opposed, Allen said, the cameras would not have been installed.

The department also adopted a privacy policy, which says cameras should not be used where citizens have a reasonable expectation of privacy. The policy also states that recordings of non-criminal activity will be destroyed after 14 days.

A kiosk at the downtown precinct allows the public to see what officers are looking at.

“We’re not hiding what we’re viewing,” Allen said.

Jason Hoppin can be reached at jhoppin@pioneerpress.com or 651-292-1892.

In Minneapolis “¦

St. Paul’s mayor and police chief envision a system of surveillance cameras throughout the city in an effort to fight crime.

Minneapolis launched such a system in 2004 in the Block E area of downtown. The results:

29 — Number of Minneapolis cameras

250 — Approximate number of arrests based on surveillance images

9 — Percentage drop in downtown Minneapolis robberies since cameras were installed

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Copyright (c) 2006, Pioneer Press, St. Paul, Minn.

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