This was the tight spot one New Orleans bad guy found himself in as a result of the city's decision to use wireless technology to stave off crime. In January 2005, New Orleans kicked off its Crime Camera initiative by deploying hundreds of cameras in the New Orleans Police Department's (NOPD) 6th District, one of the city's crime hot spots.
The Crime Camera initiative, which relies on Wi-Fi-connected cameras to monitor trouble spots, is one point of a seven-point plan initiated by Mayor C. Ray Nagin to stifle high crime rates.
"It was not a feeling that crime was getting out of hand, but a feeling that we wanted to be proactive and do something about it before it got any worse," said Chris Drake, project manager with the Mayor's Office of Technology.
The city began testing the cameras in 2004 in the NOPD's District 1. With the blessing of the City Council, New Orleans initiated an adopt-a-camera program in which area citizen groups -- such as neighborhood watch, churches and businesses -- sponsor cameras in their areas. During the pilot, which ran from January 2004 to August 2004, the murder rate dropped 57 percent from the same time period in 2003, and the vehicle theft rate dropped 25 percent.
Based on those results, New Orleans decided to expand the use of the Wi-Fi-networked video cameras as a viable crime-fighting tool throughout the city.
Caught in the Act
The city has a budget for 240 Sony IP pan/tilt/zoom cameras, which are powered by the utility poles they're mounted on. The cameras are placed in designated high-crime areas.
"They are constantly on virtual patrol, scanning the area within their optical-zoom limits based on virtual patrols programmed in by our staff and NOPD officers," Drake said, noting that the city makes it a policy to never have a lone camera in any one area.
"For operational reasons, it's better to have at least two cameras in a deployment area -- generally 800 to 1,000 feet apart maximum -- so they have overlapping coverage areas," he said, explaining that placing the cameras in a position to take advantage of overlapping areas allows a constant wireless signal for their operation.
The city uses a Tropos Wi-Fi connection that operates at 1.5 Mbps. The outdoor mesh Wi-Fi network provides communications for the cameras, said Drake.
"We use high-bandwidth, point-to-point wireless to feed bandwidth to omni-directional hot zones powered by outdoor Wi-Fi access points," he continued. "Each point gives about a one-third mile radius. We can put three to four cameras anywhere in that zone and connect wirelessly through the Tropos unit, back through the 'bandwidth injection' point-to-point connection."
The city has plans to bring other functionality to its Wi-Fi network, including electronic police reports, a Web-based justice information system and an electronic citation system. Although the city is already using these in some form, they will be on the network as soon as more bandwidth is available.
To make this possible, Drake said the city is eyeing the eventual use of WiMAX and that New Orleans currently holds licenses for the 4.9 GHz public safety spectrum.
"WiMAX will provide a standards-based bandwidth injection methodology and can make use of the available public safety spectrum," he said. "This will also enable, along with migration to 802.11g at the hotspot level, a large increase in the available bandwidth on the wireless network and allow us to open it up to noncamera uses."
Paying for It
Funds for the project, the cost of which is projected at $4 million to $4.5 million, are covered by the Mayor's Office of Technology and the city's Office of Homeland Security. A portion of the money also comes from businesses and other local groups interested in adopting a camera, which they can do for a one-time fee of $5,000.
"For that fee, they get to choose the location the camera goes in, and it will be guaranteed to stay there for three years," Drake said. "There is no ongoing cost to the citizen. The city picks up the little bit of maintenance associated with the wireless backhaul."
Under the terms of these types of agreements, those who adopt cameras aren't permitted to view or control the cameras, which remain on the NOPD/Office of Homeland Security network and under their control.
A Question of Rights
To Joe Cook, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana, the cameras raise concerns about the government's involvement in citizens' personal lives.
"They shouldn't have to worry about being on candid camera, watched by the government everywhere they go in a public place," Cook said. "The cameras are a reckless gamble with our privacy rights, which are becoming an endangered species in our country. Add this to the Patriot Act. It adds up to an Orwellian society going berserk."
Nevertheless, Drake said citizen reaction has been very positive, with more than 200 citizen groups signed up to buy cameras, and at this point, the cameras will remain in New Orleans.
The ACLU won't back down anytime soon. Cook said the organization is considering filing a lawsuit to obtain public records, which he said they haven't received despite having requested them.
"The government is not to be trusted, pure and simple," Cook argued. "They have a track record for abusing people's rights."
No Longer in Denial
In the first quarter of 2005, murders in the 6th District were reduced 50 percent from the first quarter of 2004, and vehicle thefts were down almost 31 percent.
The cameras also have a big impact when prosecuting alleged criminals. "We have had almost a 100 percent track record of defendants pleading their case when video evidence is introduced from our cameras," Drake said.
Though the NOPD and community groups don't mind the cameras keeping an electronic eye on neighborhoods, some neighborhood hooligans have expressed displeasure with the new crime-fighting tools, Drake said.
"In the pilot project, one of the cameras that did not have a vandal-resistant cover was shot by a hyper-charged paintball gun loaded with paint pellets and Mardi Gras beads," Drake recalled. "The perpetrator was, of course, caught on digital video and was apprehended and prosecuted."
