Quick little news story in the
Tacoma Tribune about how the Lakewood Police Department(where many episodes of Cops have been filmed) received a Federal Grant to install dashboard cameras in their patrol cars.
I thought that was pretty cool...but two things here surprised...first, that they didn't already have them, and 2nd, the line in the story that said:
The department will join the Steilacoom Department of Public Safety as the only law enforcement agencies in Pierce County with the cameras.
Color me naive and uninformed...you mean to tell me that the City of Tacoma Police Department doesn't have dashboard camera's already? Holy Smokes...I thought in this day and age that EVERYONE had dashboard cameras in their police cruisers.
I know if I was a good cop, I'd be begging my department to get dashboard cameras.
The third and final thing that caught my eye was in the sidebar of the story, where it listed out what different departments were going to do with their grant money. Scrolling down to Olympia, we see that they got $16,414 in grant money, and they intend to use it to install 2 cameras in additional police cars. Umm...let's see, carry the one...so, over $8,000 PER CAR to install a video camera?
Wow. Tell you what, I'll write up a contract to wire up both cars for $10,000 even...save the tax payers $6,000...
$8,000 per car...ridiculous.
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