Pursuant to the Indiana Access to Public Records Act, Indiana Code 5-14-3, I am requesting public records related to the City of North Vernon’s surveillance cameras, camera systems, video recordings, access rules, retention rules, and related policies.
This request includes, but is not limited to, cameras used by or connected to City Hall, the Mayor’s Office, Police Department, Code Enforcement, Parks Department, downtown livestream/event cameras, city-owned buildings, city-owned property, public spaces, and the recently approved cameras for the Code Enforcement office at 505 Amb Drive.
Please provide the following records:
- Any city policy, procedure, ordinance, resolution, memorandum, rule, written guidance, internal instruction, or handbook section governing the use of city surveillance cameras.
- Any policy or procedure governing who may access live camera feeds.
- Any policy or procedure governing who may access recorded camera footage.
- Any policy or procedure governing who may export, download, copy, email, text, save, print, share, or otherwise distribute camera footage.
- Any policy or procedure governing whether camera footage may be shared with city employees, elected officials, department heads, police officers, code enforcement, outside agencies, contractors, private citizens, attorneys, insurance companies, media outlets, or the public.
- Any retention policy or retention schedule for city camera footage, including how long footage is kept before deletion or overwriting.
- Any records showing whether access to the camera system is logged, audited, tracked, reviewed, or monitored.
- Any records showing who currently has user access, administrative access, viewing access, export access, or login credentials for any city camera system. I am not requesting passwords or confidential credentials, only records showing positions, departments, user roles, access levels, or authorized users.
- Any training materials, user agreements, confidentiality agreements, acknowledgement forms, or instructions given to employees, officials, contractors, or users with access to city cameras or camera footage.
- Any disciplinary policy, rule, or procedure addressing misuse of city cameras or footage, including unauthorized viewing, personal use, stalking, harassment, political use, sharing footage without authorization, or accessing footage for non-official purposes.
- Any records showing complaints, investigations, disciplinary actions, or reports involving alleged misuse of city cameras or camera footage.
- Any records showing whether the city’s camera systems are connected to, accessed by, monitored by, maintained by, or stored through any outside vendor, contractor, cloud platform, police system, or third-party service.
- Any contracts, service agreements, terms of service, data-sharing agreements, maintenance agreements, or vendor agreements that govern storage, access, monitoring, maintenance, retention, or sharing of city camera footage.
- Any records identifying the city official, employee, department, board, or vendor responsible for maintaining the camera system and enforcing camera-related policies.
- Any agenda packet materials, staff reports, memoranda, emails, or communications discussing the need for a camera policy, changes to a camera policy, concerns about camera access, concerns about retention, or concerns about misuse of city camera footage.
If the City of North Vernon does not have any policy or written procedure governing city surveillance cameras, access to footage, retention, sharing, auditing, or misuse, please state that in writing after a reasonable search.
I am not requesting passwords, live login credentials, network vulnerability information, alarm codes, or technical details that would genuinely compromise building security. If the city believes any portion of a responsive record is exempt from disclosure, please provide the non-exempt portions with redactions and identify the specific statutory basis for each denial or redaction.
Please provide these records electronically by email if possible. Attach a legal receipt If there will be any copying or production cost.
Because this request concerns public access to records involving city surveillance systems and camera-use policies, I have copied the Office of the Indiana Public Access Counselor for awareness only, as well as possible follow ups with PAC due to being denied digital copies of the still missing city minutes.
Please confirm receipt of this request within the time required by Indiana law.
Thank you.
No Acknowledgment of Receipt