Seaside Heights Buys Body Cameras for Most Police Officers

Body cameras worn by North Charleston, S.C. police. (Credit: Ryan Johnson/ Wikimedia)

Seaside Heights, complying with a state mandate to outfit nearly all police officers with body-worn cameras, purchased the devices as well as support systems and cloud storage for the program.

The borough council approved a $455,606 contract with Axon Enterprises, Inc., under a special state contract, to provide the hardware and software for officers to wear the cameras. The deal includes a five-year contract for maintenance issues and cloud storage for the video records.

Borough Administrator Christopher Vaz said nearly all of the the town’s police officers would be outfitted with cameras, however the status of Class I special officers, who do not carry weapons, is still being determined. Under the latest round of legislation adopted by the state, more officers than ever before – including detectives in plain clothes under certain circumstances – must wear cameras. Seaside Heights is in conversations with the state to determine how to best handle the large number of unarmed special officers who work on boardwalks and amidst parking meters each summer.

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