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Law Enforcement
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Deterring trouble in paradise
West Palm Beach installs video surveillance system
Feb 14, 2008
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by Mark J. Pescatore
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Florida's Treasure Coast may look like a subtropical slice of heaven in the brochures, but law enforcement officials still need to deal with criminal activity. The West Palm Beach Police Department recently deployed a video surveillance system in an effort to acquire evidence and, hopefully, deter crime.
Michael Cambisios, communications manager, West Palm Beach Telecommunications Services & Public Safety Information Technology, said the video surveillance system is primarily used for investigative and evidentiary purposes, so it's not monitored 24/7. However, the video is tied into the police department's dispatch, so relevant images can be accessed when a call is received. Plus, a 52-inch LCD monitor is housed in dispatch for dedicated monitoring of the surveillance cameras using ZView software from Tridenttek, and a second 52-inch LCD is located in a community services room at headquarters so it can be monitored by volunteers.
"It really helps the police force be in more places," said Rich Montalvo from Security 101, a security solutions dealer and integrator with offices in six states that's working with West Palm Beach on the system. Beyond an expanded presence, he said the system also helps officers assess incidents, so the department can allocate the proper resources when responding to a call and make better decisions about a situation. Security 101 has also helped the nearby Fort Lauderdale Police Department and Sunrise Police Department with video surveillance systems that use much of the same equipment in portable applications.
The West Palm Beach network currently supports 13 cameras in locations across the city that warrant additional police presence. While two cameras are attached to a hospital and a church in the downtown area, the other 11 are mounted on poles. The JVC VN-C655U network dome cameras in use record in M-JPEG and offer day/night operation, 25x optical zoom, and PTZ capability.
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| Michael Camisios (seated) from the city of West Palm Beach and Rich Montalvo from Security 101 monitor cameras using a 52-inch LCD monitor that's housed in the police department's dispatch area. |
Custom weatherproof housings with Videolarm vandal-proof domes are adorned with a police decal on the outside and Kevlar on the inside. (Yes, one has already taken a bullet since installation began in late 2007.) The sealed housings are also equipped with a thermostat and fan to maintain climate control in the hot and humid South Florida climate.
Each camera site is equipped with a FireTide dual-radio HotPoint 6000 wireless mesh node for transmitting data, plus a FireTide HotPoint 4000 wireless access point (WAP). As a result, each camera location is a "hotspot" where officers can drive up and see the entire video network and control the cameras using their vehicle's authorized laptop.
"The mesh is going to be utilized a lot more," said Montalvo. "It's robust enough to handle growth now and in the close future." Good thing -- the city is already planning to add more cameras to the network.
According to West Palm Beach Police Chief Delsa Bush, the city has already been approached by private entities that want to add surveillance cameras. "I'm thrilled," she told Government Video. "Just people knowing the city is being monitored has been a great help."
In addition, last month [JANUARY] West Palm Beach mayor Lois Frankel announced a new "CityCam" initiative that will allow businesses to purchase surveillance cameras that will be connected to the police surveillance video network. The city expects to make grants available to help with equipment costs.
At first, the system used a 45 Mbps broadband wireless backhaul from Trango, similar to the Fort Lauderdale system, but West Palm Beach has moved to fiber from the towers to downtown police headquarters. Camera feeds are recorded on a Dell server with about 15 TB of direct attached storage (DAS). The network is designed to support 100 cameras recording at 30 fps at full resolution. According to Cambisios, so far the city has spent close to $400,000 on the system, including installation.
MORE INFO
Dell dell.com
FireTide firetide.com
JVC jvc.com/pro
Security 101 security101.com
Trango trangobroadband.com
Trident Tek tridenttek.com
Videolarm videolarm.com
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