Agenda item

To receive an update on the situation of the CCTV in Salisbury.

Officer: Tracy Carter, Associate Director for Waste and Environment.

Associate Director Tracy Carter gave an update to the Board on the current situation of CCTV coverage for Salisbury, Wilton and Amesbury.

Background

The current system was unsustainable and reaching the end of its lifespan. Revenue budgets for staffing and maintenance contracts were withdrawn for 2015-16. Wiltshire Council members agreed to invest £0.5m of capital in providing a new system.

Other CCTV networks across the county were provided and run by town and parish councils with cameras monitored by volunteers. Wiltshire Council wants to move CCTV from its current location of Pennyfarthing House.

Progress

Meetings have been held with Salisbury City Council, Salisbury BID, Wiltshire Police, Amesbury Town Council and Wilton Town Council. The priorities were the night time economy and purple flag for Salisbury.

Flexibility was required to provide solutions for Amesbury and Wilton and for the BID to expand the system in Salisbury.

Access would be required to a record and retrieve system and parties would be keen to retain a control room which could be staffed to allow monitoring. The new control room would be in Wiltshire Council offices at Bourne Hill giving police 24 hour per day access.

Technical survey has been carried out to check feasibility of a wireless system and the aim was to minimise the cost of running the system.

Existing System

Wiltshire Council had terminated the contracts for CCTV monitoring and for maintenance of the system. The system had been operated since then by Wiltshire Council as a record and retrieve service and access had been provided to the police and over 35 officers had been trained by Wiltshire Council to use the system.

BT lines had been mapped to see if any could be turned off before the new system was ready. During the transition no city centre cameras would be switched off. The existing control room would remain at Pennyfarthing House until the new system was in place.

Cameras in Amesbury and Wilton would continue to function until new solution had been agreed with the town councils.

The BID had employed two staff as volunteer co-ordinators and trained a number of volunteers to operate the system. Wiltshire Council was working with the BID to provide access to the system.

New System

Specification had been drafted and key parties would be consulted. Once agreed, the procurement process would commence. Options would be priced for solutions for Amesbury and Wilton town councils.

Once procured the new system would be transferred to Salisbury City Council as part of a wider agreement on the transfer of assets and services.

The Chairman noted that there had been several different accounts of the situation circulated through the media during the summer and meetings had taken place with SCC to discuss the future of CCTV in Salisbury, however the Board had not been invited to be a part of any discussions or consulted.

Questions and comments were then received, these included:

• Would the definition and quality of the recording be improved? Answer: Yes, the new digital technology available would provide a far clearer picture.
• Who provides the training for the volunteers? Answer: WC had been working with Steve Godwin from BID to make sure the right training system was in place. SIA licensed staff provided the training for volunteers. Feedback was awaited on whether the volunteers needed to be licensed. Volunteers were accompanied by a SIA licensed operative for a month. The current role of the data controller remained with WC, but we are investigating whether this could transfer over to the BID in due course.

Inspector Minty added that the Police work closely with CCTV and volunteers would have access to Police radios, which meant that anyone involved would have to have Police clearance.