My perspective on Body-Worn Cameras

Before I ran for Alder of the 18th District, I served on the Body-Worn Camera Feasibility Review Committee. Our task was to see if a Body-Worn Camera Pilot should be implemented in the North District. We met for weeks and weeks and wrote a report and a model policy. In the end, we voted to recommend that Common Council proceed with the pilot. 
On April 19, 2021, Common Council voted to go ahead with the pilot, as long as certain conditions were met in the policy. $83,000 was budgeted in the 2023 budget to cover the pilot. Chief Barnes worked hard to craft a policy that complies as much as it can and I'm comfortable with it.
When I ran for Alder, I knocked thousands of doors, and heard overwhelming support for body cameras on police. When I ran for Alder, I ran on a platform of public safety, including body cameras. I wanted to be the Alder who would bring a pilot to our city so we could finally have local body camera data to study. 
Polling of Americans across the board shows broad support for body cameras. Studies show 88-93% support by the public, with an even higher percentage among African Americans. I served on the NAACP doing community outreach and served on their Criminal Justice Committee. NAACP, nationally and locally, supports body-worn cameras

I served on the NAACP doing community outreach and on their Criminal Justice Committee. The NAACP, both nationally and locally, supports body-worn cameras
Every department around us uses body cameras already. If they weren't before the summer of 2020, they are now. Barack Obama recommended body cams and gave a lot of grant funding for cities to purchase them. All cities larger than Madison use them, and every single other capital city. Why not us? Why not here? We claim to be progressive, but on this issue we're left in the dust.
This is the right time to kick off this pilot in my district. We have the funding. We have a carefully-crafted policy. We have an Office of the Independent Monitor and the Police Civilian Oversight Board for oversight and accountability. We have the Public Safety Review Committee, which also overwhelmingly voted to implement the pilot. 
I plan to support the resolution I am sponsoring along with others.
Emmitt Till was a 14-year-old African American boy who grew up right next door in Chicago. On family vacation in Mississippi in 1955, he was abducted, tortured, and lynched after being accused of offending a white woman. Till's body was brought back to Chicago, where his mother decided to have a service with an open casket, so people could see this racism and brutality on display and confront it. Body cameras have served a similar purpose in exposing the sometimes ugly truth of humanity and systemic injustice and they can lead to greater, more objective transparency.
We can't just keep doing the same thing and expecting different results. We will never find a better time to implement a body camera pilot. I hope my colleagues will join me in charting a new course of police relations. A new beginning of police-community partnership that leads to trust, transparency, training, and healing.
Whichever side you fall on the issue, I am the Alder for all of District 18 and would welcome your thoughts. Community engagement is so important. If you would like to speak into this issue at our Common Council meeting this Tuesday, August 1, please feel free to register at the link below. 
https://www.cityofmadison.com/city-hall/committees/meeting-schedule/register?meeting-id=67386
It is Agenda #60.
Comments are strictly limited to 3 minutes and if you go over your limit, you will be cut off. 
You can give your comments in person at the meeting at:City-County Building210 Martin Luther King Jr. BlvdRoom 201
Or you can give your comments virtually via zoom. When you register at the link above, you will receive an email with instructions to join the meeting.