South Bend Police Chief and Mayor respond to proposed fee increase for body camera footage
SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- South Bend Chief of Police, Scott Ruszkowski, as well as Mayor, James Mueller, both spoke with ABC57 about South Bend Common Council Bill 43-25, a proposal that would significantly raise the price of requesting police body and dash camera footage.
That proposal was put forward by the city's legal team at a personnel and finance committee meeting last Monday, July 14th.
Bill 43-25 would raise the cost to $50 per hour it takes to edit, review or redact the video, up to $150 per recording.
Both Chief Ruszkowski and Mayor Mueller spoke about how the bill could help recover the cost of putting body camera footage through a legal review process.
Chief Ruszkowski also noted that the city's legal team was in place long before body cameras were introduced to the police department, so the extra task of having to review and redact footage was added to the city's workload without compensation.
Proposed Bill 43-25 will go through its second and third readings at the next Common Council meeting on Monday, July 28th.