Law enforcement officers rely on patrol car cameras to document evidence and critical police-citizen interactions.

Joe Gerace, Chautauqua County sheriff, said his department’s vehicles – unlike many of the Jamestown and Lakewood-Busti police vehicles – have yet to be outfitted with them.

As a result, he said, the county is likely being shortchanged on evidence collection and – perhaps just as importantly- facing the risk of costly lawsuits.

“We already have two pending lawsuits that wouldn’t be there if we had in-car cameras,” Gerace said. “The insurance investigator (in one of the lawsuits) said ‘send us the in-car camera and this (lawsuit) would be dead.'”

Gerace budgeted $150,000 in the prospective 2017 budget to purchase in-car cameras – and the necessary networking equipment- for his entire 20-car fleet. The cameras would augment the body-worn cameras already purchased by the Sheriff’s Office via a federal grant and at no cost to the county taxpayer.

“I think protecting and covering ourselves from liability is something worth investing in,” Gerace said. “(I think) $150,000 is peanuts compared to payouts in lawsuits filed against the county.”

Recently, however, the county’s Audit and Control Committee determined that the Sheriff’s Office budget was largely driving a $1.3 million increase in the total local share in the 2017 budget.

“The sheriff’s budget alone is showing a local share increase of $1.24 million,” said Committee Chairman Pierre Chagnon, R-Bemus Point, at an earlier budget meeting. “The sheriff’s budget alone is driving the entire local share increase. This is an eye-opener.”

On Wednesday, the Public Safety Committee recommended budget cuts to the Sheriff’s Office and focused on the $150,000 request for in-car cameras.

While initial recommendations called for the sum to be cut in half, the Audit and Control Committee on Thursday agreed to a $50,000 reduction to $100,000.

Gerace said each camera costs approximately $5,000, but is likely to waver depending on the bidding process. He could not estimate how many vehicles would be outfitted with cameras at this time.

“I told Audit and Control that I understand their desire to reduce spending and I totally respect that and appreciate it,” Gerace said. “I’ll work with whatever they give me … so we’ll do what we can with the numbers they appropriated.”