Gahanna latest city to use license plate-reading cameras

GAHANNA, Ohio (WCMH) --The City of Gahanna is the latest Central Ohio city to install Flock safety camera technology. Flock is a license plate reader system that will alert police to a stolen car or a car registered to a wanted person.

As of now, there are three Flock cameras around Gahanna but soon there will be 21.

Chief of Police Jeff Spence said Gahanna is lucky to have a low overall crime rate, but the one outlier they have seen rise in the last few years is vehicle theft.

“Those cameras can act as a deterrent, as a prevention method, but they can also help us preempt crime in progress,” Spence said.

Spence said he’s seen Gahanna's neighbors like Whitehall and Columbus have success with the technology. He said these cameras will act as 21 new sets of eyes in places his officers can’t always be.

“We've had an exponential increase in vehicle theft,” Spence said. “We would go from three to five to maybe ten a year with that one, the high end to 60, 70 vehicle thefts and, you know, what we were seeing is a trend and a lot of times when a vehicle was stolen in our city, the thieves would drive a stolen vehicle in from another jurisdiction.”

The chief said in the city’s short test period, it’s already seen the benefits.

“It's already led, in just a couple of weeks, to the identification of a theft suspect,” Spence said.

He said he hopes this will improve residents' quality of life. He said people often think of vehicle theft as a low-level crime, but it is something that can impact more aspects of life than some realize.

“I think we often don't look at the impact of a stolen vehicle,” Spence said. “We think that's a vehicle. It's an inanimate object. But I think in our city, you know, that's a person's livelihood. That's the way they get to work. That's the way they provide for their family.”

Spence said the cameras will also help in situations like a possible child abduction.

He said the cameras will be located at major entry points to the city and also some in residential areas.

The new camera purchase was approved as a part of the 2024 capital improvement plan.