#SomervilleMA is discussing deploying body worn cameras on our police officers. This might sound good from an accountability perspective, but in most cities with police body cameras, the cameras and footage are controlled by the police and are used primarily for surveillance.
Somerville residents, please contact the Finance Committee to ask them to defer acceptance of grant money for cameras until we have more information. Details below.
I'm part of a group organizing about police body cameras in Somerville, and Councilor JT Scott will be sponsoring some of us to speak at the Legislative Matters committee meeting on April 28th, but in the meantime there's a Finance Committee agenda item for tomorrow night to approve the mayor's request that we accept and expend a federal grant to buy the cameras.
We're hoping that if we can get enough Somerville residents to write to the Finance Committee and ask for a deferral that we can get them to wait until after the Legislative Matters meeting to decide whether to accept the grant.
Ben Wheeler (https://www.somervillema.gov/content/councilor-ben-wheeler) is Chair of the Finance Committee (https://www.somervillema.gov/departments/city-council#committees-commissions).
Suggested email language to follow.
Here's suggested email language to the Somerville Finance Committee, asking them to defer their decision on accepting federal money for police body cameras. Feel free to customize and make your own:
https://cryptpad.fr/doc/#/2/doc/view/mBlTfGi7K2kraupXw4xsJXohfStmoRJ5ayGX6K6N2NQ/
Alexandra Thorn