TOWN OF MANLIUS – The town of Manlius is considering installing an overhead camera that records license plates and vehicle body types of vehicles traveling on Route 5 in the village of Fayetteville.
Earlier this month Police Chief Mike Crowell reported to the town board that the town had been awarded a grant for a Flock camera. He had hoped to put a Flock camera in each of the three villages in the town, but because the grant only covered one camera, he chose the village of Fayetteville because Route 5 is the town’s busiest road. He has already received permission from Fayetteville Mayor Mark Olson to install it on one of the village’s light poles, he said.
Crowell explained that unlike the Cop Cameras used in the city of Syracuse and in other places, the Flock cameras only record license plates and vehicle body types.
“It’s not in a traditional sense a camera. What it is does essentially is monitor traffic on main routes,” Crowell said. “The city of Syracuse uses two different types of recording devices. The one I’m proposing doesn’t surveil people, it doesn’t record faces or individuals.”
The data recorded by the Flock camera would be owned by the town but could be shared with other law enforcement agencies that participate in the Flock system. It would be deleted after 30 days, Crowell said.
Crowell asked the town board for permission to enter into an agreement with Flock, but several board members expressed concerns about moving forward without any public input.
“One of the things that we’re concerned about is the resident awareness that this is going on,” said Councilor Sara Bollinger.
Councilor William Nicholson said residents may also have concerns about how the data collected from the camera would be used.
“What most folks don’t really have a handle on is the exponentially greater potential to collect, maintain and analyze data that has blossomed in the last eight to ten years,” he said. “We would certainly want to have a conversation to allay those concerns.”
“Your license plate on your car when you’re traveling on a public roadway, there’s zero expectation of privacy,” Crowell said. “It’s just a great way to use technology to help in what we’re faced with every day in law enforcement.”
In addition, he said, the department is already collecting license plate data through six of Manlius’ police cars, which are outfitted with equipment that collects the data.
“It’s something that every other agency in Onondaga County has been doing for years,” he said.
“I do believe the residents might want to know the police cars are doing that too,” Bollinger responded.
The board asked Crowell to make a presentation to the town’s police committee, which meets on Oct. 26, to help seek out additional resident feedback.
“Rather than someone seeing the camera and saying, ‘what’s that camera,’ we just want to prime them,” said Supervisor John Deer. “We’ll come up with some kind of communication plan that we can bring to the public.”
