On Tuesday evening, the Champaign City Council unanimously approved a contract with AGB Investigative Services to provide five security officers to patrol Downtown Champaign. Some important details, from The News-Gazette’s reporting on the meeting:
- This Chicago-based company has already been contracted for the Champaign Unit 4 School District. The five officers will come from a pool of 20 officers already working in the area.
- Beginning May 26th the will patrol the downtown business district on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights from 8 p.m. to 4 a.m.
- Officers will be paid $50 an hour, the council will spend no more that $203,986 through 2022.
- They will not carry firearms, tasers, or pepper spray. They will be uniformed and have body cameras.
- Physical interaction is limited to “being able to hold until Champaign Police get there.”
- They will call 911 if an incident happens. Their primary purpose is to watch and observe and be a deterrant.
- Citizen complaints can be made to the company as well as to the city.
This answers a few of the questions we had about this measure, but certainly not all.
Top photo from City of Champaign Facebook page.