LYNCHBURG, Va. – Lynchburg Police are asking the public to help them combat violence in the city through a new initiative using security cameras.
“Hill City Connect” is a new program powered by FUSUS which uses residential and business security cameras that people voluntarily register to use.
“We want to reduce crime, especially violent crime in our city. This actually helps us be able to do that but it’s more than just that. In other cities around the world this has helped to find missing persons, endangered persons and people with Alzheimer’s,” Lt. Craig Dowdy said.
By visiting the Hill City Connect website, people are able to register their cameras or integrate them. Registering puts all the cameras registered on a map. Integrating allows police to have live views from the cameras part of the system.
“We can then find out who the owner of that is quicker and be able to call them to be able to get permission to access that camera to actually investigate the crime,” Dowdy said. “They get to tell us how to actually use their camera systems and when to actually use their camera systems.”
The police department used $250,000 in grant money to implement a two-year agreement with FUSUS.
The program is used in more than 200 cities nationwide and has a proven track record of helping departments close cases.
“Other jurisdictions have seen an increase in their clearance rates in their homicides. One city in particular had an 82% clearance rate on their homicides when the national average is 52%...just by using this system,” Dowdy said.
People wishing to integrate the cameras will have an extra cost associated as they will need to purchase equipment from FUSUS. It costs nothing for people to just register their cameras in order for them to be on the overall map.