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The first major bill to require body cameras for all Georgia police officers will be introduced next week in the state Senate, a publicly popular mandate that would likely come with a hefty price tag for local cities and counties.
That reason alone makes Senate Bill 46 a likely candidate to be rewritten as it moves through the state Legislature. Its Democratic sponsor, state Sen. Vincent Fort of Atlanta, has already reached across the aisle for help and out to law enforcement groups about how to make the bill more palatable.
“We are open to getting it done,” said Fort, who is behind at least a half-dozen bills this session focused on law enforcement, including restrictions on so-called “no knock” search warrants. “We do not have pride of authorship.”
A report obtained last month by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution estimated that at least an additional 12,800 body cameras would be needed to supplement those already in use across Georgia at a cost of more than $18 million in the first year alone.
That price tag, which would be borne by local municipalities, does not include what would become ongoing costs to pay for video file storage or repair and replacement costs for faulty or damaged equipment.
The state Department of Community Affairs initially provided the estimate assuming additional costs to equip police vehicles with dashboard cameras — an idea that it said, combined with adding the body cameras, could cost local authorities as much as $125 million over three years. Fort, however, has only included body cameras in the bill.
Debate over use of the cameras ignited as an issue nationwide last year after events such as the shooting death of an unarmed teenager in Ferguson, Mo. While few oppose the cameras themselves, doubts linger whether their use should be mandatory or local agencies would be allowed to opt in as they develop policy and can afford it. There’s also the question of how to pay for the new cameras.
“Mandates without providing the funds, that could be a real hardship,” Dunwoody Police Chief Billy Grogan said.
Dunwoody, which tested the concept last year, will for the first time this year equip all uniformed patrol officers with body cameras as part of its regular policing policy. Grogan estimated the cost to the small city to be about $20,000 for about 30 cameras and file storage — something he said not all agencies, particularly smaller departments, could afford.
“Realize, having a body camera on a police officer is not going to solve everything. It’s not going to show everything,” said Grogan, who is also a board member of the Georgia Association of Chiefs of Police — a group that has been in discussion with Fort about the bill. “It’s good as long as people understand the limitations.”
The public wants the cameras. Outfitting all police officers with them received the highest ranking among Georgians in a recent Atlanta Journal-Constitution poll, with 89 percent backing the idea.
As it stands, SB 46 would mandate body cameras starting in 2017 for all officers who conduct traffic stops or respond to emergency dispatch calls as their primary duty. Agencies would be required to keep the files for at least 90 days or up to three years if an agency received a complaint about a police encounter.
SB 46 is not the only body camera bill filed in the Legislature. State Rep. Billy Mitchell, D-Stone Mountain, earlier this month filed a sparser House Bill 32 mandating body cameras for all law enforcement officers, the rules for which would be set by the state Board of Public Safety.
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