Video Surveillance Opportunities in Crime Prevention Grow as Budgets Shrink

Video surveillance is on the rise, and not just for private businesses and major urban areas: It’s a growing portion of FY2012 security’s $300 million spending budget across state and local jurisdictions of all sizes.
According to Joanna Salini, research analyst for the Deltek Justice/Public Safety team, that trend is expected to grow, driven by factors such as other jurisdictions’ success in implementing video surveillance, localized crime trends and general budget pressures. See more detail in her full blog entry, “Video surveillance: Supplementing boots on the ground,” and her video summary below:

Video Surveillance: Factors for GrowthAccording to Salini, the use of video surveillance from closed-circuit television camera (CCTV) networks is on the rise in larger jurisdictions, because of (perhaps counter-intuitively) cuts in law enforcement budgets. Video surveillance is seen as a highly cost-effective strategy for police agencies, since law enforcement’s traditional solution to neighborhood crime — more patrol officers in the vicinity — simply isn’t possible due to a decrease in overall budgets.
Larger urban areas such as Baltimore, Chicago, Houston and New York City are already seeing successes using the technology in their crime prevention efforts, and Salini expects that smaller jurisdictions will follow suit.

Advice for VendorsVendors looking for opportunities in video surveillance solutions need to be aware of general controversies and regional laws and regulations surrounding the use of video surveillance. Furthermore, vendors should be aware of relevant grant opportunities, and should work with agencies to apply for them.
Finally, vendors must also be aware of the business needs of jurisdictions and law enforcement agencies, in order to better understand how to market their solutions, with the understanding that successes in implementing video surveillance networks solutions will likely lead to further opportunities.