Syracuse committee reviews proposed Axon license-plate reader contract amid privacy and data-sharing questions

Syracuse City officials on Monday reviewed proposed terms for a contract with Axon to expand the Syracuse Police Department’s license-plate reader (LPR) system and fielded questions about data ownership, sharing with other agencies and retention policies.

Chief Bridal, who spoke for SPD, described the technology the contract would supply: pole-mounted cameras that read multiple lanes at traffic and highway speeds, compiling plate reads into a searchable system intended to generate investigative leads. "It reads cars going at various speeds... and then compiles that data into a system that allows the police department to go back and based on criminal investigations, search that data to assist us in solving crime," Bridal said.

The issue drew privacy questions from committee members and the public. Sue Kasoff, who participated in the meeting, said the city’s proposal is for SPD to own and house the LPR data in a closed system under the contract, a point she flagged as important for both the committee and the public. "The data that is collected as a result of the installation of LPRs is data that is solely owned and accessed by SPD in the city," Kasoff said.

Bridal and others repeatedly said LPR data are not actively monitored in real time in the way the city’s COPS cameras may be; instead, the department uses LPRs reactively after incidents when investigators have time frames and locations to query. "There's no active monitoring of the LPR cameras like our COPS cameras," Bridal said. "This is, after the fact... we're specifically looking at the location where this might have occurred, and there's no active monitoring."

Retention and evidentiary procedures were a focal point. Bridal told the committee the department’s bulk LPR data policy is 30 days, consistent with the surveillance working group’s median recommendation; data pulled into an investigation are archived as evidence and retained according to the state Criminal Procedure Law (CPL) and case-driven discovery rules. "Any time we pull data from the system for a crime, we're gonna archive it off and it becomes part of evidence," Bridal said. "The retention of that evidence follows the crime... murders, rapes, you have to keep forever."

Committee members pressed how broadly the department would share data with other agencies. Bridal said SPD does not currently share LPR data with other agencies but could enter memoranda of agreement (MOAs) with nearby law-enforcement partners — for example, DeWitt, the county sheriff or neighboring towns — that would allow specific sharing while contractually prohibiting onward distribution. He added that, absent a court order or subpoena, SPD would not provide data to federal agencies such as immigration enforcement. "Absent a court order or a subpoena... we will not share that information," Bridal said.

A question about vendor hosting and liability surfaced after a committee member observed Axon would host the data in the cloud. Bridal said he could not speak to vendor liability and Kasoff said liability terms would be part of the contract negotiations and appropriate for executive-session discussion. "That would form one of the terms of the contract," Kasoff said.

The department said the current Syracuse footprint is 13 LPRs and the contract contemplates expanding to 26, with locations concentrated at major intersections and ramps where traffic converges. Bridal said he would provide detailed site locations on request; a committee member asked whether those sites had been cross-referenced with Vision Zero traffic-safety data and was told they had not.

Committee members also reiterated community concerns about procuring technology from vendors that supply federal agencies, including ICE. Bridal responded that many of the state-of-the-art tools used by local departments are also used by federal agencies, and restricting vendors could limit SPD’s access to systems it considers effective. He cited, as an industry estimate referenced by Axon, that vehicles are involved in a large share of crimes nationally — a figure he described as reflective of how LPRs can support investigations but not as a Syracuse-specific, independently verified statistic.

Before moving on to finalize contractual language, the committee voted to enter executive session to receive legal advice on contract terms. The chair called for the motion and the committee proceeded by voice vote to go into executive session to discuss legal advice related to the contract.

The committee did not complete public negotiation of contract terms; members said vendor liability, specific contractual guardrails for data sharing and a definitive site list would be addressed in closed session or in subsequent public follow-ups.

The committee’s next procedural step is executive session for legal advice on contract terms; no final public approval of the contract was recorded during the open meeting.