A week after the city announced 16 police surveillance cameras will be installed on Syracuse’s North Side, some local politicians are saying the cameras need to be expanded into other neighborhoods.

“If I could find more money to get more cameras, I would do that,” said Pamela Hunter, a Syracuse councilwoman. “There are more neighborhoods and streets that could use these.”

Bill Magnarelli, assemblyman for the 129th district, received a $224,500 state grant, which was made available to assembly members for capital projects within their districts. The assembly members listened to the citizens of their districts and assessed their needs in the city of Syracuse, Magnarelli said.

“People came to my front door to lobby for these cameras because some of their neighborhoods were being overrun by drugs, prostitution and other criminal activities,” Magnarelli said.

Five of the cameras will cover Washington Square Park and four more will cover Park Street. The Hawley-Green area will also receive about seven new cameras.

The Syracuse Common Council also installed nine cameras on the Near West Side in 2010, specifically to reduce the frequent gun and drug crimes that happened there.

Hunter, the chairwoman for the Syracuse Common Council’s Public Safety Committee, said the locations of the cameras on the North Side were based on community input and request. Though the North Side is receiving cameras, Hunter said the same crimes occur both on the South and North sides of the city.

Hunter said crimes have changed over time, and the council is always listening to the concerns of the community. An increase in car and home break-ins affect people on an everyday basis, she said.

“There are never enough resources in some districts. In a recent community meeting, South Side members came to the North Side and we realized the same kind of crimes are being committed,” Hunter said. “Syracuse is a blended city and all the sides have the same issues. It’s a community problem and we need to work together to solve it.”

Magnarelli mentioned that the old cameras were seen to be beneficial this past spring in an arson case. A suspicious fire broke out and a woman died. Neighbors said they had seen two young teens walking by the house around the time of the fire. When the police looked at the camera positioned near the street, they noticed that the man who started the fire arrived after the two teens had passed the house.

“This case proved that cameras are beneficial to the city,” Magnarelli said. “Not only did the camera capture the perpetrator, but it also stopped two young innocent men from being questioned about a crime they didn’t know anything about.”

The 16 new cameras should be completely installed within the next couple of months, Hunter added.

The cameras are being installed through the Syracuse City Police Department’s Criminal Observation and Protection System. COPS is an ongoing policing program designed to protect citizens in Syracuse from crimes through investigation and prosecution, Hunter said.

Magnarelli said he thinks the police can clean up neighborhoods pretty well if cameras are installed, and he would like more neighborhoods in the city to get cameras.

“The cameras are portable so they can be used as a deterrent to stop crime in the street and make our streets in Syracuse safer,” Magnarelli said.

He added that issuing the state grant to install new cameras was the right decision.

“There’s no legal right to privacy out in the public,” Magnarelli said. “If you perpetrate a crime in public, the privacy issue is moot to me. The bottom line is, if we’re going to protect our neighborhoods and children on the street, then I think we’re doing the right thing.”

Published on October 22, 2014 at 12:01 am