- April 15, 2024
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The Flagler County Sheriff’s Office and the Town Center Community Development District have announced a private/public partnership enabling the purchase of license plate readers for Town Center. The public/private partnership is valued at over $101,000.
Sheriff Rick Staly has been working on a public/private LPR partnership with Allete Inc. & Douglas Development for one year. Allete and the Town Center CDD will be paying all costs associated with the LPR installations while FCSO will fund the monthly connection costs. Town Center CDD approved funding the project at its CDD Meeting on Friday, May 14, after a presentation by FCSO Sgt. Mike Lagana and a representative of Vigilant Technology. This was the last step needed to move forward with this public/private partnership whereby Allete, Douglas Property & Development and Town Center continue to give ahead to the community and provide law enforcement services for all the citizens of Palm Coast.
“As Town Center continues to attract high wage jobs and residents, we wanted to ensure Palm Coast remains safe for our visitors and residents,” said Jeff Douglas, of Douglas Development. “The Sheriff’s Office has had huge success with LPR’s and we thought this would be a great partnership.”
LPRs are cameras that are either mounted permanently at a location or on mobile trailers. When a car passes by the camera, the device scans the license plate and runs the tag through state and national databases. If the tag matches one that's in the database, the system alerts an analyst and deputies in the field. Deputies can also input tags into the database if they're searching for a vehicle.
Utilizing LPR technology allows for proactive policing, apprehension of suspects and fugitives, recovery of missing persons and stolen vehicles, and helps prevent crimes before they occur. FCSO began implementing LPR’s in 2018 and in 2020 alone, LPR “hits” resulted in 93 arrests, recovering 51 stolen vehicles, 15 fugitives arrested, 33 stolen tags recovered and 9 missing persons found.
“We appreciate the partnership with Allete, Douglas Development and the Town Center CDD to enhance the safety and security of the Town Center area,” said Staly. “This technology revolutionizes crime-fighting in Flagler County by not only helping solve crimes, recover stolen property and help us locate fugitives, but it also aids in the recovery of missing individuals in the event of an Amber or a Silver Alert. When lives are on the line, every second counts. We’re glad to have another tool to advance our proactive and real-time crime-fighting techniques.”
