The red and gold graffiti streaked 40 feet across the window and 60 feet down the face of the building — the third time Mayor John Linn’s business was vandalized. If the colors were any indication, the same person or gang had struck each time.
Linn said he hopes a grant received by the Lompoc Police Department to install mobile cameras in high-crime neighborhoods in October will reduce the amount of graffiti and other illegal activity in those neighborhoods.
Cameras are widely used in large cities, and the use of mobile cameras, approved by the Lompoc City Council, will make this one of the few “small” cities — the first city in Santa Barbara County — to relay a live-feed to the Lompoc Police Department, said Capt. Larry Ralston.
Funds from the $400,000 Community Oriented Policing Services technology grant received in 2009 have also allowed for the installation of surveillance cameras in police patrol cars.
Police eventually caught the juvenile who vandalized Linn’s property, but by then he
had already committed numerous similar acts on other property, the mayor said.
“If we had a camera in one location to catch him in the act, then we would have stopped him at the beginning of the road instead of four months later,” Linn said.
The surveillance cameras produced by Phoenix-based company RoboVu will provide an extra pair of eyes for police to watch over high-crime neighborhoods.
Police will be able to use the cameras, which can pan, tilt and zoom in on activity, to capture the images of suspected criminals, Ralston said.
Eight mobile cameras will be placed in undisclosed locations and two fixed cameras will be placed at the intersections of H Street and Ocean and H Street and Central Avenue, Ralston said.
“Crime in our worst areas will get reduced once word gets out that these cameras are out,” he said.
RoboVu founder Ed Foster said his line of products have been put to use in nearly 100 cities across the United States. The cameras allow police officers to skip costly jury sessions and convict criminals quickly with indisputable camera images, he said.
During budget-stretched times, Foster said, the cameras are a cost-effective way to prevent crime.
“You can hire more cops, which is hard to do with the budget,” Foster said. “Or you can put these cameras up.”
Ralston said the traffic cameras set up on H Street will provide a live feed that residents can view through the city’s website.
The cameras will also be used there to monitor incoming and outgoing traffic, Ralston said.
Ralston said the cameras would not be a step toward one day implementing red-light traffic cameras.
He would not reveal the location of the other eight cameras, which will be used in areas known to have gang activity, graffiti and other crimes, he said.
Ralston said cameras will not be used to pry into the lives of residents, which is illegal.
In one year, the city will submit a report to the City Council on progress.
Linn said his support of the cameras came because he was tired of seeing public property damaged.
“It’s just a hoodlum out to deface public and private property,” Linn said. “Enough is enough.”
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