“The cameras give us an extra set of eyes, allowing us to respond as situations develop rather than waiting for someone to call us,” said Gaithersburg Police Captain Chris Bonvillain. “I’m happy to report that even before the installation of cameras, we have seen a decrease in crime in Olde Towne and throughout the city. With the use of these surveillance cameras, which may include some behavioral analytic capabilities, we hope to demonstrate that we can even more efficiently monitor incidents and prevent them from escalating.”

The city received a $117,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Justice for the pilot program. The cameras will be able to pan, tilt and zoom, and may be relocated. Video will be recorded to a secure server for storage and retrieval. Bonvillain said he hopes to have cameras in place by fall.

According to Gaithersburg Police Department statistics, robberies and burglaries remain about the same when comparing January to June of 2009 to the same months in 2010. Robberies during the six-month period in 2009 stood at 33 while 32 were committed during the same period this year.

In the first six months of 2009, 87 burglaries were reported while 93 were reported so far this year.

Police statistics show that 10 of the robberies this year and 41 of the burglaries occurred along the Seneca beat, which includes the area west of I-270. Twenty-two of this year’s robberies and 52 of the burglaries occurred along the Frederick beat, which includes Olde Towne and the area east of I-270.

Contrary to media reports, Bonvillain said the cameras are not targeted at gang activity in Olde Towne.

“The location of Olde Towne was not picked due to gangs. This is an opportunity for our department to be ahead of the curve,” he said.

Gaithersburg Police Detective Patrick Word, Gaithersburg’s gang expert, said the community has five active gangs and related subsets, with about 150 to 200 active gang members in the area.

“That number has not really changed in the last five years or so,” Word said.

The active gangs here are mostly neighborhood or culturally based including African American gangs, Bloods and Crips, and Hispanic gangs such as 18th Street, MS-13 and Latin Kings.

Contact with gang members has actually dropped from 2007 to 2009. In 2007, police contact with gangs accounted for about one in seven of Gaithersburg police total documented contacts with citizens. Contact is defined as any paper contact such as a gang member who is a suspect in a crime, witness to a crime, victim of a crime, the recipient of a traffic or parking citation, or the participant in a field interview. In 2008 and 2009 those contacts with gang members dropped to one in nine of all of Gaithersburg police total contact with the public or just 12 percent.

Gaithersburg’s leaders are using a three-pronged approach to suppress gang activity, intervene so young people are not tempted to join a gang, and prevent gang infiltration.

In addition to being aggressive with gang crime, Gaithersburg is also working to educate families on how to prevent youth from joining gangs through mentoring programs at local middle and high schools.