Police eye videotape, but where exactly?
In an ideal world, says Captain Bernard O'Rourke, the police could post an officer on every corner in Chinatown, one of the city's several crime ''hot spots."
''But we don't have those resources," he says.
The reality is that crime is up this year, and the latest crime buster, police hope, will be machine, not human.
To supplement cops on the street, police plan to install 17 surveillance cameras over the next two months on buildings and street lamps in Chinatown. Police say it's a pilot program and that they are consulting with residents on the matter, but some neighborhood leaders say communication has been minimal and worry that the cameras might focus on business areas at the expense of residential streets.
''If this is supposed to be an inclusive process, all the representative groups should be sitting at the table to make these decisions," said Michelle Yee, a member of the Chinatown Resident Association. So far, there has been little chance for public discussion, Yee said.
The project will mark the first time Boston police will use their own cameras to routinely tape street activity, rather than videotape from banks and businesses that detectives happen on while investigating cases.
No sound will be recorded, but otherwise, there's no expectation of privacy in public areas, O'Rourke said. ''It's simply recording everyday activity, in our case, targeting individuals committing crimes, whether drug activity or otherwise," he said.
The cameras, left over from the Democratic National Convention and most recently employed near Fenway Park during the Red Sox post-season, will be used to discourage crime and collect evidence for drug cases and other investigations, police said. Using DNC money, police spent about $690,000 on cameras, cables, computer software, and installation costs at the FleetCenter, police said.
If effective, the camera project will be expanded to other high-crime areas.
Technical experts have been scouting out the best spots for antennas and wiring. Others are securing permission from property owners to install the cameras. Lawyers are reading rules from other cities in which such cameras are in use, and the police are developing guidelines for using the digital video information.
Some who live and work in Chinatown said the unprecedented installation of cameras raises concerns over privacy and may merely shift problems to new areas.
''This is a big change in our public life, to have this as a matter of routine," said Klemens Meyer, director of dialysis services at Tufts-New England Medical Center and a regular at public safety meetings in Chinatown. ''Mind you, I think the benefits of this outweigh the civil liberties risks, but I've read '1984,' and I worry about it."
Foot traffic is often associated with vibrancy in a city, but in Chinatown, busy streets and restaurants that stay open until 4 a.m. also allow drug dealers, who mostly sell crack cocaine, to blend in. O'Rourke, who supervises police patrolling an area that spans the Theater District to Charlestown and the North End, said the people who frequent five homeless shelters operating in or near Chinatown provide street cover for drug activity. Add to that, he said, a large number citywide of drug dealers and other felons who have completed prison sentences and are returning to the street.
Get rid of drug activity, and violent crime ''will definitely go down," O'Rourke said. ''I'd be naive to think we can eliminate the drug trade, but our goal is to reduce the problem, particularly in the vicinity of Chinatown and the Theater District, almost to the point of being nonexistent."
From January to November this year, police made 769 drug arrests in O'Rourke's district, with 542 in Chinatown, Bay Village, and Midtown, according to police statistics. ''That's the highest figure we've had in several years," he said. Drug arrests totaled 689 for the same period last year, nearly 500 of those arrests in Chinatown and the Theater District.
With names like Operation Wilbur and Operation Big Mac, drug sweeps in the area in recent years have cleaned up some problem spots but also pushed drug dealers elsewhere in Chinatown, particularly toward New England Medical Center and South Station, O'Rourke said.
Chinatown residents say they likewise fear that an abundance of cameras in the business areas, in the northern part of Chinatown, could push crime toward residential areas.
Several groups have written letters to police and to the local public safety committee asking that seemingly redundant cameras on Washington, Charles, Boylston, and Tremont streets be moved to Marginal Road, Hudson, Oak, and Tyler streets.
''Which would've caught the perpetrator who stabbed the old guy," said Chinatown resident Michelle Yee, a mother of three elementary-school-aged children, referring to a mid-November robbery of a Tyler Street shop, Yue Lung.
In that robbery, a 65-year-old store employee, Wen Li, was stabbed repeatedly. He is recovering, and police said the investigation is continuing.
Plans are being revised to incorporate residents' suggestions to move several cameras, O'Rourke said.
Police have appointed a 23-person committee of residents, businesspeople, community activists, and officials from institutions like Tufts to work with them on reviewing camera locations and guidelines for using the videos.
One problem, though, is that the police-appointed committee has yet to meet; another is that many of those on it were unaware until recently they had been named to it.
Bill Moy, 70, who serves as an informal liaison to the police and also heads the Chinatown Neighborhood Council, seen by some as representing the old guard in Chinatown, said that the committee is working out logistics with the police and hopes to schedule a meeting before Christmas.
Talk of installing the security cameras has unleashed discussion of other public safety concerns, given a large concentration of non-English-speaking immigrants and elderly residents in an area that stretches from Chinatown to Castle Square in the South End.
''Not everyone has the same amount of access and influence, for sure," in expressing their problems to police, Yee said.
O'Rourke said that ''if there are concerns at all on things, we will call an open meeting," with a translator present.
Residents complain of prostitutes walking the streets near apartment buildings and drug dealers who can get away with crimes because of linguistic and cultural barriers, and a reluctance by some elderly residents to report crimes.
''They think this is the best area to do these types of things because they don't think they'll be caught," said Chong Chow, 36, a computer programmer who works from his Chinatown home and a 30-year resident of the neighborhood. ''That's why it's so important to put these cameras in Chinatown and do other safety outreach" such as through neighborhood crime watch groups, he said.
