Tulsa leaders are celebrating the preliminary success of a trial program for license plate-reading cameras that has resulted in the recovery of $400,000 worth of stolen property and 20 felony arrests in less than two months.
As a part of a one-year trial, Flock Safety provided the Tulsa Police Department with 25 license plate-reading cameras at no cost. The trial period has not begun because one camera has not yet been installed, but the other 24 cameras have already begun making an impact in policing, Chief Wendell Franklin said.
“We have been operating in the dark, and flipping this technology on is like flipping the light switch on and you’re able to see things around you that you were never able to see before,” Franklin said during a news conference Thursday.
Cameras were installed starting in late June, with the most recent camera going up July 28. Franklin said that so far, the Flock Safety program has helped police recover 28 stolen vehicles and six guns.
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“It is remarkable to hear those numbers and to know that that is in less than two months’ time that we’re talking about,” Mayor G.T. Bynum said. “I am so grateful for the way that Chief Franklin and his team and the Tulsa Police Department have rolled out this system.”
About 500 officers are trained in and have access to the Flock Safety operating software.
“We look forward to continuing to advance that technology, especially in an environment where we have significant staffing issues, recruiting issues and retention issues within our department,” Franklin said.
If TPD continues using the technology after the one-year pilot program ends, it will cost $2,500 per camera per year with a one-time $250 installation fee for each camera.
“If it proves to be technology that we can we can utilize, then I think it’s something that we’ll adopt as a city,” Franklin said.
Cameras have been deployed at 61st Street and Peoria Avenue in south Tulsa, along East Virgin Street and adjacent neighborhoods in north Tulsa, and from approximately 21st Street and Garnett Road to 41st Street and Garnett Road in east Tulsa.
Capt. Jacob Johnston, who oversees the program, said the Police Department, in consultation with its division commanders, followed crime data to come up with camera placement strategies that worked best for each area.
“Cameras are being deployed in a way where you couldn’t leave the area in a general sense and not go by one,” Johnston said.
The cameras in north Tulsa are in a more concentrated geographic area to capture vehicle traffic in and around the Seminole Hills apartments, an area of repeated violent crimes, Johnston said.
The cameras installed in east Tulsa are more spread out than those in north Tulsa, Johnston said, but the goal is the same: to identify vehicles entering and exiting apartment complexes where violent crime rates are high.
A license-plate reading camera “allows officers the ability to conduct precision policing, focusing specifically on the vehicle as a target,” Franklin said.
That information is automatically transmitted to the FBI’s National Crime Information Center, which sends a notice to police if the vehicle has been identified as being stolen or used in a crime. The technology is also used to assist police during Amber and Silver alerts.
“There is no doubt in my mind that Tulsa is going to be a safer city in the future because of this technology being deployed, and we’re already seeing the fruits of that just in the very first wave of deploying these cameras,” Bynum said.
The Flock System cameras do not track a vehicle’s speed and will not be used to enforce traffic laws, Johnston said, and officers are not permitted to use an alert from NCIC as the sole probable cause to stop a car.
“It doesn’t do any people recognition, no facial recognition,” Johnston said. “It doesn’t alert us if there is a person walking by. … It does not capture and save that image. It is looking for license plates.”
The Police Department announced earlier this year that it is partnering with the National Police Institute and Axon, maker of Taser weapons and a police body camera pioneer, on a study of the effectiveness of license-plate reader technology.
The Tulsa County Sheriff’s Office has entered into its own agreement to participate in the license-plate reader pilot program. Its Flock Safety cameras will be installed in unincorporated parts of the county.
The Flock Safety license-plate readers will eventually be incorporated into TPD’s Real Time Information Center, but the technology is different from the live-streaming cameras that will be at the heart of the RTIC.
The city’s Real Time Information Center is scheduled to open in City Hall by the middle of next year. It will serve as the hub for a team of at least 18 people — both officers and civilians — to monitor in real time live-streaming video from cameras across the city.
The recently approved fiscal year 2023 budget includes $2.55 million to create the facility, with additional funding for personnel. The RTIC is expected to have as many as 50 cameras that can pan, tilt and zoom in areas across the city.
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