BROOKVILLE — The police department has initiated its home and business security camera program and the police chief is encouraging business owners and residents to be participants in the program.

“I’m excited about this because we’ve wanted to do this for probably the last two years, but we didn’t know how we were going to pull it off,” police chief Doug Jerome said.

Jerome said he has been searching for a computer software program that would allow the department to list all the residents and businesses who had outdoor cameras.

Jerome said, however, every program that was found cost anywhere from $5,000-$15,000.

Jerome said what he didn’t know and was surprised to learn is the city already had such a program that would allow his department to list homes and businesses with outdoor cameras.

“We have an awesome program I didn’t know we had,” Jerome said, adding the city purchased the program about two years ago.

Jerome said he learned of the program from the city’s front office staff.

“I learned that the program lists where every water shut-off and every fire hydrant is located in the city,” Jerome said.

Upon learning that fact, Jerome asked if it was possible to create a similar database that lists all the outdoor cameras in the city.

Jerome said he happily learned the answer was yes.

“The staff showed me a drop-down window that allows you to add cameras. With this program you can place an icon of a camera on the house and business which will allow us to know every house and business in the city with cameras that register with us,” Jerome said.

With the ability to establish a database, Jerome and his officers set up the home and business security camera program.

Using the department’s website and Facebook page, residents and business owners with outdoor cameras can voluntarily register and provide this information.

“To register, we are simply asking people to follow what we have on the website and our Facebook page,” Jerome said.

“Scan the QR code to register. Tell us who you are, who we can contact with a main telephone number and a secondary telephone number. Let us know that you have cameras on your house and how many cameras you have,” Jerome said.

Jerome indicated the information will be stored in the department’s database.

Jerome gave a hypothetical example of how the program will work.

“Let’s say we have a crime that happened on Arlington Road and the criminal drives down Arlington Road. Through this program, we know we have six houses and three businesses that have cameras,” Jerome said.

“We’ll simply going to call those people first and ask them to check their cameras and if they have footage of the crime, we will ask them to please email the footage to us,” Jerome continued.

Jerome said if a resident or business owner doesn’t know how to supply the police department with the video footage, the department will provide assistance.

“We can also provide you with a flash drive to place the footage on it. We can do anything you need us to do to obtain the video because that footage could solve that crime,” Jerome said.

Jerome stressed the department will not have access to any resident’s or business owner’s outdoor camera(s).

Jerome said the purpose of the outdoor camera database is the ability to solve a crime as quickly as possible.

“I will tell you that it is seconds, minutes and hours that matter when it comes to resolving an incident or a crime,’ Jerome said.

“We want to plan the best route we can to stop and even prevent some of these crimes,”Jerome continued.

To register using the police department’s website, go to brookvilleohio.com/330/Police and click on “forms and applications.” Click on the “Home/business security camera” link and follow the instructions.

Anyone wanting to register their outdoor camera(s) in person or wanting additional information, may call the police department at (937) 833-2001.

Reach Terry Baver at [email protected].