During a panel on Tuesday, D.C. Police Chief Pamela Smith asked small business owners to allow police access to their cameras to help stop crime.
On Tuesday, D.C. Police Chief Pamela Smith joined Peter Kilpatrick, president of Catholic University, at the 2024 Potomac Conference on Public Safety.
As Kilpatrick finished his thoughts, Smith turned to the panel moderator, Elliot Ferguson, president and CEO of Destination DC. He immediately shook his head, understanding that the top D.C. police officer had one last thing to say.
“I just want to add one thing. I work in a private industry business environment,” Smith said. “One of the things we launched with Real Time Crime Center is the ability to connect your cameras.”
The theme of the panel discussion was “Collaboration for Success: Strategies, Resources, and Building Trust,” and was a collaboration between the Board of Trade, the Council of Governments, the Greater Washington Partnership, and the Consortium of Universities.
During the roughly 40-minute conversation, Smith and Metro Transit Chief Michael Anzallo talked about how crime rates have dropped over the course of this calendar year.
Smith said that, to date, the Metropolitan Police Department has nearly 40,000 cameras connected to the Real Time Crime Center through CameraConnect DC.
“We are asking you, your partners, your businesses, to connect your cameras to our Real Time Crime Center,” Smith said. “If you have a business, a grocery store, we would love to use your cameras.”
Afterward, Smith spoke to WTOP and delivered another appeal to business owners.
“Please, please, please, allow the Metropolitan Police Department to have access to those cameras,” Smith said. “It helps us move into those areas more quickly and make proper arrests of the people who are causing chaos in our city.”
Smith also spoke about the decrease in crime that has occurred in the District since January.
“We’ve had a 30% drop in violent crime, a 31% drop in robberies. We’ve seen a very, very good 47% drop in auto thefts,” Smith said. “We know we still have work to do, but we have to keep going.”
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