MYRTLE BEACH, SC (WBTW)- The City of Myrtle Beach installed new license plate readers and city cameras, but this comes as one South Carolina law maker wants to restrict how police store and use the data collected.

License plate readers are at the entrance and exits to the city. If you drive pass one, it gets information like your tag number, date, time, and GPS location of the reader.

Myrtle Beach police have more eyes on the city. Now, they have nearly 900 surveillance cameras. They used federal grant money to get eight new license plate readers, bringing the total LPRs to 37 which cost about $70,000. 

“It alerts us when a stolen vehicle or something that’s of interest comes to the city. We dispatch an officer to that location and they immediately start looking for it,” said Captain John Bertang with Myrtle Beach Police Department.

Representative Todd Rutherford of Columbia, wants to regulate license plate readers. SLED said agencies keep data for three years. The proposed legislation would limit the storing of license plate data to 90 days and would ban state and local police agencies from selling or trading the data. 

Myrtle Beach Police credit the technology to helping lower their crime rate. License plate readers helped catch shooting suspect Brittany Mullinax in May of 2018.

“It’s another piece of the puzzle. It’s not the solution, but it’s another thing that helps keep the citizens and visitors safe and secure,” said Cpt. Bertang.

The proposed bill said the data must be kept if it’s part of an ongoing investigation, but must be destroyed if the investigation does not result in criminal charges.

Solicitor Jimmy Richardson said if data from a license plate reader is a part of evidence, it could be added to evidence.com where agencies already send body cam and dash footage. It’s kept there until the case is disposed, plus seven years for violent cases.

Myrtle beach police said they make sure they’re in compliance with any state and federal legislation.
The new license plate readers were put up on Farrow Parkway and the Highway 17 Bypass.