Paying the bill for police body-cam footage

The police accountability bill approved by the Connecticut legislature in 2020 included a provision mandating that departments must outfit all officers with body cameras by this coming July. The intent of the requirement, which has the backing of this editorial board, is to boost transparency and build public trust in law enforcement. It has the added benefit of protecting officers wrongly accused of misconduct by providing a video record of their actions.

But some details are lacking. Who is responsible for the cost of handling requests to access videos? Or for the expense of long-term storage of these digital files? For some departments that have already introduced the body cams, such as New Haven, demand for videos has been extensive.

Reviewing hours of video footage is time consuming. It can include editing to remove subjects who are exempt from the disclosure requirements, including minors, domestic and sexual abuse victims and cases of suicide. But any edits should be minimal, sometimes involving pixilating faces.

While the legislature provided funding to help police departments pay for the cameras and associated technology, it did not cover the costs associated with responding to those FOI requests or the long-term digital storage expenses, say police officials.

Passing along that expense to those seeking videos, as some departments are doing, is inappropriate.

If the cost of getting access to these videos is prohibitive it discourages requests and undermines the legislature’s motivation for mandating the cameras in the first place — transparency. Day columnist David Collins, when seeking a day’s worth of video footage from the New London Police Department to research a story, was surprised both that it took several months for the department to compile it and that the city wanted about $629 to cover the cost of doing so. The department had not added staff to deal with such requests, leaving it to an officer to get it done among his or her regular responsibilities.

Thomas Hennick, public education officer for the Connecticut Freedom of Information Commission, tells The Day that its interpretation of the FOI law is that it does not allow assessing these fees to someone seeking to access videos. New London Law Director Jeffrey Londregan, and attorneys consulting departments in other cities, disagree, pointing to a provision in the FOI law that allows a local or state entity to charge for “formatting” or “programming” documents.

As things stand now, whether officials assess you a fee or not depends on what department you’re seeking video footage from.

This is unacceptable.

The FOI Commission could help the situation by issuing a “declaratory ruling,” which would amount to guidelines for police departments to follow. This guidance could state that it considers charging requesters to be illegitimate, with the commission’s legal reasoning explained.

As things stand now, the commission gives its advice to departments when asked. Providing the same information to all would encourage consistency and give the public a clearer expectation of how police should manage their requests.

But this is only a temporary solution, and an inadequate one. Some departments will reject the advice in favor of their own reading of the statutes. In fact, some have. The formatting and programming terms are not well defined. The legal language needs to be clarified to better fit the technology.

What is necessary is to create statutory language specifically tailored to requests for body and dash camera videos. There needs to be fee schedules, with reasonable costs, but not so costly as to discourage people from accessing information to which they are entitled. The rules should include hardship exemptions. It is likely that the state will have to provide funding to support the mandate the legislature created.

The FOI Commission could take the lead on this, seeking input from law enforcement, and from freedom of information and community advocates. Its recommendations could then be provided to the legislature as the basis for legislation.

To better define the demand and the expense, police departments can collect the data showing what the new camera mandates are costing them, then make the case that more state financial support is necessary if lawmakers want to meet the goals of the body-camera policy.

Passing along excessive expenses to those seeking information, and in the process discouraging such requests, is certainly not the answer.