The City University of New York is letting $120,000 worth of body cameras gather dust at one Manhattan school — because they don’t want the public to see the crime and violence taking place on campus grounds, insiders told The Post.
In 2021, City College of New York purchased 62 body cameras, accessories, and software as part of a pilot program to improve transparency between campus security and the public, according to CCNY public safety officers and financial documents obtained by The Post.
The acquisition followed a spate of crime around the Harlem campus at the height of the pandemic, according to campus officers.
But CCNY insiders told The Post that CUNY brass likely shelved the cameras’ deployment to prevent students’ parents and the public from witnessing bloody crimes or the campus community acting poorly.
“A big part of why they don’t want us to have body cameras is it’ll show what’s really happening on the campuses,” one veteran CCNY officer told The Post.
“You’ll see some of the interactions we have, where faculty, staff, even students may be completely in the wrong, and they don’t want that behavior leaked on the news.”
The new cameras would “serve to provide a contemporaneous objective record of encounters, facilitate review by supervisors, foster accountability and encourage lawful and respectful interactions between the public and Public Safety,” according to a draft proposal for the program obtained by The Post.
Shortly after the school sent the proposal to CUNY’s central office for review, however, Andre Brown, the university system’s executive director of public safety, put the kibosh on the program, leaving the cameras to sit in boxes for years, CCNY officers said.
City College of New York, which has a sprawling campus the surrounding Harlem community passes through daily, had 14,403 students enrolled in fall 2022.
Major crimes in the 26th Precinct, which covers the university, have jumped 14% percent through Oct. 1 this year compared to the same period last year, to 711 from 625, and up 65% compared to the same period two years ago, according to NYPD data.
A City College spokesperson said that the body cameras’ rollout had been shelved because the school’s leadership had not realized the range of requirements for implementing their use, including existing policies and protocols as well as liability issues when approving the 2021 purchase.
“We are developing a plan that spells out their use in ways that are consistent with NYPD regulations, best practices, and the safety of our community and may consider a pilot in the future,” the spokesperson said.