Mpls. set to buy body cameras, but uncertain of how quickly it can share the footage

As Minneapolis prepares to outfit all of its police officers with body cameras, the police department division that will respond to public requests for the cameras' footage is already staggering under the weight of a growing backlog of records requests.

Officials said this week that the number of requests handled by the Minneapolis Police Department's Records Information Unit has grown by 400 percent in the last few years. Between 2014 and 2015 alone, the number of annual requests soared from between 70,000 and 80,000 to approximately 150,000.

Each week, the unit gets further behind, with about 100 hours' worth of work that goes untouched.

Now, days before the City Council is scheduled to take a final vote on a five-year, $4 million contract with Taser International to purchase 587 cameras, some council members are raising red flags about the city's ability to process and share the video officers will record. In two committee meetings this week, Council Member Linea Palmisano urged her council colleagues to direct the Police Department to expand the records unit and to dedicate unused funds toward the body camera program.

While the city has budgeted for two additional staff members to review and redact body camera footage, Palmisano said there's no plan to bump up the number of people who will ensure requests are fulfilled. Currently, the records unit has an 11-person staff, but two of those are out on military or medical leave and two more are either working reduced hours or on probationary duty as a new employee.

"At this point in time, we are ready to allocate $4 million for a body camera program without any kind of public-facing service on it," she said. "There isn't money in this $4 million for anything that serves the public in their requests."

The concern isn't new. Council members and Mayor Betsy Hodges have been pushing for the use of body cameras since 2013, and the city delved deeper into the realities of the devices with a four-month pilot program last year.

In a council committee meeting on Monday, Deputy Chief Travis Glampe said it's unclear how many videos and requests will come out of the citywide body camera program. During the pilot program, the department created about 30,000 videos, and already has received requests for all body camera footage.

Even smaller requests can require considerable work. Glampe said a request for a 10-minute-long incident that involved six officers would require someone to review all 60 minutes of video, and then figure out if any of it needed to be redacted.

Glampe said that could multiply quickly in a department that responds to about a half-million calls per year. Meanwhile, the city is uncertain how much it will be required to share under state law; legislators may take up the issue this year.

Palmisano said she's also concerned all of that video will be processed, reviewed and released by the Police Department. She said the City Clerk's Office, which oversees other data requests and funnels police requests to the Records Information Unit, should have a more hands-on role.

If the city and police intend to become more transparent, the council member said, there should be more of an emphasis on getting the videos to the public, rather than back to police for their own use.

The $4 million body camera contract, which received the unanimous approval of the council's public safety and ways and means committees, is likely to be approved by the full council on Friday. But many remain wary of the city's preparedness, even as they cast their votes.

"I think all of us up here are 150 percent for the body camera initiative, but it's not an initiative that we want to get half-pregnant on," Council Member Jacob Frey said. "We want to do it right the first time, and we want the rollout to be as flawless as possible."