Cops want to buy a bunch of those “temporary” street cameras installed for the G20

Back in May, when Toronto Police began installing 77 new closed-circuit security cameras on downtown streets in preparation for the G20 summit, the idea was that they wouldn’t stay up for long. More specifically, they were supposed to stay up until “the completion of the event, when there’s no longer an issue of security,” Toronto police Const. Wendy Drummond told the Toronto Star. Well, the cops may be doing a 180; they now want to buy 52 of them, along with some other G20 toys they “temporarily” purchased for the summit.Along with the CCTV cameras, the police want to buy back 400 sets of tactical gear (gas masks, helmets and eye shields) and three of the infamous sound cannons. Law enforcement would buy back the equipment from the government at half price.

Of course, the furthest thing from anyone’s mind back in May was that the cameras would, in fact, stay up once the summit was over. Well, maybe not the furthest. One Star commenter noted back in June, “How much you want to bet those cameras don’t come down after the G20 is over?”

• Cameras, sound cannons among G20 equipment Toronto police aim to keep [Globe and Mail]
• Toronto streets get more surveillance cameras for G20 [Toronto Star]