At last Thursday’s Board of Education meeting, the Westbury board accepted a proposal from BOCES to provide video monitoring services, an effort that the district hopes will help increase security and prevent further break-ins.
“Unfortunately because of the times we live in, we need the added protection to safeguard our property,” said Superintedent Mary Lagnado.
BOCES will provide monitoring at the district schools and administrative complex for the 2014-15 school year for an estimated $48,315.
The district will continue to hire Summit Security Services Inc., to provide mobile security on evenings and weekends. The company is hired on a month-to-month basis and employees are paid $20.68 per hour.
The BOCES Command Center in Westbury provides round-the-clock monitoring and security by tapping into a school district’s existing camera system. Operators watch several screens in the room, which bring up live feed. Operators are not looking at video from all the participating schools at one time; instead video only comes up on the screens when an event happens. These events include doors opening, people in restricted areas, or fire/panic alarms going off.
The operator is to use pre-defined responses based on the situation. For example, if a panic button is pushed, a script will come up prompting the operator to contact the police, and providing phone numbers of the superintendent and other personnel. Scripts were negotiated with the police department to ensure the best response was executed for each potential scenario.
“It’s not about what they see, it’s about how they respond. This is an event driven system. As an event occurs, they respond to the event. It’s not about watching a hundred cameras, it’s more effective having the system telling you when something is triggered and go exploring why it occurred and get deep into it. By centralizing our response, a script pops up and they have a step by step checklist,” said Nassau BOCES District Superintendent Tom Rogers when the center opened in April 2013.
The security command center also partners with the Nassau County Police Department. During an emergency, officers will be able to receive real time video and see exactly what is going on in the school and where. They can see video and have access to the floor plans not only at the command center, but also en route to the school, using iPads or their mobile devices.
