Good idea: City of Goldsboro police and county sheriff's deputies need cameras

Before another dollar is spent on recreation or another study of a possibility for another taxpayer-funded project, the city of Goldsboro needs to do something immediately.

And the Wayne County commissioners need to do it, too.

Both groups need to buy body-mounted cameras for every officer in their employ.

We know it will be expensive. There are more than a few officers on both forces. But it will be the best investment ever if there is a questionable confrontation between police and a suspect in the city or county.

There will be no "he said, he said." And there will be no justification for bad behavior. The answer as to whether a shooting was justified will be right there -- for all to see.

The cameras will not stop the scrutiny of officers. Everyone thinks they know how they would handle a confrontation with a suspect even though it is very different when you face such an instance in person.

And there will still be bad cops as well as race peddlers who will use incidents to proclaim yet another war on minority teenagers before the facts are even in.

But it is not for them that we should have our officers wear body cameras. It is so we can find out once and for all where the bad eggs are and get them off the force. And so we can quit allowing people with an agenda and half the facts to label the men and women who serve our communities as cold-blooded racists out to target minority youths when the vast majority are merely trying to keep themselves and this community safe.

That's how you make sure you don't have a Ferguson, Mo., in Goldsboro, N.C.

The credit for this idea goes to the Mount Olive Town Board. In the interest of making sure there is no reason to question an incident, they made sure that they will have the information they need in case of a questionable arrest.

They bit the bullet and got the equipment. And that is what we need to do, too.

Truth and light are what it takes to battle darkness and half-truths.

This is the first step to making sure the bigger goal -- keeping this community and its residents, all its residents, safe -- remains the top priority.

And if something happens -- God forbid -- it will be the best decision we have ever made and the best money we have ever spent.

Published in Editorials on September 2, 2014 11:10 AM