“It’s not enough anymore to have video and react. Tis is about being proactive. It’s about how to stop an incident from getting worse, or stopping it from happening.”
—Shawn Enides, Genetec
I
t was an isolated incident that promises to have even more far-reaching effects than it already had. A bus driver was fired in July by Montgomery County Public Schools in Maryland, and faces felony charges after an alleged assault on a student
who receives special education services. Onboard video captured the incident, but concerned parents want more safeguards. Now, Transportation Director Todd Watkins is weighing how to shift his department’s use of video from simply incident review, to a proactive security strategy. Te first step has been to incorporate random video sampling to its safety protocol. “If we see something wrong, we can deal with it immediately. But the bigger picture is that we’re trying to increase the deterrent effect,” he explained. “I liken it to random drug testing. We’d like every driver, student and bus staff to think, ‘I might be viewed on video today.’” Nonetheless, there are still calls from parents to archive video for up to two years. Tat’s no small task. Like the vast majority of districts nationwide, Montgomery County’s bus cameras are con- nected to hard drives that store video until it is overwritten. While the district is accelerating camera installation on all of its 1,350 buses, what comes next remains up in the air. Each bus hard drive holds 2 terabytes of data and maxes out storage capacity every 25 days. Hard drives from 50 buses would have to be pulled every day on a carefully choreographed schedule, in order to archive data for longer periods of time. “Just the staffing needs are
overwhelming. Plus, if we’re going pull hard drives and upload videos overnight, we’re putting at risk enforcement data that has not finished loading yet,” he said. Ten there’s the cost. Storing data for just 90 days would cost an estimated $10 million over the next five years, he claimed. “Te question is, do we get enough bang for the buck?” asked Watkins, who noted most incidents are flagged within the system’s current 25-day capacity. “I think it’s going to be hard to justify the cost, when those same resources are needed in classrooms.”
THE ADVENT OF THE SMART CAMPUS Clint Bryer, K-12 mobile video sales manager at Houston-head-
quartered Safety Vision, and Shawn Enides, transportation business development manager for Montreal-based Genetec, Inc., say there are better solutions to the industry standard of proprietary surveillance systems. Tey contend the open architecture internet protocol, or IP, system promises to integrate transportation departments into overall security networks with revolutionary results. “It’s not enough anymore to have video and react,” Enides said. “Tis is about being proactive. It’s about how to stop an incident from getting worse, or stopping it from happening.” Bryer noted the mobile market has been dominated for decades
by a half-dozen big names. Each sells proprietary equipment, forcing districts into a single, closed system, or worse, a patchwork of systems that don’t interrelate with each other, let alone the video management systems that are inside the school buildings. “Why would a district use more than one video provider—when they can’t communicate with each other?” he asked. An open architecture IP system can be upgraded easily, because
software is the only feature that is changed. (Genetec, the world’s leading manufacturer of surveillance software, has partnered with Safety Vision, but its software could be used with com- patible hardware from other companies.) Enides noted that many major metropolitan areas use Genetec software as they strive to create “smart cities,” with integrated services that are capable of heading off problems and creating greater efficiencies. Looping in K-12 districts to systems used by first responders is a natural fit, he said. “Instead of having a different system that police and fire can’t connect with, it makes sense that police and fire have access to information when they’re walking into a situation,” he said. “It’s not all about
Safety Vision demonstrates how open architecture IP fits total school safety and security needs.
50 School Transportation News • NOVEMBER 2018
security. It’s operational, too. It makes it easier for people to get things done.” He added that smart campuses aren’t far behind, with integrated school buses “to make the system smarter.”
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