Implementation of body-worn cameras for Oly cops pushed back to October

Implementation of body-worn cameras for Olympia police officers is pushed back to October as the city’s vendor, Axon, is experiencing an influx of customers, Olympia Police Chief Rich Allen reported at the Olympia City Council meeting on Tuesday, August 16.

At his Town Hall meeting in June, Allen said police officers would start wearing body-worn cameras in August and launch in-car video systems in mid-2023.

"Unfortunately, that timeline is delayed and pushed back to October. Our vendor Axon needs some more time to get our program up and running. This is disappointing but not entirely unexpected," Allen told the council members.

According to Allen, Axon has thousands of new customers. "Those new customers have the same timeline, so we simply have to wait our turn."

The police chief said the police department has scheduled an open house in the council chambers on October 27 at 6 p.m. Officers will be demonstrating and wearing the cameras, and a representative from Axon will attend to answer any questions from the community members.

Allen said he plans to present to the city council again in November this year. "I will share information about the body-worn camera process, the timelines we had, how we got here, and then talk about the next phase of our program, which is the in-car video systems," he said.

In May, the city council approved a contract with Axon Enterprise, Inc., the weapons and tech company that introduced the taser.

In an earlier report to the city council, Allen said the contract with Axon cost $736,172. The services include base software, hardware, licensing, additional hardware refresh at the contract, live-streaming software, and installation.