County considering body cameras for sheriff’s office

The potential for body-worn cameras on Clark County Sheriff’s deputies has near-universal approval from the local law and justice community, even though the implementation of a program would lead to significant costs in part based on public records requests.

During a March 31 work session, Clark County Council was joined remotely with representatives of several groups who would be impacted by adding body cameras to deputies’ equipment. Law enforcement, the county prosecutor’s office, and the council itself all spoke in support of having a program in place, though the amount of work the additional evidence from the cameras would generate could potentially cost the county millions.

Clark County Sheriff Chuck Atkins said he was “100-percent behind” the acquisition of body cameras. Chief Criminal Deputy Sheriff John Horch added that those in the county’s deputy sheriff’s guild were also in favor of the addition, saying it was not the first time the consideration of body cameras was brought before council.

Horch said the sheriff’s office has already done some work with potential vendors of the equipment. He said if funding is approved by council, the sheriff’s office has coordinated a work group, which includes community-focused members to help with its implementation.

Horch said body cameras are “a valuable tool for several reasons,” helping to provide an audio and visual picture of what occurs during an incident, as well as helping the prosecutor’s office with regard to things like false claims and officer conduct.

Horch noted that body cameras are not an “end-all” solution, pointing to cases where events were still disputed even with the presence of the equipment, “but it does help,” he said.

Horch said that during a trial run with cameras in the fall, individuals being contacted were less likely to escalate a situation when cameras were in use, something he admitted came as a surprise among potential benefits of the equipment’s use.

“Some officers are maybe or maybe not changing their behavior. That hasn’t been proven overwhelmingly, but one thing we do know is that when people are being videotaped … their behavior has changed quite a bit, which helps us, and in turn, what happens from there,” Horch said.

Chief Civil Deputy Kari Schulz said the sheriff’s office is requesting five positions for the program — three for public disclosure requests, one for data management, and one to manage the program and equipment. Schulz estimated pay and benefits for those positions to be roughly between $400,000 and $500,000, adding the positions would have a higher technical ability than most other jobs.

Schulz said that every minute of body camera footage that needed review equated to 10 minutes of work, in some cases greater for individuals still in training. Atkins noted that his office receives anywhere from 400 to 600 records requests monthly, “which is nothing like any other area receives.”

“We could be shocked and have people not want as much as we suspect they might, but the reality is, I think, we’re going to be bombarded with everybody and their brother wanting every piece of our data,” Atkins said.

Part of the review consists of redactions for footage of minors or individuals not involved with the case, Horch said. Though redaction software is helpful, Schulz said in some cases it can lead to false positives, such as redacting a basketball or a rock instead of a face, which requires manual work on the part of one of the potential hires to undo the redaction.

Clark County Prosecuting Attorney Tony Golik said his office is also in support of body camera implementation. Golik said his office filed roughly 2,500 felony cases in a pre-pandemic year. 

He said body camera evidence would be used and moved similarly as a police report, being generated by a law enforcement agency before being sent to the prosecutor’s office, who then sends it to the case defense as well as the assigned prosecutor for the case.

Golik said having body camera footage go through that process would lead to “extra lawyer work,” though ultimately that proves useful in providing critical evidence for a case. He said the impact on the county clerk’s office would be far less, as the evidence would only head there if a case went to trial, something that happens less than 5 percent of the time.

Golik said the greatest impact of the additional public records burden would be on the sheriff’s office, and on the prosecutor’s office to a lesser extent. He estimated the costs to his office to be about $573,000 for the first year of implementation and about $544,000 for the next year. Similar increases are expected for the county’s indigent defense, though that would be dependent on contracts with those attorneys.

Though he acknowledged the cost, Golik said he is “extremely” in support of body cameras.

“This is something that we need to do. We would’ve done it long ago if it wasn’t expensive,” Golik remarked.

Representatives of both county superior and district courts agreed with Golik’s assessment on impacts, though Clark County District Court Administrator Amber Emery said both court’s equipment may need an upgrade in order to handle the new type of evidence. 

Clark County Manager Kathleen Otto said altogether estimates of the initial cost for a body camera program would be between $800,000 to $1 million, with ongoing costs of up to $2 million annually, mostly for personnel.

Funding biggest issue for program

“I support the idea, (but) it is finding the funds to do it,” Clark County Council Chair Eileen Quiring O’Brien said. 

She asked about the possibility of leaving it up to the vote of the people, with the stipulation that approval could lead to additional tax that would exclusively fund the body camera program. 

Councilor Gary Medvigy drew on his experience on the county law and justice council and as a judge in California, saying he believed that “law enforcement universally has come to accept that (body camera equipment) is a good thing.”

“There’s good behavior on both sides of the camera, there’s just a lot of good impacts,” Medvigy said, adding he fully supports the implementation.

He said funding is the biggest issue, pointing to the “huge overhead” of employees dedicated to records requests. 

“Across this state, every agency is absolutely hamstrung (with requests,) and they’re behind,” Medvigy said. 

Though he noted there were legitimate records requests in court cases and media inquiries, “public records requests are absolutely abused, and the cost is absorbed by the taxpayer.”

Medvigy said addressing the issue of frivolous requests is something that would have to be dealt with by the Washington State Legislature.

Noting that public records staff are scattered across different departments in the county, Councilor Temple Lentz suggested consolidating those employees into one countywide records office.

The sheriff’s office asked the funding to become available July 1. Horch said a potential rollout would be done in a phased approach rather than all at once. 

Both Horch and Atkins noted that Vancouver is undergoing its own rollout that could see cameras used in spring of 2022. What that city is doing is separate from what the county is considering, Atkins said, but the efforts of the sheriff’s office could be coordinated with implementation of the equipment at other city police departments countywide.

“I think there are some creative ways we can roll (those cities) in with us, if the city doesn’t want to do it (themselves,)” Atkins said, adding it would be helpful for mutual aid situations where the sheriff’s office worked in city jurisdictions, or vice-versa.

Council is still in consideration of approving funds to start the project. Horch said the sheriff’s office is waiting for the “next step” in implementation, which would be for the county council to approve funding.

“We’ve test-driven the car, so to speak, and we’re ready to buy the car, but we don’t have the money available,” Horch said.