STARKVILLE — A fight breaks in the Cotton District with several parties involved. Many more are witnesses.
No one calls 911 while the fight is in progress. Starkville Police Department first finds out about it on social media.
By the time officers respond, all parties have left the scene. A police camera captured the fight, but no one was monitoring the feed at the time.
“Had we been more proactive on this … we’re probably able to deploy officers to the individuals that were involved,” Police Chief Mark Ballard said Friday during a board of aldermen work session at City Hall in which he showed video footage of the fight. “… The last thing you want is for individuals to think they can fight on our institutions, leave and show back up on a Friday night and fight again.”
He quickly turned to another example, also caught on police video, where a couple started fighting in a parking lot. Someone was monitoring the feed at SPD, and a patrol officer nearby responded quickly, breaking up the fight and making arrests.
Ballard wants the quicker response to be the norm, but that means more cameras and the staff to monitor the feeds 24/7.
He and city Information Technology Director Joel Clements pitched a comprehensive security plan Friday that would add 41 cameras and eight license plate readers to SPD’s surveillance force over the next two years. It would also grow the monitoring staff from one to three.
The cameras cost $205,000, Clements said, and recurring costs for camera connectivity, storing footage and using the plate readers would run almost $83,000 per year.
Additionally, Ward 2 Alderwoman Sandra Sistrunk, who serves as budget chair, estimated the salary and benefits for two new staffers would cost between $70,000 and $80,000 annually.
If approved, the board would include half the cameras in the city’s Fiscal Year 2025 budget and the other half the following year.
Force multiplier
SPD now deploys 34 cameras, mostly in the city’s entertainment districts and in areas with higher crime volume.
The department also has agreements with various business owners and apartment complex owners that allow police access to monitor some of their camera feeds in real time. Ballard estimated those agreements double its surveillance capabilities.
New cameras would be deployed on the west side of the city, chiefly the Highway 12 corridor, as well as in the annexed area in Clayton Village, he said.
Ballard said cameras are extremely useful with wrecks, on which SPD worked almost 900 in 2023, and disturbances/fights, to which SPD responded to almost 700 that same year.
Cameras don’t lie, he said, and it captures things victims and witnesses may not see or remember clearly.
They also see people who may not want to be seen – one reason he wants to have one outside OCH Regional Medical Center.
“If you’re shot, chances are you’ll have someone who will take you to the emergency room,” Ballard said. “That doesn’t mean they are going to stay or walk in. … They might roll you out in the parking lot and keep right on going.”
A ‘better’ idea than before
Mayor Lynn Spruill pushed earlier this year for an ordinance requiring businesses of a certain size, and any that sold liquor or hemp, to have cameras at their entrances, exits and parking lots.
Business owners pushed back hard against the measure, and it ultimately failed.
Spruill said that effort helped build the idea Ballard presented Friday.
“Because everybody pushed back on the other idea, this is a better idea,” she told the board. “This gives us more control.”
Vice Mayor Roy A. Perkins, who represents Ward 6, supported the failed camera measure and strongly endorses Ballard’s current plan.
“We need to do whatever it takes to support this investment,” he said. “… This is so extremely necessary. … If this camera system involves a tax increase, I’m going to vote for it.”
Zack Plair is the managing editor for The Dispatch.
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