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Las Cruces City Council Discusses Increase In Police Body Cameras And Additional Housing Assistance

The Las Cruces City Council voted to approve a contract with Axon Enterprise for body cameras and data storage services. Over 60 new body cameras will be added to the Las Cruces Police Department’s inventory, bringing the department’s total number of body cameras to 214. Rob Benavidez, with the Las Cruces Police Department, spoke to the council about the benefits of using Axon Enterprise.

“We have used this system for a very long time, and we have gone through a lot of heartache with other camera systems that we have tried,” Benavidez said. “Since we moved to this system, I can honestly tell you, since I've been involved with law enforcement here, which is a little close to 18 years, we have probably saved the city quite a bit because we have taken the steps to record our actions.”

The new cameras will satisfy the requirements mandated by New Mexico Senate Bill 8 stating all police interactions with the public must be recorded.  Benavidez explained how the department is working to satisfy the requirements.

“Any law enforcement action that the city of Las Cruces takes, it will be recorded. That includes us helping out on the side of the road with a fender, or someone that needs assistance, to regular welfare checks,” Benavidez said. “The problem with what we had in the past, we did not have enough cameras to cover the entire agency when this came down, which caused a lot of constraints on the agency and we were juggling systems. This contract helps put a camera on every person that needs to have a camera, and so we have all those bases covered.”

He also highlighted the contract will include virtual reality empathy training.

“The current plan right now is that when we get the system in place, it will be provided as a briefing training when available,” Benavidez said. “The great part about this is it will not require a lot a training hours, meaning we don't remove a lot of officers from the field to do this training...so the plan is to put all the officers through this training, like we do all our other CIT training.”

The council also approved a resolution to allocate over $607,000 to the New Mexico Mortgage Finance Authority to go toward offsetting pandemic related housing needs for eligible Las Cruces residents.

City Housing and Neighborhood Services Manager Natalie Green explained how the funds will be used to help households in the city financially recover.

“That program awards up to $1,500 per month for up to a total of three months to income eligible households within city limits. Those income eligible households must be below 80% of area median income,” Green said. “They need to demonstrate a financial hardship due to COVID, and they need to be able to provide documentation to demonstrate their delinquency in their housing costs.”

The funding for the program comes courtesy of Community Development Block Grant money received via the CARES Act. Green says that hundreds of households have applied for assistance.

“We have received approximately 422 applicants for city-limits. About 300 of those are for rent, 100 of those are for mortgage and then the rest are either manufactured or mobile homes,” Green said.

Although the city is not currently taking additional applications, Las Cruces residents in need of more information about assistance programs can email fairhousing@las-cruces.org or call the city directly.

Madison Staten was a Multimedia Reporter for KRWG Public Media from 2020-2022.