In Support of Public Safety Technology

(This letter was written by Brian Culang)
To the Mayor, Village Board, and Public Safety Officials of Scarsdale:

I am writing to express my unequivocal support for the proposed public safety technology system recently outlined by our town leadership.

This issue is deeply personal for my family. In 2017, our home on Berwick Road was the target of a terrifying home invasion. Three men drove to our residence in a stolen car, forcibly entered our home in the middle of the night, and physically confronted members of my family. It was a chaotic, violent, and traumatic event. By some miracle, and a lot of luck, we were able to fend them off. But they fled, disappearing into the night.

What ultimately brought those men to justice was the use of police technology. The Scarsdale Police Department, leveraging license plate readers and coordination with regional law enforcement, tracked the suspects down, arrested them, and successfully prosecuted them. But I believe with every fiber of my being that if the technology currently under consideration had been in place in 2017, this crime would never have occurred in the first place. It would have stopped them before they even entered our neighborhood.

Any system that helps our law enforcement officers do their jobs more effectively, keeps our neighborhoods safe, and prevents crimes before they happen is something I strongly support. The idea that we would hold back tools that could protect our families because of abstract political rhetoric or misplaced ideological concerns is not just unwise—it’s dangerous.

Let me be blunt: there is no good reason to distrust our local leaders on this issue. These are people we elected, who live here, who raise their kids here, and who have a proven track record of keeping our town one of the safest in the country. To conflate this focused, thoughtful proposal with national debates about immigration, surveillance, or privacy is lunacy. This is not Washington. This is Scarsdale. And we are better than that.

There are a lot of smart, accomplished people in this town. Let’s not do something stupid. Let’s not tie the hands of our police or gamble with the safety of our neighbors based on theoretical fears or cable news narratives. Let’s act like the thoughtful, pragmatic community we claim to be.

I urge the Board to move forward with this proposal without delay. I thank our leaders for their courage and clarity on this issue—and I hope the community will rally around them to do the right thing.

Sincerely,

Brian Culang
Scarsdale, NY