Richmond official Bill Hobgood gave a “ringing” endorsement to the Automated Secure Alarm Protocol (ASAP) at an ISC West session in Las Vegas, Security Systems News (SSN) reported. Hobgood, project manager for the Department of Information Technology Public Safety Team in Richmond, VA, was speaking about the effectiveness of the protocol, and how it benefits law enforcement by saving time and resources.
We agree. The Central Station Alarm Association (CSAA) has been working closely with local officials over the past several years to help move this process forward. We’re pleased to have been able to provide them support. The goal is a good one: Improve communications from monitoring centers to police departments. By speeding the transmission of these communications, and reducing errors, this helps apprehend more criminals, and reduce unwanted alarms.
According to the story in SSN, Richmond has logged more than 15,000 alarm calls under ASAP with no errors. The protocol has also reduced call processing times to 15 seconds or less, which has led to faster emergency responses. We salute this effort by local officials. It’s been piloted in Houston, TX, and York County, VA, in addition to Richmond.
Vector Security, United Central Control (UCC) and Monitronics have all participated in these pilot projects. We salute these companies as well. We are confident that industry leadership, coupled with commitments from local jurisdictions, will expand this effort in the years ahead.