Civil liberties lawyers and advocates are objecting to the city of Sacramento’s plans to install new security cameras and related surveillance equipment at several locations in the city.

Jim Updegraff, the chair of the Sacramento County Chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), told the City Council Tuesday that the planned surveillance system would be “an affront to the privacy and civil liberties of the citizens of the City of Sacramento.”

Mayor Kevin Johnson and Police Chief Rick Braziel last month publicized the city’s plan to use a pot of $615, 500 in Federal Homeland Security grant funds to fund a new surveillance system with 32 cameras, four mobile surveillance trailers and other related equipment. Johnson said the surveillance system was important because Sacramento has ranked second to Oakland in violent crime statistics over the past seven to eight years.

But Sacramento County’s ACLU chapter and ACLU attorneys in San Francisco are challenging Johnson and Braziel’s views.

Outside the meeting, Updegraff told The Sacramento Press that the ACLU’s opposition does not mean the group plans to sue the city. The group always tries to work with issues, he said.

But the group’s firm opposition is clear. Updegraff told the City Council that the surveillance system will invade citizens’ privacy and will not fight crime. The group is also calling on the City Council to hold a public hearing about the planned surveillance system.

“Study after study, from San Francisco to London, have demonstrated video cameras are ineffective in reducing crime,” Updegraff said.

The Sacramento County ACLU chapter and ACLU attorneys in San Francisco together are directly challenging statements Johnson made last month about the surveillance system.

“The new system will create a powerful deterrent for would-be criminals,” Johnson said last month. “Similar systems have been used in other cities around the country and played a major role in reducing crime.”

Updegraff questioned the accuracy of Johnson’s comments, noting that ACLU attorneys had studied Johnson’s remarks. “Our attorneys in San Francisco are not aware of any studies in the country that support the comments of the mayor,” Updegraff said.

The local ACLU chapter is also challenging one of Braziel’s statements.

Braziel said at a press conference last month: “The cameras we put up will only be in places that are in open view of the public, so it is no different than somebody walking down the street with their videophone and taking pictures.”

The Sacramento County ACLU chapter “disagrees” with and “deplores” Braziel’s comment, Updegraff said.

Images from innocent people’s videophones “do not end up in police files,” Updegraff said, and are not shared with other law enforcement agencies such as the FBI and the Sacramento Regional Terrorism Threat Assessment Center.

Sacramento Police Department spokesman Konrad VonSchoech said last month that the city will hold a procurement process for the cameras and other surveillance equipment.