troublemakers out tonight

No - the company we had was not as visible as we would have liked so that was part of our reason for switching. New Horizon are very visible and their cars are easily spotted. As I know in my ride arounds we have hit every single street in Broadlands at least once

Staci

 

I saw him driving down our street a couple of weeks ago. The day after several cars had items stolen from them.

 

We are limited by a couple of factors. Primarily, Virginia is a Dillon Rule state. This means you can only do what you are expressly authorized to do. For example, even towns/counties could not have curfews unless the state legislature gives them that specific authority. Unless the state legislature amends the code to include HOA's, we cannot do it.

Secondly, our HOA documents do not have any provision that allows the HOA to create this kind of authority.

 

Ok. Good to know the name of the company so if I do see them I will know who it is and what they are doing.

 

I was at the pool this morning and talked with the manager on duty who told me that they are pulling chairs out of the deep end on a regular basis THIS summer. And they pulled out some other stuff last week as well which was not just chairs.

I'll admit that I thought this stuff stopped becasue I hadn't heard it was still going on - obviously, I was misinformed. Is the security company actually stopping any of this?

 

Wow, brings back memories - my life as a lifeguard 25 yrs ago. I remember our asst. pool manager used to sleep in the guardhouse on a number of nights because of the same kind of overnight idiocy.

 

Wouldn't it be relatively cheap and easy to set up a couple of cameras with good night vision capability? Aim a couple out toward the pool, and another one or two toward the parking lot if they arrive by car (to get a shot of the make and model of the vehicle).

 

Any news on anything going on last night/this morning? I heard someone at 3:30 am driving up our street with the music thumping quite loudly.

 

Kids do not have a monopoly on that activity!

 

Video cameras are extremely effective when properly monitored, i.e. not by human beings who cannot do the job well. Take a look at this company:

http://www.myarcherfish.com/

I should disclose that I do not work for them or with them, technically they are a competitor of mine, although my company does much larger, high-end systems. This is a pretty good product for the money, and it could make those mobile patrols directed responders rather than have them drive around hoping they catch someone.

 

The directed response idea makes sense, I'm just not sure cameras are the way to do it. They had the same pool problem also in Fairfax, they had cameras which did provide nice footage for the evening news.

Archerfish is a subscription (see below). I don't understand the benefit of software detection versus true motion detectors for this application.

The system on the Costco website mentions "homeland security video technology" which makes for good ad copy but for the system shown appears to use low resolution recording and pretty basic cameras.

If we're just trying to notify the patrol, we don't need cameras at all. Honeywell makes numerous sensors that are quite good. Panasonic makes a low end camera that emails notifications and low res footage on contact closure. There are numerous ways to do email or text message notification from contact closure.

From the Costco website:

*You must choose one of two Archerfish SmartPortal subscription options for your Archerfish device. The free Basic Subscription provides remote system operation, including live video and DVR viewing. The Premium Subscription* provides full SmartPortal functionality, including intelligent alerts and mobile notifications. You will receive an automatic free Premium Subscription upgrade for 3 months after you register your first Archerfish device. After the trial period, you may choose to continue with either subscription option.

 

I think the answer that many others have alluded to is to go after the perps once they've been caught. Charges need to be pressed. The HOA needs to go after then to recoup some of the cost of having the patrols (ie. Responding to vandalism is $500, etc.). Finally, any affected homeowner of vandalism also goes after them to make things right. There is no reason why a trashed mailbox couldn't cost the perp $1,000 plus whatever the court wants to give to them. Breaking into a car could easily be more.... I had a neighbor who's kid went crazy and destroyed about $1,500 in one night. Time everything settled out it costs his parents $6900 and the son was on probation. Seems a lesson was learned as NOTHING ever happened again.....

 

I work for an electronic security company that does everthing from standard cameras to 16 Megapixel IP cameras. Cameras are good in several circumstances - when they are monitored 24x7, or when used for post incident analysis. Sincethe first option is out, the camera do provide evidence, and if the quality is good enough, identification of the suspects and the crime.

I would think that cameras could be sucessful for HOA owned property like the community center and the pools, but there is a price to pay for quality gear that actually works.

If the HOA is going to go down this route, please let me know and we can work a great price on some professional equipment.

That said, a police or security presence cannot be beat, but to make it effective, there needs to be legal action after the fact, or the whole effort will never be a deterrent.

Personally, I have no issue throwing the book at someone for vandalism, or other crimes.

 

"I don't understand the benefit of software detection versus true motion detectors for this application. "

CBP had high-end "true motion detectors" deployed at all of the Northern ports of entry for the border. These kicked-in when the border closed for the day. they finally switched them off after the monitoring operators logged 6,000 false alarms in a single night... All those sensors were replaced by video-based analytics.

To even the most well-configured outdoor motion sensors the whole world is moving. Object-based video analytics is designed to mitigate those issues by separating the moving objects in the foreground of a video image from the background, which will not static, is unimportant.

Analytics can allow a small number of humans to monitor huge camera populations efficiently and effectively. Remember that next time you go into Walmart, or Target, or Best Buy, or Bloomingdales, or pretty-much any airport, casino, USAF or USMC base, or particularly if you ever visit Fort Bragg....

Archerfish is an attempt to bundle some of the "homeland security" style capabilities for consumer consumption. Vitamin D (http://www.vitamindinc.com/) is another. None of these guys have ALL of the bells and whistles that the DoD or high-end commercial people have, but they do have enough to provide reliable, real-time direction of responders, giving them a description of what is occurring, where it is happening, and an image of who they are looking for.

This 2c is sponsored by your Federal tax dollars!

 

How are you distinguishing "software" detection from "true" motion detection? By software detection do you mean background subtraction?

 

A little more than just background subtraction.

This link helps a little:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_tracking

This one too, although it's old now:

http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~vsam/

I'm talking about object-based identification, categorization, and tracking systems, utilizing both behavioral (e.g. size, shape, speed, trajectory) and temporal prescribed rules to generate events.

I should also declare; I am not a Phd, nor have I played one on TV, so I'm trying to keep the conversation at a shallow-enough level that I don;t mislead anyone!!

 

That's OK, I'm wrapping up my PhD in computer vision, you won't mislead me.

Who put together the algorithms for you?

 

I'm afraid I can't share that.

I didn't want to get into what I do for a living, I just wanted to share some insight of what is now available at the commercial end of the market where it could help out the HOA, or even homeowners if they feel they need something a little weightier than traditional security technology.

Congratulations on your choice of Phd. Since I became involved with the industry in 2003 it's been really fun to work with all the '50lb brains' that are working in this sector. It taxes my '2lb brain' no-end to converse with you guys, but I appreciate the work you all do!

 

Whoa...$6,900??? Damn..that is NUTS that the kid did that. I guess his parents got the shaft from their OWN son! Nice! Less $$$ for college or other stuff for him!