Who's watching?
Orillia city council has been asked to fund cameras to keep constant vigil downtown
Posted By NATHAN TAYLOR, The Packet & Times
Updated 6 months ago
The Orillia Police Services Board wants to install surveillance cameras in various parts of the city. One of the proposed locations is at the Orillia Opera House, at the corner of West and Mississaga streets. (NATHAN TAYLOR Packet & Times photo illustration)
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Will Orillia smile for the camera?
A proposal has been made to install surveillance cameras in some of the city's busiest areas. The Orillia Police Services Board (OPSB) backs the idea. Its members say the move would be an obvious deterrent to criminal activity.
But where's the proof?
Studies by the Surveillance Camera Awareness Network (SCAN), comprised of university academics and policymakers in Canada, simply state: "...deterrence has not been proven."
Professor David Lyon, of the Queen's University Surveil-lance Studies Centre, said there "may be the possibility for using images for forensic purposes," but that would be after the fact -- after a crime has taken place.
"There's no evidence, to put it crudely, that it makes you safer," he said.
Insp. Don Goard, commander of the Orillia OPP detachment, is among those who are pushing for the surveillance system. Despite his 100% support for the cameras, he admits "deterrence is always a difficult thing to quantitatively prove."
"Will it work in all cases? No," he said, "But if you know you're going to get caught, are you going to commit the offences? Absolutely not."
PUBLIC CONSULTATION NEEDED
The OPSB made a pitch last year, too, for the cameras.
But city manager Ian Brown and the rest of the senior management team recommended council not proceed at that time because "there had been no indication of public consultation."
"My role is always to make sure council doesn't come back to me and say, 'I wish you told me X at the time because I would've voted differently,'" he said. "I want to be sure all points of view are brought before council and the community. They do need to make sure the community and specific interest groups are onside."
With the proposal once again before council, there's a need for more consultation, he said.
Goard noted there have been three public meetings, at which Quinte West OPP Insp. Earl Johns has given presentations on the cameras. (Camera surveillance has been used in Trenton and Frankford, under Quinte West OPP's jurisdiction, since 2008.)
Nobody showed up for the first two meetings. The third attracted mostly members of the business community.
If there's a silent majority with an opinion on the matter, Goard suggested it speak up before a decision is made.
When Johns was in town for the last meeting, he raved about the cameras, and even showed footage of an armed robbery at an ATM machine. That footage aided police in nabbing the out-of- town crook.
Goard also gave an example of how surveillance cameras have been useful.
The devices were installed in Sudbury in an area notorious for prostitution and drug dealing. The cameras solved the problem, he said.
But the SCAN study is critical of how camera surveillance has been justified by law enforcement.
"The fear of crime has been used to justify the growth of these systems. More recently, fear of terrorism has provided an impetus for introducing cameras, particularly in public transportation systems and airports, in the wake of terrorist attacks such as 9/11 in the United States and 7/7 in the United Kingdom."
But Goard insists that's not the case locally.
"We don't want to use fear as a lever. We want to reduce crime to make our community safe," he said.
PRIVACY AT STAKE?
One of the main concerns with camera surveillance is personal privacy. In this digital age, however, people can be unknowingly, or knowingly, recorded in a number of circumstances, whether it's in a private business, on a news camera or, especially, in Britain, where it's estimated there are more than 4 million closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras.
The issue of privacy, though, goes beyond simply being recorded on camera.
"What happens with those data? Where do they go? Who can use them and for what?" Lyon questioned.
The cameras being used in Quinte West have the ability to powerfully and accurately zoom in on items like licence plates. SCAN also noted some surveillance cameras are "powerful enough to read cellphone text messages from 250 metres away."
If an Orillia officer were caught using the camera inapp ro p r i at e l y (for example, zooming in on someone's private text message), he or she would be held accountable, Goard said.
During the last public meeting in January, Johns said members of the public who stopped in at the community policing office were able to take a look at the live surveillance footage.
"That disturbed me a little to think that anyone could drop in and look at the images," Brown said.
When asked if he had any concerns about the system being unethical, Goard said "not at all."
"Do these people have a right to privacy if they're going to commit a crime in our community? I don't think so," he said.
In fact, he'd like to, ultimately, take it a step further than what's being done at the Quinte West community policing office.
"The best situation would be to have those cameras on a public television channel," he said, noting the public could then contact the police with tips if they see any criminal activity. It would, in a sense, also become a community-policing tool. (The police would not be actively monitoring the footage, he added.)
Brown said council, before making a decision on the cameras, might want to hear from municipalities that have decided against installing the systems, and from the information and privacy commissioner.
INFORMED CONSENT
There would be signs at the site of each camera, but there are questions about whether that goes far enough to ensure informed consent is achieved.
"Camera surveillance signage rarely allows for the full 'informed consent' of those who are within the gaze of camera surveillance," the SCAN report states.
Brown also noted people might not know they're being recorded until it's already happening.
Goard argued there would be "implied consent" if someone is in a public place anyway.
BUSINESS COMMUNITY IN DOUBT
The Downtown Orillia Management Board does not yet have a unified position on the issue, but chair Pete Bowen previously said some members were "vehemently against" the notion.
Bowen himself was unconvinced of the need for such a system at this time.
BUDGET
During budget discussions earlier in the month, the budget committee set aside $25,000 without committing to the project. The OPSB has submitted a grant application for $100,000. The total cost to get cameras at the eight proposed locations is $125,000.
ntaylor@orilliapacket.com
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Google Map's cameras have already been here
STAFF -- Google Earth and Google Maps street view show high-resolution images of almost every urban neighbourhood you can imagine, including Orillia. Go to Google Maps online, search for Orillia and drag the icon of the yellow man onto the street of your choice and it's like you're walking through that neighbourhood, without getting up from your seat.
The maps give users a 360-degree horizontal and 290-degree vertical panoramic, street-level view. It's really no different than taking a stroll down the street yourself. Maybe you could even find yourself on there somewhere.
Most faces, commercial signs and licence plates have been blurred out. House addresses are approximate, although the numerals on homes are clearly visible.
Simcoe North MP Bruce Stanton doesn't see any legal problems.
"I think the legal team at Google would have to cover their bases," he said. "It's when individual information or the personal information is connected with the address, then I could see a problem."
Most of northern Simcoe County is also at a person's fingertips. "Anytime you have a tool that can put your town on the map in the digital world, it's a step in the right direction," Stanton said. "People looking at a location for a business are able to get a feel for it and what it looks like."
Simcoe North MPP Garfield Dunlop says it's a great way for people who may be thinking of visiting the region to first see it from the confines of their home.
"It's a really valuable tool for a lot of purposes, including tourism and even for the general population," he said. "If people want to look into a bed and breakfast, or a marina for their boat or a cottage they'd like to rent, they'll be able to judge if it's a good quality product."
Dunlop says the technology could also be beneficial to firefighters to possibly look at different ways to enter a building.
According to Google's website, the streetscape maps can also help people find parking availability or disabled access to a building, or preview holiday accommodations.
"It can also be used to show estate listings, location of news stories and scouting locations for events," according to Google.
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Proposed sites forsurveillance cameras
* Rotary Aquatheatre (Couchiching Beach Park)
* Royal Canadian Legion
* Skateboard park
* City Centre building
* Pizza Pizza (Mississaga and Peter streets)
* Opera House
* Port of Orillia
* OPP detachment (Peter Street South)
