Trustees back train station cameras

To clean up the downtown train station, Arlington Heights officials support installing six security cameras.

"Complaints about loitering, vandalism and cleanliness have gone up, especially after we lost the McDonald's who had full-time people assigned to maintain the station," said Village Manager Bill Dixon.

At a committee meeting on Monday, trustees supported installing cameras to deter crime. The official vote will take place on April 21, and, if approved, the cameras will be installed in late May, said Steve Daugherty of Current Technologies Corp., the Lombard-based company that would install the cameras.

It would cost $57,200 to buy and set up the cameras and $8,500 annually to maintain the system, Daugherty said.

Four cameras would be inside the station and two would be outside. The cameras would be on 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The tapes could be viewed in real time or played back by police officers at the station or in squad cars.

Commuters will notice the cameras, said Cmdr. Jeffrey DuFloth of the Arlington Heights Police Department.

"This isn't a secret," he said. "We want people to know they are there and that they'll be monitored."

At times people hang around the train station for hours smoking cigarettes and asking commuters for money, according to a staff memo. They often leave behind garbage and sleep on station benches.

Most of the activity is done by people under the influence of alcohol, DuFloth said.

The cameras would be installed only at the downtown Arlington Heights station, not the Arlington Park station, DuFloth said.

Trustee Tom Hayes commutes daily to Chicago from the downtown Arlington Heights train station.

"I can attest to the conditions," Hayes said. "It's not terrible, but we could use some help."

Officials also installed low metal fences around some plants and replaced the station's exterior benches to reduce crime.