Tuesday, April 05, 2011

Oh dear

Torrevieja has invested 1.7 million Euros on its sophisticated system of CCTV cameras to monitor the city. In all there are 191 cameras, 71 of which have been installed to monitor traffic.

The town now needs permission to use the other 91 because they may be deemed to be intruding on people’s liberty. The application will be reviewed by a joint commission consisting of a judge from the Superior Court of Justice, state attorney, a member of the Federation of Municipalities and Provinces and a member nominated by the Government delegation at Valencia.

Normally you would expect permission to be sought before embarking on such a project but in this case the director general of the police in Torrevieja explains that there was a limited time to use the money and deadlines to comply with for funding. He says that it may be the commission will recommend that some of the cameras are re aligned or that the cameras are only operative for certain times of day. Even if a camera has to moved altogether this will not affect the overall operation of the system.

The police unions wonder why it is that the town can invest in such a system when they can’t afford to wash the police cars and have to use an obsolete computer for other tasks. They also query who will be manning the system at night when they only have two patrols available.

Let us hope that, in the end, the 1.7 million Euros has been well spent and that the system makes Torrevieja a safer place for its citizens.

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