Police to put cameras on St. Paul’s Central Corridor
City Council approval will mean $1.2 million to place 60 cameras along University Avenue and in downtown.
With funding help from the federal government and Target Corp., St. Paul police are on track to place approximately 60 cameras along University Avenue and throughout downtown.If the City Council members say yes at a meeting Wednesday, the Police Department will accept a $1.2 million federal grant for the cameras, which will be placed along the proposed Central Corridor light-rail line between St. Paul and Minneapolis.
A matching grant for $300,000 from Target Corp. will also go toward the project, which could be completed by the end of the year, although a number of details have not been finalized, Assistant Chief Matt Bostrom said on Friday.
“We’d like to have something up and tested by December,” Bostrom said. “We’d love to have them all done.”
St. Paul police also hope to attain a $2 million Homeland Security grant to place cameras along and around the Mississippi River. Doug Holtz, commander for the department’s Homeland Security Division, said Minneapolis already has funding to place cameras along its portion of the river, but St. Paul needs matching funds to secure federal funding for their side of the Mississippi.
“We will get that money,” Holtz said Friday night.
Minneapolis police use cameras to catch criminals and deter crime in its downtown and in some neighborhoods.
The Central Corridor cameras would first be placed in the Midway shopping area and gradually spread out to the Minneapolis border and Union Depot in downtown St. Paul, said Tom Walsh, spokesman for St. Paul police. The new light-rail line is expected to begin operating in 2014.
Walsh said details about camera placement and quantity haven’t been finalized.
Holtz said the public will be able to view footage from the various cameras at two computer kiosks in the department’s headquarters and new Western District office.
City-owned light poles will be used to mount the cameras that will be placed at major intersections along University Avenue. All of the cameras will be connected through a “wireless mesh,” that will allow the system to operate even if multiple cameras are down, Holtz said.
The American Civil Liberties Union has raised concerns of voyeurism, racial profiling and invasion of privacy over such cameras elsewhere.
Holtz suggested people shouldn’t be fearful of being observed because the cameras will be used to deter crime and make communities safer.
“They’re there to let people know that they’re there,” he said.
Holtz said St. Paul police want Metro Transit police to help monitor the surveillance from the cameras, which will be built to handle the Minnesota cold.
Chief John Harrington said recently that he hoped to imitate Minneapolis’ downtown camera system in St. Paul’s downtown.
Minneapolis has used downtown cameras to capture serious and violent crimes on film.
Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak has said that the cameras have caused a dramatic reduction in assaults, robberies and other serious crimes in the area.
Holtz said St. Paul police hope their cameras have a similar impact on crime.
“It’s bigger than just a bunch of cameras on University Avenue,” he said.
Myron P. Medcalf • 651-298-1546 • mmedcalf@startribune.com
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