Religious signs: city won’t be counting
The city will not be submitting a head count of its workers who wear religious signifiers.
It won’t be putting body cameras on its cops, either.
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Kate
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Dominic 16:51 on 2019-02-06 Permalink
I’m stunned at Plante choice for the videocameras for cops. Its a no-brainer. Pretty disappointed in this decision
Jack 17:32 on 2019-02-06 Permalink
With Dominic, you’d think the good cops would welcome that level of transparency.
Ginger Baker 17:44 on 2019-02-06 Permalink
Also quite disappointed; the optics of this aren’t great, and it seems as though the Plante Admin is taking the cops’ word for it. Where was the independent review? How did they arrive at cost estimates that exceed what the manufacturer has indicated?
Is the police brotherhood actually that strong that they can manipulate Projet Montreal?
or are they sell outs?
Kate 20:21 on 2019-02-06 Permalink
Not so sure I agree, about the cameras. The cop can activate the cam or not, which means the results will be kind of weak.
jeather 20:46 on 2019-02-06 Permalink
You need to start somewhere. First it’s wearing them, then it’s having them activated automatically, then it’s actually getting in trouble for not having a functioning cam. Police have shown us they don’t deserve our trust, and this just reinforces that.
Ginger Baker 20:48 on 2019-02-06 Permalink
The rep from the manufacturer says they can be controlled automatically and they don’t necessarily have to be left in the hands of the SPVM, i.e. there could be independent civilian oversight of the cameras.
Apparently this has been tried in various locations in the States.Leaving the ‘tapes’ in the hands of the Fuzz is entirely counter-productive, but we need civilian oversight anyways.
Ephraim 22:12 on 2019-02-06 Permalink
Kate – When you turn off a cam, there are always questions to answer about why. It saves a lot of money… first of all, it’s much easier to do your report, the evidence can stand in for you in court and it deescalates problems. All benefits. The real DOWNSIDE is for the cops who violate the law…. they have to stop. We don’t have full oversight and the cracks are WIDE. How many more people need to be stopped for driving while black before we do enough to stop this.
Ian 09:20 on 2019-02-07 Permalink
It was very interesting listening to Alex Norris try to defend this decision this morning on the CBC, a lot of semantics and double talk… but he did raise an interesting point – because of Quebec’s privacy laws cops aren’t allowed to film people in certain contexts, cannot activate them in specific places without permission like houses of worship, and have to blur out everyone not involved in the incident. We do have some super specific laws around being filmed though I would be awfully surprised if being a cop on the job wouldn’t grant you an exemption in the courts… but IANAL.
Ephraim 11:22 on 2019-02-07 Permalink
Doubt that the privacy act would apply if it’s not for public usage and that it is publicly known that they are filming. Otherwise we wouldn’t be allowed to have traffic cameras, speed cameras, and those street cameras.
But let’s look at the opposite, if the policeman had to notify people (s)he was turning it on, it would still deescalate situations and protect the police from attack and could record situations for later usage and training.
Kevin 12:40 on 2019-02-07 Permalink
I could be wrong, but every discussion I’ve had with my lawyer about this says the privacy act only applies to publishing photos of people.
Publishers have to take particular care not to use a photo of a person in a particular circumstance and then use it to illustrate a topic with which they are not related.
If you are in a private location, the owners of that establishment can forbid you from taking photos or video, again, according to my lawyer.
I’m not surprised if certain officials are wrong in knowing what can and cannot be filmed. There was even a police officer who was just reprimanded for thinking he could tell a cyclist to turn off his cellphone camera (although the officer did it in a threatening way).
Ian 12:47 on 2019-02-07 Permalink
I hear you all, it sounded strange to me too – but that’s what Alex Norris was claiming.
dwgs 16:29 on 2019-02-07 Permalink
I seem to recall Mr Norris being economical with the truth in the case of the Fletcher’s Field ball park.
Tux 00:35 on 2019-02-08 Permalink
A cop yelled at me once for filming a traffic stop. This was back in the era of flip phones, so if the cops were afraid of postage stamp size videos then, they’re surely afraid of HD cameras now. I also have a few stories about a pair of cops that busted into my friend’s apartment for a noise complaint, confiscated his cannabis, and then stalked him for a couple days. They’d wait for him outside his building after work and yell borderline-threats at him. Hopefully, we get with the times on this issue eventually. They need accountability. I’ve been fortunate never to have had a serious run-in with them, but the Fredy Villanueva case would have been a lot more cut-and-dried if the officers had had cameras attached to ’em.