Geneva is renewing its contract with Axon for police body and in-car cameras, as well as getting new Tasers, to the tune of about $1.2 million over the next 10 years.
The contract, which will start in August and extend through August 2036, was approved by the Geneva City Council at its meeting on Monday. It’s set to cost the city $1.2 million over the 10-year term.
As of Jan. 1, 2025, all police officers in Illinois are required to wear body cameras while on duty, one of the significant mandates of the controversial 2021 SAFE-T Act. Larger departments had to be in compliance in 2022, and midsize departments had deadlines in 2023 and 2024.
The contract approved by Geneva’s City Council includes 38 body-worn cameras, 10 in-car cameras and 14 Taser 7 electronic control devices, along with associated software, per the resolution approved Monday.
At a Committee of the Whole meeting last month, City Administrator Alex Voigt explained to the council that Geneva Deputy Police Chief Matt Dean had worked with Axon to standardize the three contracts the city has — for body-worn cameras, squad car cameras and Tasers — so that everything is bundled and on a similar schedule.
This is essentially meant to maximize savings for the city and improve efficiency, according to Voigt.
The city’s current contracts with Axon for body camera and in-car camera programs are set to expire in 2028 and currently follow separate program schedules, according to the city. The purchase of new Tasers was budgeted for this year to replace a 2013 Taser model that was purchased in 2017.
Combining the contracts and using current pricing — as opposed to letting the current contracts expire — is slated to save the city more than half a million dollars, per a memo included in Monday’s meeting agenda. The city would start out with
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an annual payment of around $80,000, which would increase steadily over the duration of the contract, according to documents included in Monday’s meeting agenda.At a May Committee of the Whole meeting, Dean explained that Axon is not the only player in the industry, but pointed to the company’s reliability and its software and ability to transfer videos to the State’s Attorney’s Office.
“We really see the market continuing to go in Axon’s favor,” Dean said, referring to neighboring municipalities’ use of the vendor.
Batavia, for example, is switching over to Axon from a different vendor, and Aurora also gets its body-worn cameras from the company.
Nevertheless, the length of the contract — and the contract itself — initially weathered some pushback from the council.
At the May 18 Committee of the Whole meeting, Ald. Anaïs Bowring expressed some hesitation that Axon is “becoming a bit of a monopoly player,” suggesting that she’d be more comfortable with a shorter-term contract to give the city more flexibility in the future.
Dean, however, said there was cost savings of about $119,000 for the 10-year term versus a shorter term.
Ald. Martha Paschke, however, said she understood the reason for the length of the contract, and was assured that the city has a possible way out of the contract if needed.
Ald. Amy Mayer expressed some concern about rapid changes in technology, asking about trends in the industry as far as the wearability and comfort of the devices the department is looking to purchase.
Dean, in response, said the contract includes a refresh of the technology the city’s getting from Axon.
Ald. Mark Reinecke said he was of “mixed minds” on the contract at the May meeting, saying he believes the hardware is “essential” but expressing concern about the back-end functions, like the security of the data that’s stored.
Dean said he has “the utmost confidence” in the company and that they’ve thus far provided reliable service and have similar ideas about data protection as the police department does.
Following a vote to move the matter forward at the Committee of the Whole meeting, the contract then came to the full City Council Monday for final approval.
Bowring expressed continued hesitation about the contract, but acknowledged that this is a state-mandated requirement and that there are “not many other options at this point.”
The matter was ultimately approved by the council at Monday’s meeting, with all council members who were present voting for it except Bowring.