Earlier this week, Mayor LaToya Cantrell and other city marked the first anniversary of the City’s Real-Time Crime Center (RTCC) by touting the success and growth of the crime-fighting initiative.
“We have seen the center, in real time, prevent crimes from happening. We’ve seen — in real time — how it’s allowed us to solve and clear cases,” Mayor Cantrell says. “This is a holistic approach to improving the overall quality of life in the City of New Orleans. We’ve only scratched the surface.”
The New Orleans Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness (NOHSEP) operates the 24/7 Real-Time Crime Center (RTCC), which uses technology to provide critical information to first responders in the field and to assist with investigations of criminal activity or quality of life concerns. Opened in November 2017, the RTCC is a state-of-the-art facility modeled after best practices in public safety monitoring across the globe.
Since November 2017, the Center’s staff has grown from six to 18. In 2017, the city installed Installed 260 public safety cameras this year, bringing the total number of City-owned public safety camera feeds to over 340. Meanwhile, the RTCC has fielded more than 2,300 requests for assistance, providing relevant footage for 70 percent of them.
The RTCC has saved an estimated 2,000 manpower hours in the New Orleans Police Department, allowing officers to devote more time to community policing and building better cases.