[From Feds Investigating Cook County's 'Project Shield' | NBC Chicago ]
Project Shield in Cook County consists of 802.11b and 4.9Ghz hotspots, adjustable and fixed cameras, vehicle locator GPS, pole mounted police surveillance cameras, premises digital video recorders, and personal computer-based viewing stations. These devices are wired into the Cook County network. The project was funded by a $41 million grant from Homeland Security.
During Phase I and II of the project, the county installed the system in 35 municipalities. “Hylton said that paid for 35 to 40 suburban police cars to be outfitted with cameras and computers, as well as 37 stationary cameras placed across the county. In some of those police cars, though, the cameras never worked.” The cost was $22 million for Phase I and II.
“We were scheduled to get some installed in 2006,” said Franklin Park Police Chief Tom Wolfe. “There was either a hardware problem or some kind of installation problem that didn’t allow that to occur.” Franklin Park was hardly alone, Marin reported. Suburban police departments across Cook County were contacted, and while there was some praise for Project Shield, there were more often complaints. In departments like the River Forest and Palos Heights police departments, mobile cameras were installed and later removed because they just didn’t work.
Phase III consists of a partial retrofit and an emphasis on standardizing all the system components. As of July, 2007, 130 vehicles, 65 hotspots, 98 surveillance cameras and 55 viewing stations had been installed as part of Project Shield.
The lack of results has pushed governments official to seek greater oversight into how this money was spent. Some are calling it a boondoggle. For more background, see these stories on ABC and Fox.
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