Its been months in the planning stages, now a pilot program is set to begin that will have Lima police officers wearing body cameras.
A four week pilot project was announced at Lima Mayor David Berger's weekly briefing today. Multiple officers on each shift will be equipped with a Watch Guard brand VISTA camera while on duty. They will be testing the efficiency and effectiveness of the camera which records video and audio. The officers will go through training of the equipment and the newly-created policy for the body cams. The policy was created by a committee with several stakeholders involved, including Lima's Black Ministerial Association. They had approached Police Chief Kevin Martin with their concerns for the need for body cameras on officers. Representatives say the meetings were open and honest and some of their ideas are incorporated in the policy, but there's more work to do.
After the 4 week pilot, Major James Baker says they will send out a survey to all stakeholders involved to get their take on the equipment. If approved, he says they'd like to get 50 cameras to start.
