APPRO-2023-46 : An Appropriation From Free Cash (account 01-324001) in the amount of $224,998.80 to the Police Department for overtime costs and a Case Cracker system.

Transcript (~7 min @ 1:53:55)

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▶ 1:53:41 Speaker 2: Vice Chair Jamal Dean? Yes. Councilor Ella? Yes. Councilor Eccles? Yes. Councilor Gepe. Yes. Councilor Stewart? Yes. Councilor Chetty? Yes. Councilor Williams? Yes. President Navarez? Yes. And Chair Ley? Yes. That's signed? Yes. Unanim Unanim. Okay. This

▶ 1:53:56 Leila Migliorelli: Order will be brought to full counsel, um, appropriation 2023 dash 46 and appropriation from free cash account zero one dash 3 2 4 0 1 in the amount of $224,998 and 80 cents to the police department for overtime costs and a case cracker system.

▶ 1:54:18 Speaker 1: Thank behalf we have Chief Fowler here.

▶ 1:54:21 Speaker 3: Yes. Good. Good evening everyone. Madame Chad. Thank you. Um, I know it's been a long night. I won't be as quick as Chief Collina nor as long as the D P w, hopefully, but, um, uh, real quickly, just to, just to, I think you got my memo just to, uh, give you a little history of why we're here and why we're in that deficit. Uh, when I came on in December, I walked into a good thing where we had five offices just graduate the academy. So I actually walked into a good staffing level at that time. But the first five months of this fiscal year, they were, they were severely shorthanded in, um, in staffing. And the overtime budget at that time was already spent. I walked into a, a negative deficit because of the short staffing. So we made some improvements in the last five or six months due to the increasing staffing. The problem is, uh, we hired five and in December that hit the streets. I lost four since December to now. So we're actually unfortunately sort of going backwards, but with the cooperation of you all and the mayor, we do have funding to fill those spots. But those take, like I said from my budgetary, we're talking at least 12 months before an officer is hired, goes to the Academy field, trains and actually makes an impact on openings, overtimes and so forth. So I'm here to, uh, request that money, um, to make up the deficit that we have. Uh, the reasons being what I just said, we were so shorthanded the first half of the year with the cooperation of the unions and some schedule changes and shift allocations and moving people around. I think we're in a little bit of a better spot moving forward. Uh, the three offices that retired since I got on or transferred, there were significant buyouts contractually that they had to get paid out on. So, uh, you know, that costs money out of that salary and wages line item. Um, the overtime, we spent $32,000 this fiscal year so far on community city slash quasi city events. Um, like summer stroll, uh, the holiday, uh, chamber combat, all that type of stuff that, that affects our overtime item. That, that was about 32,000 and we spent about 53,000 in community events overall, which I think we still need to do. And I think last time I was here for the budget, I talked about mandated overtime, which, um, mandated training, which comes out of our overtime budget. And that's 56 hours for 49 offices, roughly about $140,000. Uh, I think next fiscal year. We sort of realign that to account for what's training and what's overtime and what's training over time. Um, so I'm here to respectfully request that money to make up the deficit that we had. Um, the case cracker, the other li i item that's included in that $224,000, uh, if you don't know, that's uh, video, um, for interviews and interrogations for suspects, witnesses and so forth, uh, which is required on a Commonwealth versus Dgm BS to anytime you interview someone or specially interrogate someone in a, in a police station, you're mandated to record it audio and video for, uh, for trial purposes that this case cracker system will also cover our booking system. Um, which is obviously you have to record all your bookings that come in for liability issues, but also for, uh, criminal trials. Uh, any OUIs, pretty much any defense attorney who's worth the assault will ask for the, the O ui, uh, booking amongst other bookings. So that system is old. Um, when we got it, I, I think it was about five years ago, I w it was actually refurbished. It was a used system. It was never, it was never new. We ran into some problems with it failing. We had an O UI case where the, we needed the, uh, booking video, uh, and it was no lo it wasn't available due to, uh, issues with the machine. And that's tough to explain to a da and defense attorneys that we, we don't have the, the video that was requested. So this will solve our problem, brand new system up to date technology, um, moving forward. Um, and that's pretty much it. I respectfully requests the, the authorization. If you have any questions, be happy to answer them.

▶ 1:58:31 Speaker 1: Councilor Williams. Thanks. Um,

▶ 1:58:32 Ryan Williams: so is this case cracker a portable system or is it a room system cameras in the room or is it like in a briefcase? Cause they

▶ 1:58:39 Speaker 3: Oh, it, it's all hard. It's in the room. So there's it's in the room. Yeah. There's one in the interrogation room, interview room, and then one in the booking room.

▶ 1:58:45 Ryan Williams: Right. And we have cameras in the interrogation room currently. Yes. But they're not very good. Yes. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I get you. Um, and are you concerned at all with the ongoing discussions about the public safety building with installing a camera system? Is it, do you find it'll be easy to remove and put in the new building? I mean,

▶ 1:59:04 Speaker 3: I, I'd have to talk to the tech. It, it, it should be, but even if hopefully we get the approval for it, we we're still looking until 2027. I see, I see. Ish. So we, we have, we have time that I think the life of that, even if it wasn't transported over would be pretty good. Um Okay. But I, but I think they shouldn't have a problem bringing that over.

▶ 1:59:25 Speaker 8: Yeah. Okay. Very good. Appreciate it. Thanks Sean. That's it.

▶ 1:59:30 Speaker 1: Anyone else? President Grigoraitis.

▶ 1:59:33 Jen Grigoraitis: Thank you Madam Chair. Thank you Chief for being here. Um, totally in support of all of this. Just a few follow up questions on the case Cracker system cuz I appreciate wanting to make sure that we're, um, recording what we need for the DA and defense attorneys. Um, is there gonna be any type of annual maintenance fee and is there, I mean, are we gonna be able to build that into your budget going forward?

▶ 1:59:53 Speaker 3: Um, no, I believe we're good. I think I'd have to, let me get back to you on that, but I think that's like encompassing and it comes with a pretty significant

▶ 2:00:01 Jen Grigoraitis: warranty too. Okay. And do you know, we had kind of a robust discussion with the IT department about, um, multifactor identification and just kind of general security measures for accessing city IT systems. I'm assuming this system comes with its own security protocols that we need to follow to ensure that these, it's not hacked, it's not being accessed by anyone who doesn't have authorization to it.

▶ 2:00:25 Speaker 3: Yes, and I and I about it, ive got discussions with, um, Neil and, and Tom and, and Okay. And that crew, they, they're familiar with the system.

▶ 2:00:31 Speaker 7: Okay. Thank you. Sure. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'll make a motion to recommend second

▶ 2:00:36 Leila Migliorelli: Motion recommend made by President Grigoraitis, seconded by Councilor Ella on discussion, seeing none.

▶ 2:00:44 Speaker 2: Clerk, vice chair Jamal Dean. Yes. Councilor Ella. Yes. Councilor Eccles. Yes. Councilor Gpe. Yes. Councilor Stewart? Yes. Councilor Chetty? Yes. Councilor Williams? Yes. President of your Yes. And chair Elli? Yes. That's nine. Yes. Unanimous.