WYPR News in Maryland
(2006-01-23)
Photo courtesy of BACVA>
AMBIENCE: AXTS UP
The ubiquitous flashing blue lights of the police cameras tower above Greenmount Avenue in downtown Baltimore. There are eight cameras positioned along nine blocks of Greenmount, from North Avenue north to 28th Street and they've met mixed reviews from the people who live there.
AMBIENCE: AXTS UP
Sandra Coles, a community organizer with of the People's Homesteading Group, walks along the bustling corner of North and Greenmount.
TAPE: (18 SECONDS)
IC: "Honestly, the residents in this community really isn't happy with the cameras here. But then you have a number of residents are happy... I think if I had my way, we'd have a camera on each block."
That's a sentiment echoed by Brian Williams, who stands in front of the "I Can" transitional shelter on Greenmount Avenue. He says he's seen a change since the cameras went up...
TAPE: (18 SECONDS)
IC: "It's truly a difference. Because if not, these corners would have been...they'd be on the corners. This one time I used to be on the corners. Actually I'm a recovering heroin addict. And I used in this area. I used to sit across the street. So it's a difference. It has my blessings."
Greenmount Avenue, and several other Baltimore streets, are latticed with surveillance cameras; but the devices aren't nearly as prevalent in other areas.
In northeast Baltimore, a solitary camera sits perched on the corner of Tivoly Avenue and Harford Road. Its line of sight is illuminated by a bank of high-powered lights, which bathe the side street after nightfall.
Mark Washington, executive director of the Coldstream Homestead Montebello Community Corporation the neighborhood association that covers Tivoly Avenue says the cameras have caused a number of changes in the neighborhood.
TAPE: (11 SECONDS)
IC: "On the plus side, the cameras have had a beneficial impact on crime in the area. On the negative... if you're riding through tise neighborhood, all you see is 'Flashing Blue Light'. Not a good area. Get out."
AMBIENCE: Door Open
About 150 feet away from that flashing blue light sits Lewis Grocery.
TAPE: (02 SECONDS)
IC: "I'd like to order meat loaf..."
Behind the counter, Mrs. Lewis has nothing but praise for the cameras.
TAPE: (11 SECONDS)
IC: "I love 'em. I feel that it has deterred somewhat the crime. And since the light and the cameras, you don't have to keep going to the door to tell them to move away."
Surveillance cameras walk the thin line between law enforcement and privacy issues. The latter is particularly important to a man waiting for a bus on Greenmount Avenue.
TAPE: (08 SECONDS)
IC: "Like an invasion of my privacy man, not that I'm doin' anything wrong. It's like I'm livin' in a communist country, or something."
TAPE: (13 Seconds)
IC: "The most obvious concern is the sort of privacy concern that's encompassed by the Fourth Amendment."
Renee Hitchens is an Assistant Professor at the University of Maryland, School of Law.
TAPE: (25 Seconds)
IC: "The debate in the Supreme Court has gone something like this: what you hold out for the public to observe isn't subject to privacy protections. But what you seek to protect as private even in the public sphere may trip some Constitutional protections. And the court has also said that when the Government starts engaging in conduct that looks sort of like a 24 hour 7 day a week dragnet, then the Constitutional protections are triggered."
One man walking along Greenmount, who declined to be identified, is ambivalent on the issue.
TAPE: (13 SECONDS)
IC: "That's an invasion of some people's privacy. But there's a good side and a bad side. Cause if somethin' jumped off and some of my peoples got merped, then I will like to know who did it."
Police have solved a number of crimes with the help of the surveillance cameras. But crime rates have dropped in the watched areas as well... due in part to the deterrent effect of the flashing blue lights.
AMBIENCE: AXTS UP
Annette lives directly across from one of the cameras, at the corner of 20th and Greenmount. She isn't always happy about the lights - but she is happy about the overall effect.
Annette spoke leaning against the doorframe of her house, surrounded by three boisterous teenagers none of whom like the cameras.
TAPE: (14 SECONDS)
IC: "[That light is annoying.] It's bright. Especially when I'm trying to get some sleep. But it helps. Cause I work at night. [it don't work at all] It does help me at night when I leave here tryin' to work at night. It helps me."
Crime has dropped by 27-percent within the glare of the lights on Greenmount Avenue, according to police statistics. But it's a net drop of 23-percent because about four-percent of crime has simply moved outside the cameras' gaze. Sandra Coles explains the change she's seen in drug activity since the installation of the police cameras.
TAPE: (15 SECONDS)
IC: "It still exists, but they know now to not be so much in the open with it. In a sense it's just movin' them in a darker area, so they can continue to sell the drugs."
AMBIENCE: AXTS UP
On Tivoly Avenue, four young men are passing a joint on a front porch, tapping their feet to the music from a boombox. They become animated when asked about the cameras.
TAPE: (13 SECONDS)
IC: "We don't need that. Yeah, it's invading our privacy. Yeah. We can't do nothing. We're scared to get off the porch. We aren't movie stars, baby."
Across the street, Beverly steps out of her house, blinking in the afternoon sunlight. She's pleased with the cameras.
TAPE: (16 SECONDS)
IC: "It helps the neighborhood a lot. We can sit out front, enjoy the sun. This one block went through a lot. And we needed a change. Cause I want to be 'round here a while, and we needed a change!"
The change in the neighborhoods covered by the cameras is ongoing. On Greenmount Avenue, Sandra Coles thinks they're a good beginning, yet argues that more work needs to be done to combat crime.
TAPE: (23 SECONDS)
IC: "I would like to see some kind of curfew... because this is a huge job. This is going go take the hands and the minds of institutions and residents working with the police hand on hand together. But far as I'm concerned, this is a start. The cameras is a start."
But Renee Hitchins warns that increased surveillance brings us one step closer to a less free society.
TAPE: (18 SECONDS)
IC: "I think that unfortunately by the time the magnitude of what we have given up becomes obvious, it'll be too late because we will have already ceded so much to the public sphere. There really should be pause for concern at every single incremental step that we take that strip people of their privacy rights."
AMBIENCE: AXTS UP
On Tivoly Avenue, Mark Washington thinks that the lowered crime rates can be sustained and even reduced further by greater community activism. He hopes that the camera won't become a permanent fixture in the neighborhood...
TAPE: (27 SECONDS)
IC: "it's one of those things where you take the good with the bad. It's a necessary evil, at this point. How long it will be a necessary evil remains to be seen. I will say that the relationship and response we've had from the northeastern district of command staff right on down to the patrol officers has been fantastic. So we're hoping that this effort is something that will be short-lived, won't be a longtime necessity in the community."
I'm Nathan Sterner, reporting from Tivoly and Greenmount Avenues, for 88.1 WYPR.
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