CLARKSVILLE, TN (CLARKSVILLE NOW) – The Clarksville Police Department is looking to install license plate readers (LPRs) on the sides of local highways, saying that doing so would enhance both public and officer safety while improving departmental efficiency.
A resolution to support for the initiative is on the City Council agenda for Thursday, Jan. 5, but not every council member is sold on the idea. At the council’s executive session last week, many questions were asked about the LPRs and the effects they could have on people’s information.
Fourth Amendment concerns
“I have full trust that the intent is stated to protect our communities, but I have Fourth Amendment concerns for this resolution,” Councilperson Karen Reynolds said Thursday, noting she was worried about information being bought and sold. “This is going to actually cost taxpayers in the next couple of years. We’ll have to harden our IT as we collect more and more data.”
Clarksville Police Chief David Crockarell responded to those concerns.
“We own the data. It goes to a cloud that is owned by us. By law, it is not subject to open record requests. It is something that cannot be released. It is private information.”
Questions were also raised about oversight of the data. Crockarell told the council that CPD already undergoes regular external and internal audits for other software, and that LPRs will also be subject to regular reviews.
“We will install some internal audits quarterly with this program, just to ensure that our administrators and those that have been granted access to view the software are complying with the policies and standards that are set. As far as our department, from a lot of angles, there is a number of ways that you could describe oversight.”
Councilperson Wallace Redd asked what the difference was between LPRs and officers just looking at a license plate and manually entering that data into a system.
“There is no difference,” said City Attorney Lance Baker. “The only difference from a legal standpoint is that the license plate reader equipment makes the job of checking license plates more efficient.”
Situations where LPRs would help
Crockarell said he has watched how the system has played out in other areas over the past several years and explained that it would be beneficial to the department and the community.
“Primarily, this is a product to reduce victimization,” he said. “I wouldn’t be here today if I wasn’t confident that now is the time to do this. This has been something that has been available for well over a decade.”
Crockarell said this would allow officers to locate vehicles more quickly, such as those that are stolen or involved in a violent crime. He said the system would have been helpful to officers during recent carjacking incidents.
“I can speak of this past weekend. A young lady, with her 5-year-old child, carjacked three vehicles armed with a weapon from here to Ashland City and back,” he said. “I can speak to a number of cases just in the past couple of weeks where we have used this data.”
Crockarell explained that LPRs would allow officers to better track down vehicles involved in “rolling domestics.” Additionally, the police chief said, LPRs can be used to locate individuals experiencing a mental health crisis more quickly.
“People who are having mental health issues or a crisis, at the moment, they go mobile. The goal is to locate those individuals and use our crisis intervention and techniques to get to them, and hopefully approach them to where they may not act upon the thoughts that they’re considering or speaking about.”
The system and cost
Councilperson Ambar Marquis asked how much the system was going to cost taxpayers.
“Long term, it’s going to depend on the number of devices. And what we’re learning with law enforcement is that everything is technology-based, and licensing and maintenance agreements are really a bulk part of our budget,” Crockarell said.
He noted that with the current plan, it would cost the department between $25,000 and $30,000 to maintain the systems and subsequent agreements after the initial grant-funded installment.
“The grant requires that we use a state contract, and the state contract is through Motorola,” Crockarell said.
The city would use software from Vigilant VehicleManager, a company owned by Motorola. According to Vigilant, the software enables users to search by complete or partial plate number and based on a particular location.
Further, the software can identify a vehicle spotted across multiple locations, and searches can be filtered by vehicle year, make and model, as well as date and time.
Crockarell told the council the software will be able to take pictures of about 98% of the license plates passing the reader. Per state law, that data will be deleted within 90 days, unless deemed part of a criminal investigation.
The council will vote on the measure to support the installation of LPRs in Clarksville at their regular session on Thursday, Jan. 5, at 6 p.m. at One Public Square.
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