The Peabody Police Department is hoping the City Council will act favorably on Mayor Edward A. Bettencourt, Jr.’s request to authorize him to enter into a five-year agreement with Axon Enterprises to provide body born cameras and related support for police officers.
The matter will be taken up by the Finance Committee Thursday. Should the committee approve the request, the matter will likely be presented at the council’s meeting later that night.
“We are hoping to get their approval at that meeting as we’ve been doing a lot of work on this,” said Police Chief Thomas Griffin. “In today’s state and society and world the expectation is that when things happen, police can go right to the footage so the thought is that police officers need this.”
In a letter to the City Council in November 2022, the mayor said the agreement will “hold the cost for the five-year period without further escalation.”
Bettencourt wrote that having a Body Worn Camera (BWC) program “is a new requirement for Peabody Police (and) we will use grants to implement the program along with police-budgeted funds to cover these costs over the next five years.”
Griffin said the first year will be covered by a grant of approximately $230,000, which will cover costs associated with the initial purchase and warranties.
Bettencourt said the funding will outfit “all sworn officers with a body camera.”
A schedule attached to Bettencourt’s letter stated that the total cost of the program from year two through year five is approximately $153,000. The following items are included in the program: 89 basic and 10 professional license from software provider Evidence.com with redaction assistant license, auto tagging license, performance license and auto transcribe license; 30 Axon single bay dock extended warranties and TAP refresh; 17 Axon multi-bay extended warranties and TAP refresh and 99 Axon cameras with extended warranty and TAP refresh. Griffin said that TAP refresh (technical assurance plan) replaces all cameras every two years.
“With a five-year plan, the cameras would be replaced at the start of the 3rd and 5th years,” said Griffin.
Griffin said much of the work leading up to the mayor’s request was working with unions and developing department BWC policies. He said Capt. Doug Marcus and Sgt. Rob Faletra spearheaded the efforts, visiting the Lynn, Salem and Boston police departments, which already have operational BWC programs in place.
“We didn’t have an existing policy, so we had to do that really from scratch,” said Griffin. “And then it was really a matter of seeing what other departments are doing. Not every department has a program, so we felt it was important to research some of the ones that did to see what we needed to do.”
Griffin said the department wants to “stay ahead of this” so that, if and when body cameras are mandated by state law, Peabody will already have a program in place.
“The parallel thing is that part of police reform that may make it mandatory,” said Griffin. “We didn’t want to be in a position where the state enacts a law requiring them and being told we have six months to get the program up and running to be in compliance. We are hoping to have everyone trained this summer at the latest, so I really feel it’s going to work out extremely well for the City of Peabody. Lots of departments are moving in this direction as they should. This will put the public more at ease knowing we have them and, for us, we will be ready and in compliance if the law requires it. Right now, we, as a department and city, believe we must do this, so hopefully it will all work out Thursday night.”
