Bacolod City – Bacolod City Police Office (BCPO) Director PCol. Joeresty Coronica urged business owners and establishments within Bacolod City, particularly in crowded areas, to install closed-circuit televisions (CCTVs), inside and outside their premises, for security purposes.
The request follows the recent gun attack along Bonifacio Street at the city’s central market, where during the police investigation, they discovered that most of the CCTVs located in the area, owned by the government and private establishments, were out of order.
With the discovery, Coronica coordinated with the city government to ensure that every establishment in the area must comply with the existing city ordinance which mandates that all establishments must have CCTV.
“We have been encouraging our business owners and establishments to install CCTV cameras in their premises. These cameras should not only be facing inside their premises but also their immediate vicinity,” he said.
“In these modern times, if we can get more CCTV footage, we can fast track our investigation and the identification of our suspects,” he further said, citing that the more establishments can provide footage, the faster investigations can be.
City Legal Office head Atty. Karol Joseph Chiu admitted that more than a hundred of the government-owned CCTVs in the downtown area are malfunctioning, while some are broken.
The city is currently in the process of repairing those cameras, particularly along the main streets, while they are already implementing the strict compliance of commercial establishments to the ordinance which requires them to install CCTVs.
“The city had allocated P2 million to repair those cameras,” he said.
Furthermore, Bacolod City Mayor Greg Gasataya revealed that some of the businesses in the area had already installed CCTVs, however, some vandals are destroying it.
“It is not necessary that we will not give them permits, because some have abided by the mandate, but they told us that some persons are destroying their cameras,” he said.
Gasataya added that he will meet with the business owners again to discuss the matter of the presence of the BCPO, to assist in the proper direction that installed CCTV must face.
“We ensure that all these CCTVs [government-owned] will be repaired,” Gasataya vowed.* (Richard Caballero Jr. via tvds)