CHICAGO (WBBM NEWSRADIO) --A North Side Alderman wants to widen the net the City is using to try to find stolen cars. It involves using private security personnel.
There are neighborhoods on the North side and elsewhere where residents have banded together to pay for private security companies to help patrol their blocks.
Second ward Alderman, Brian Hopkins said many of the private patrol vehicles are equipped with license plate readers to scan and record cars in the area, but he said those devices are not tied in with the Chicago police Department system listing stolen vehicles.
"That seems to me to be low-hanging fruit," he explaied.
"If we could connect them, so while they're on patrol, if they happen to pass a vehicle that's wanted and the license plate triggers it, it provides an immediate notification to CPD of the location of that wanted vehicle.”
Hopkins plans to introduce a measure in city council to make that possible. The second ward has just gotten a fixed license plate reader too at State and Division.
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