Two members of the Body Worn Camera Comittee are asking alders, or someone, to look at how much they really cost, and science.
Sorry this got a little long so here’s what your will find in this post
- Backgroun – Info on the 8 meetings in July, link to the final report. 2 conclusions in the report and the 10 preconditions for implementing body cameras that if they aren’t implemented, we shouldn’t have body cameras.
- Email from Yannette Figureroa Cole providing information on costs and asking that they send the report back and look at the true costs of implementing body cameras.
- Science. Greg Gelembiuk was asked to provide the council with information he wanted included in the report – which wasn’t, leading to his resignation from the committee.
BACKGROUND
The body worn camera committee had 8 meetings in January (and they complain the Public Safety Review Committee meets too often).
1/4/2021
1/7/2021
1/11/2021
1/15/2021
1/19/2021
1/22/2021
1/25/2021
1/26/2021
They finished their draft report, had a public hearing and then finished their final report. It’s a 57 page report and all their meeting materialsv are here. I didn’t read it thoroughly (yet), but there are a couple conclusions in the report of interest.
They got mixed information and opinions about Body Worn Camera’s (BWCs) but they could agree
- BWCs are not a panacea, and cannot alone be expected to “fix,” or necessarily even improve, the perceived problems with policing and police/community relations, over-policing, or excessive uses of force. Indeed, it is possible that they might cause more unintended negative consequence than benefits. They should be understood instead as a tool—a tool that can expand the collection of evidence. That evidence can then be used in beneficial or problematic ways. The positive or negative impact of a BWC program therefore depends more on the procedures and context under which they are deployed, and the uses that are made of them, than on the mere deployment of the cameras themselves.
- Relatedly, to realize any of the desired effects from BWCs, and to minimize the potential magnitudes and risks of harmful effects from BWCs, if BWCs are to be implemented the implementation must be only as a part of a package of reforms designed to enhance accountability, improve community relations, improve outcomes, and ensure BWCs are utilized appropriately and in ways that minimize their potential for unintended harms. In Madison, if the City follows through with the 177 recommendations made in the 2019 Report of the Madison Police Department Police and Procedure Review Ad Hoc Committee, and continues to move forward with the process of civilian engagement with police in goal-setting, policy-making, and incident review, the City will be making meaningful progress toward meeting the first of these requirements. What remains is to ensure that any BWC program the City might adopt is one that tightly regulates the use of BWCs and ensures compliance with best practices, as informed by the social science research and the experiences with BWCs in other cities, and that conditions outside the BWC program itself be set as to, as far as possible, reduce harms.
Also they concluded:
Madison should adopt a BWC program only if:
- MPD has formally adopted the BWC policies recommended by the Body-Worn Camera Feasibility Review Committee with, at most, minor modifications that do not alter the essential substance and principles outlined in this Report and in the Model Policy, which are designed to minimize officer discretion, minimize potential bias in the captured images, protect legitimate privacy interests, minimize opportunities for exacerbating racial disparities and increased criminalization of marginalized groups, minimize opportunities for mass surveillance of civilians, ensure the integrity of the recordings, enhance accountability and transparency, and enhance access to the truth.
- Accompanying all disclosure or release of BWC footage shall be a statement, either written as a document or added to the beginning of the video, informing viewers
of the perceptual bias (detailed below) inherent in viewing BWC video footage, with an instruction to the viewer to consider this risk and its impact before reaching a conclusion about the footage, in order to arrive at valid judgements. This instruction may include:
-
- Because the BWC is not aimed at the wearer, it may not capture relevant actions of the wearer. BWC footage may not accurately capture the intent and possible misconduct of the person wearing the BWC, since they are largely invisible in their own BWC video. Research shows that human beings tend to judge more harshly the person who is the subject in a video and therefore to skew perception in favor of the wearer and against the subject because BWCs are pointed at the subject.
- BWC footage may promote or create an exaggerated perception of aggression of subjects interacting with the BWC wearer, given motion and jostling of the BWC on the wearer.
- BWC footage may promote or create an exaggerated perception of the height and size of subjects interacting with the BWC wearer, dependent on the position of the BWC mount.
- The speed at which BWC footage is viewed may affect perception of subject intent or actions. Slowing down footage may make the subject appear more deliberate in their actions, while speeding up footage may make the subject appear more aggressive.
- BWC footage provides a record of events, but that record is not comprehensive and is subject to the viewer’s interpretation. BWC footage should be considered within the context of other evidence provided.
3. Given ongoing advances in research, experts on cognitive and perceptual biases should periodically be consulted for recommendations on steps that should be taken to best mitigate these biases in judgements based on body camera footage (e.g., specific trainings for prosecutors, etc.), and appropriate actions should be taken, based on these recommendations.
- The Independent Police Monitor and Police Civilian Oversight Board are fully operational and have access to BWC video footage as set forth elsewhere in this report and model policy.
- The City and MPD have made substantial and sustained progress toward adopting the other reforms recommended by the previous Madison Police Department Policy and Procedure Review Ad Hoc Committee, especially in the areas of Accountability, Use of Force, and Response to Critical Incidents.
- A system and or process for sharing BWC video footage files – preferably an electronic file sharing system if feasible – with the Dane County District Attorney’s Office and the Public Defender’s Office in time for informing charging decisions for cases referred by MPD for potential criminal charges.
- The Dane County District Attorney’s Office has formally enacted a policy to review any relevant BWC video before making a charging decision in any case referred by MPD where BWC video is available.
- The Dane County District Attorney’s Office has firmly committed to measures sufficient to prevent an overall increase in charging rates and criminalization in low-
- Arrangements have been made for a rigorous, randomized controlled trial as a pilot program, with tracking and analysis of data on key outcomes, and particularly prosecutorial charging rates. A primary use of the trial would be to determine if charging rates and pleading rates are increased, particularly for misdemeanors, for cases in which BWC video is available. If there is statistically significant evidence of an increase in charging rates, particularly for misdemeanors, which can be causally connected to the implementation of BWCs, measures sufficient to fully offset the increase should be taken before BWC program continuation or more widespread BWC implementation. If expansion of implementation occurs after the pilot program, MPD, as well as the Dane County District Attorney’s Office, should continue to collect data on the effects of BWCs to continue to ascertain if BWCs are producing increases in charging rates for low-level offenses or other unintended negative consequences. If so, the City should take the necessary steps vis-à-vis the MPD and/or the District Attorney’s Office to fully offset any unintended negative consequences.
10. The Common Council should engage in informed deliberation on whether resources required for BWC implementation would best be allocated to BWC implementation or other competing needs.
If the City, MPD, and the DA’s Office fail to fulfill these preconditions, then the Committee unanimously agrees that BWCs should not be implemented in Madison.
IT’S ALL ABOUT THE MONEY
Yannette Figuaeroa Cole (running for District 10 seat on the City council) send the following information to the common council, asking them to look into the true costs of implementing body worn cameras.
Sent: Tuesday, February 2, 2021 18:44
To: Body-Worn Camera Feasibility Review Committee; All Alders; Mayor
Subject: Re: BODY-WORN CAMERA FEASIBILITY REVIEW COMMITTEE – Question about cost
Please seek answers on the cost of full implementation! Send the report back to the committee for proper supporting data to be included. Below is the email sent to the committee last week, but received no response.
Hello,
Based on the cost updates provided I created the attached summary. But I still have the same question I have raised in your prior meetings. How much will the cost be if the pilot is successful and implemented across the city?
The initial cost of the pilot was about $72,000. However, you recognized that resources (personnel/labor) had been overlooked. Now you are presenting a pilot cost of about $136K, to cover the cost of the full implementation of 8 cameras. This includes equipment, infrastructure, training & 1000 hours of overtime across 4 employees. 1000 hours of overtime for the footage collected from 8 cameras.
Year 1 full implementation includes 289 cameras. How many labor hours are needed to handle footage for 36.125 times the amount of cameras used for the pilot? 36.125 x 8 = 289 cameras
For the pilot, the cost of labor was overlooked and corrected. Could you please provide the labor cost for full implementation? For year 1 and consecutive years?
—
Thanks,Yannette Figueroa Cole – Madison, WI
SCIENCE
Here’s the email from Greg Gelembiuk
Sent: Tuesday, February 2, 2021 16:48
To: All Alders
Cc: Rhodes-Conway, Satya V.
Subject: Regarding the report of the Body-Worn Camera Feasibility Review Committee
WHAT’S NEXT?
It was introduced at the council last night and referred to the following committees:
- Common Council Executive Committee
- Public Safety Review Committee
- Equal Opportunities Commission
Here is the resolution. The resolution authored by Common Council President Sheri Carter “accepts” the report – meaning they have no intention of following up on the recommendations as city policy. If they did, they would “adopt” the report. So, once again, looks like she intends that we don’t have a conclusion to this saga and that we won’t have adopted city policy to move forward on. We’ll see what the committees say.
Having attended every one of the meetings you mention above, I am amused. I’m pretty sure this feasibility review committee was tasked with checking out the financial feasibility of the body-worn cameras (hence the name), among other things…and you say two members of the committee want to now send it to Common Council to do a study? That’s embarrassing…. But who are the two members? Yannette Figueroa was not on the committee, although Veronica Figueroa was. Dr. Greg Gelembiuk was on the committee, but not any more. It looks like he lives on to get his biased opinion out there, even though he resigned from this committee (which week after week took his data, research and suggested edits seriously and with respect, even after his resignation on January 15). Dr. Gelembiuk’s own inflated estimates for the program continued to rise and rise as time went on, looking at costs from cities far away that included different things in their package that our department doesn’t need (like tasers and cell phones), and assumes our police officers will have to spend so much time reviewing footage that they’ll need to hire a bunch more officers. I wish they would! But the committee heard from more local departments, like Milwaukee and Fitchburg and looked into the costs involved in resourcing our police department with the brand of cameras they wanted to use and the way they would use them.
To me, this looks like another of Dr. Gelembiuk’s tactics to discredit a report he couldn’t control. Starting around 15:00 into the video linked below (the January 15 meeting), he shares his concerns, followed by the thoughts and perspectives of everyone else on the committee. All of the other members, on both sides of the issue, vouched for the quality and objectivity of the report and were in favor of moving forward with it.
https://media.cityofmadison.com/Mediasite/Showcase/madison-city-channel/Presentation/1c9c0348f4474ac4bf9feb09c800f71f1d
Another noteworthy section to watch, starting at 00:04:40 in the video linked below (from the January 19, 2021 meeting) is Veronica Figueroa, who was the sole vote against recommending body cameras, as she makes the case for the report and voices her frustration at this member’s attempted discrediting of the report. She even refers to it as bullying. Although she opposes body cameras, she strongly vouches for the credibility of the report.
https://media.cityofmadison.com/Mediasite/Showcase/madison-city-channel/Presentation/f8f6529e17c74625abc24070db4ac3881d
The meeting back on December 17 shows additional evidence of how this report was slandered by this same committee member, starting at 58:55 in the video linked below:
https://media.cityofmadison.com/Mediasite/Showcase/madison-city-channel/Presentation/da7600b5a22b42b6b1d2e08cd51b9cf81d
Lastly, the vote for or against recommending body-worn cameras took place on January 22, 2021. You can hear each member’s well-thought out conclusions starting at 2:10:25 in the video linked below. I am proud of this committee for their hard, objective work and for their individual decisions.
https://media.cityofmadison.com/Mediasite/Showcase/madison-city-channel/Presentation/60de1b0103634db2a8dea7c7ccb119431d
Hopefully this process will not just circle and circle down the drain like the work of other similar committees in the past. Hopefully we will not have our own Jacob Blake, or God forbid, George Floyd, here in Madison. Sometime, somewhere something will happen, and the Police Civilian Oversight Board and the soon-to-come Independent Monitor will be aided tremendously by the relatively objective perspective of body-worn cameras as they collect all of the evidence. The Kenosha District Attorney went on at length about how their investigation would have been aided by body-worn camera footage. Although Kenosha had agreed to equipping their department with body-worn cameras back in 2017, they had not moved forward because of the price tag. It is time for our community to move forward and provide our officers with body-worn cameras, as Joe Biden suggests in his 2021 Presidential Report, as former President Obama recommended, and as our own OIR Report recommends. Hopefully this will pass through the PSRC with a recommendation to move forward and we can finally get this needed pilot program in the North District off the ground and on our way to city-wide cameras.
As Co-chair of the now-dissolved Body-Worn Camera Feasibility Review Committee, I want to clear up a couple of misconceptions from this post. First, it is not accurate to say that two members of the former Committee have asked the Council to look into actual costs and science. The Post references an email submitted by Yannette Figureroa Cole and a 48-page letter written by Greg Gelembiuk. Yannette Figureroa Cole is not and was never a member of the Bodycam Committee; perhaps the post is confusing her with Veronica Figueroa, who was a member of the Committee, but did not write the email this post referenced. Greg Gelembiuk was a member of the Committee, but because he resigned he was not a member at the time he wrote his 48-page letter.
The post also asserts that “Greg Gelembiuk was asked to provide the council with information he wanted included in the report – which wasn’t, leading to his resignation from the committee.” That is not accurate either. Greg Gelembiuk has been trying to discredit the Committee and its work by claiming he was not permitted to add information to the Report. The reality is quite different. Pasted below is a letter to the Common Council signed by all six of the final members of the Committee, including Veronica Figueroa (who voted against a bodycam pilot project) rejecting Greg Gelembiuk’s inaccurate portrayal of the Committee, and explaining what the Committee did with the cost estimates it received.
February 4, 2021
Dear Alders,
We, the former members of the Body-Worn Camera Feasibility Review Committee, feel compelled to write, jointly and unanimously, to respond to the letter Gregory Gelembiuk has submitted to the Common Council challenging the integrity of our Committee’s process and final product. We do not respond here to his arguments about the merits of body-worn cameras (BWCs)—our Report fully addresses our views about the potential strengths and weaknesses of BWCs, and reveals that we were not of one mind about the final recommendation to undertake a BWC pilot project. We stand behind that Report fully. We respond instead to his attempts to undermine our integrity as individuals and as a group.
Greg complains that the Report is biased and one-sided. We urge all Council members to read the full Report, watch the recordings of our deliberations, and decide for yourselves. We worked hard to address both sides of the debates about BWCs, and to present fairly and neutrally the social science research findings, both when they supported BWC usage and when they did not. We fully acknowledge that, as human beings, we are all subject to cognitive biases. But there is irony in Greg’s claim that our Report is the product of confirmation bias, given that from the first day on the Committee Greg has attempted to slant everything we did and said in ways that would portray BWCs as a fool’s errand, or worse. The reality is that many members of the Committee were truly on the fence about what final position to take on BWCs until the very end, and one of us from the beginning to the end was opposed to BWCs, as is reflected in our final 5-1 vote. And yet when the Committee at times rejected Greg’s edits, or modified them in ways to enable consensus (keep in mind, as Greg himself acknowledges, we very frequently accepted his edits or additions to the Report), we did so unanimously virtually every time. Given all of our varied perspectives, it is hard to see how all of those unanimous votes could have been little more than expressions of pro-BWC confirmation bias.
Greg asserts that the Committee “foreclosed the possibility of submitting edits to correct the errors and omissions [in the draft report], on the grounds that there was no time to do so before the report deadline,” and that that gave him “no ethical choice but to resign.” This is a continuation of an even more overt and relentless effort Greg has chosen to make in social media to fight against BWCs by attacking the integrity of the Committee’s process. We must set the record straight. The Committee never foreclosed the possibility of submitting edits, or attempted to “muzzle” Greg, as he has asserted on Facebook. The reality is, the Committee met regularly precisely in order to permit Greg to submit edits, and to go over in painstaking detail the many, many edits he suggested. The Common Council created our Committee over the summer and gave it a six-month time frame to complete its work, with a deadline of the end of December 2020. The Committee initially met every two weeks into the fall, but then as the deadline approached, started meeting even more frequently, primarily specifically so that we could accommodate Greg and his extensive requested edits. As we started considering the draft Model Policy in November, and thereafter the full Draft Report, we started meeting more frequently, often weekly, and even twice a week. Even with the holidays, in November and December 2020 the Committee met nine times, on November 5, 11, and 19, and then December 3, 9, 16, 17, 21, and 22—almost all of it devoted to addressing edits to the Policy and Report, most of which were proposed by Greg. At Greg’s request, we then unanimously agreed to seek an extension of time until the first Common Council meeting in February (about a one-month extension), and Greg told us that should be sufficient time for him to complete his edits and allow us to consider them all. Almost entirely to accommodate Greg’s growing list of proposed edits, the Committee then picked up the pace even more in January, meeting January 4, 7, 11, and 15, with meetings still planned for January 19, 22, 25, and 26. As the extended deadline for completing our Report was approaching, and as Greg continued to produce more and more edits, the Committee could see no way to finish its work on time unless we set a timeline for completing the process of considering new edits. The Committee therefore voted at its January 15 meeting to set a deadline of January 19 for the submission of any final edits, so we would have time to consider them all and finalize the report in the last week of the Committee’s work. The Committee voted unanimously (with Greg abstaining)—including the Committee member who on the merits of was opposed to BWCs—to set that deadline.
Unfortunately, instead of continuing to work with the Committee constructively to finalize its Report, Greg then chose to resign, permitting him to write his own lengthy missive attacking the integrity of the Committee’s Report and process, without Committee input, and outside the transparency otherwise guaranteed by the open meetings law. There is again irony in Greg’s complaint that he did not have sufficient time to write his final edits to an already largely edited Report, and yet he had time to write his own 48-page complaint about the Committee’s Report prior to the February 2 Common Council meeting.
Greg raises in particular, as illustrations, two matters that he says show the Committee’s bias. First, he notes that the research shows that both prosecutors and public defenders, by large majorities, believe that BWCs help them win their cases. Greg wanted to include an interpretation of that data, arguing that the results showed that public defenders and prosecutors were both overly optimistic about the utility of BWCs, because both could not be right. It was not apparent to us, however, that the survey responses were inherently contradictory, as it was possible that the survey respondents were saying that BWCs would help them win their cases when BWC footage backed up their version of events, and they both could be right about that. The research at issue did not claim to show that either public defenders or prosecutors were right or wrong, or that either group was overly optimistic. It just reported their views. And so that was what the Committee chose to do as well—just report the data and let the reader decide what to make of it, without speculating one way or another about why the lawyers responded the way they did, or whether their responses were irreconcilably contradictory.
Greg then goes to great lengths arguing the cost estimates the Committee provided are too low. But those are not the Committee’s cost estimates; the Committee made no cost estimate. Instead, the Committee reported on estimates provided by the MPD and by nearby police departments (Milwaukee and Fitchburg), which have actual experience implementing BWCs, and added other cost insights gleaned from the research. Greg might not like the numbers these police departments provided the Committee, and he is free to challenge them, but the numbers included in our Report are indeed the numbers that were provided to us—not our interpretations of those numbers. It is unfortunate Greg chose to resign from the Committee instead of making his full argument about costs to the Committee, so we could fully and publicly explore those numbers.
In sum, please do not accept at face value Greg’s attempt to discredit our work and divert your attention from the substance of our Report. Please read the Report, and if you have concerns about its accuracy or the fairness of our process, watch the recordings of our meetings.
Thank you.
Respectfully submitted,
Keith Findley (past co-chiar)
Tom Brown (past co-chair)
Veronica Figueroa
Kim Jorgensen
Charles Myadze
Luke Schieve
That is correct, I was not a member of the committee. I attended multiple meetings as a resident, requested a bill itemization for the pilot and also sent an email inquiring about the rollup cost.
Mr. Findley, I am still waiting for a reply.
Thanks,
Yannette