Image Credit: Tony Webster / CC
The Tennessee Conservative Staff –
The Clarksville Police Department is considering the installation of license plate readers (LPRs) alongside highways stating that doing so would increase both public and officer safety and improve the efficiency of the department.
The City Council will present a resolution to support the initiative on Thursday, Jan. 5th at 6PM, but there are some council members not on board with the idea.
Clarksville Now reports that many questions were asked at a recent council executive session about the LPRs and the effects they could have on people’s personal information.
Councilwoman Karen Reynolds stated that she has fourth amendment concerns regarding the LPRs, noting concerns about the personal data collected being bought and sold.
“This is going to actually cost taxpayers in the next couple of years. We’ll have to harden our IT as we collect more and more data,” she said.
Clarksville Police Chief David Crockarell responded to those concerns by stating, “We own the data. It goes to a cloud that is owned by us. By law, it is not subject to open record requests. It is something that cannot be released. It is private information.”
The oversight of the data was also questioned. Crockarell told the council that CPD undergoes regular external and internal audits for other software and that LPRs would be added to regular reviews.
City Attorney Lance Baker noted that license plate reader equipment makes the job of checking license plates more efficient and from a legal standpoint is no different than officers manually entering license plates numbers into the system.
Crockarell noted that he has watched how the system has worked in other areas over the past several years and explained that it would be beneficial for many reasons.
“Primarily, this is a product to reduce victimization. I wouldn’t be here today if I wasn’t confident that now is the time to do this. This has been something that has been available for well over a decade,” he said.
Crockarell says it would allow officers to locate vehicles quicker, such as those that are stolen or involved in violent crimes.
LPRs, according to Crockarell, would also allow officers to better track down vehicles involved in “rolling domestics.” Additionally, the police chief said, LPRs can be used to locate individuals during a mental health crisis more quickly.
Councilperson Ambar Marquis questioned how much the system would cost taxpayers.
“Long term, it’s going to depend on the number of devices. And what we’re learning with law enforcement is that everything is technology-based, and licensing and maintenance agreements are really a bulk part of our budget,” Crockarell said.
It was noted that with the current plan, it would cost between $25,000 and $20,000 to maintain the systems after the initial grant-funded installation.
Crockarell told the council the software will be able to take pictures of roughly 98% of the license plates passing by any given LPR. Per state law, the collected data will be deleted within 90 days, unless deemed part of a criminal investigation.
2 Responses
Follow the Money! Big Brother is Watching!!
“City Attorney Lance Baker noted that license plate reader equipment makes the job of checking license plates more efficient…”
This isn’t a job. “Law enforcement” doesn’t run around checking every license plate. So, unlike Nashville, Clarksville isn’t trying to claim this will prevent carjackings? It’s always, only the benign finding runaway grandpa with alzheimer disease or ongoing “rolling domestic”…but they need to store all those innocent motorists’ data for 90 days at our expense.