Duterte credits Inday Sara for Davao City’s ‘James Bond’ gadgets

BY SILVER C. BALANZA

Mayor Rodrigo Duterte has credited his daughter former Mayor Sara Duterte for the city’s sophisticated state-of-the-art surveillance and monitoring system that helped bring down crime statistics.

In his Gikan sa Masa Para sa Masa television program on ABS/CBN on Sunday, Duterte said the quick solution of the killing of Davao City businessman Ramon “TY” Garcia was largely due to surveillance system which captured on Closed Circuit Television Camera (CCTV) the crucial hours before his dead body was found dumped in Sulop, Davao del Sur 

Duterte said CCTV videos helped police solve the killing in 6 hours, from the time Garcia’s family reported him as missing Friday at around 8:30AM up to the arrest of two suspects at 11:30PM.

Duterte said CCTV footages at the vicinity of Apo Hotel, where Garcia spent hours up to early morning of Friday, June 6, and those taken at the boundary with Davao del Sur, which captured Garcia’s vehicle going south, helped police investigators in solving the crime.

       Duterte admitted that the speedy solution was due to the surveillance gadgets.

We credit, Mayor Inday Sara for this, he said.

 The CCTV at Apo View Hotel is part of the surveillance system of the Public Safety Command Center (PSCC) which monitors vehicular and people traffic; while those taken in the boundary with Davao del Sur could have been captured by CCTV at the vicinity of the checkpoint of the Army anti-terrorist unit  Task Force Davao.

On July 29, 2010, a month into his mayoral stint, Inday Sara officially launched the Public Safety Command Center )PSCC), the nerve center of the  city’s peace and order surveillance and monitoring system.

On June 7, 2013, a month before she would end her mayoral term ( she did not seek reelection in the 2013 polls), Inday Sara launched the P128 million “Intelligent Operations Center” (IOC) that was embedded into the PSCC headquarters in Ecoland.

NERVE CENTER

At the 2010 opening of the PSCC then Mayor Sara Duterte acknowledged that the city having a sophisticated surveillance and monitoring unit was a dream of her father. Mayor Duterte, who was then the sitting vice mayor.

Initially, the PSCC had 17 CCTVs installed in 16 strategic areas. The gadgets served as spy eyes at the entry and exit points to the city, selected populated areas and as an adjunct to the  computerized traffic signalization system.

The CCTVs and its operating system was part of a P704 million contract with Abratique and Associates that included the installation of the traffic signals and training of of personnel of the Traffic Management Center.

The Abratique project in Davao City, using US technology developed by the State of California, was considered as a first in the country.

The PSCC operation was linked up with military, police and fire bureau, Task Force Davao, Central 011 and other government agencies.

Smart City

On June 7, 2013, Mayor Sara Duterte presided over the launch of the Intelligent Operations Center (IOC) at the Public Safety Command Center (PSCC).

“With our improved PSCC, which is now infused with IBM’s IOC technology, we can now shift from responding to critical events to anticipating and preventing them, when and where possible,” she said.

The IOC made the city become a so-called “smarter city,” a term defined by IBM as a city that is able to “leverage information to make better decisions and coordinate resources and processes to operate effectively and anticipate problems to resolve them proactively.”

The P128 million IOC is designed to further enhance the city government’s response involving public safety and security, equipped with hardware and software technologies developed by International Business Machines Corp. (IBM).

IBM Philippines dubbed the IOC as the “first in the world.”

Public safety center is Davao City’s pride

^–SUNSTAR DAVAO, July 29, 2010

DAVAO City Mayor Sara Duterte said the opening of the Public Safety Command Center (PSCC) has added to the city’s pride as one of the country’s mega cities.

Noting that the PSCC is the dream of her father, Vice Mayor Rodrigo Duterte, for the Dabawenyos, Mayor Duterte recognized that the center will highly improve the city’s already renowned peace and order capability.

The PSCC serves as the nerve center for 17 CCTVs installed in 16 strategic areas in the city, covering entry and exit points and populated areas in the downtown areas, and the traffic signalization for the entire city.

The project implementer Abratique and Associates Inc. also noted that the multi-million facility is at par with those in New York and California in the United States, and the best in the country.

Costing at P704 million at its 3rd phase alone, Abratique said this funded the widening of roads, the facilities including 17 CCTVs, the installation, and the needed training of the Traffic Management Center, among others.

“The traffic signal controller was developed by the State of California, State of New York. This became a standard in California as well as in New York and now for the US. This is the first thing in the Philippines, the,” Abratique said.

Law enforcement heads Davao City Police Office (DCPO) Director Rene Aspera and PSCC commander Ret. Col. Verner Monsanto, who also heads Central 911, said the new traffic and monitoring facility would be a great help to crime prevention and faster investigation.

During the PSCC inauguration, PLDT-Smart public affairs head Ramon Isberto headed the turning over of its Weather Monitoring and Flood Alert System which they funded and was developed by the Ateneo de Davao University Engineering and Architecture Division. 

Going hi-tech on public safety, security

MINDANEWS, June 7, 2013 

The P128 million “Intelligent Operations Center” (IOC) designed to further enhance the city government’s response involving public safety and security is now fully operational.

Mayor Sara Duterte led  the launching of the IOC that is equipped with hardware and software technologies developed by International Business Machines Corp. (IBM).

IBM Philippines dubbed the IOC as the “first in the world.”

The IOC, a project that was started almost a year ago, was set up at the third floor of the Public Safety Command Center (PSCC) beside the Davao Central 911 Communication and Emergency Response Center at Daang Patnubay Street, SIR New Matina.

Duterte said the newly-established center integrates all the services and data from the city’s different offices and intends to better manage crime, terrorism, traffic and emergency responses and public safety in the city.

“With our improved PSCC, which is now infused with IBM’s IOC technology, we can now shift from responding to critical events to anticipating and preventing them, when and where possible,” she said.

The IOC made the city become a so-called “smarter city,” a term defined by IBM as a city that is able to “leverage information to make better decisions and coordinate resources and processes to operate effectively and anticipate problems to resolve them proactively.”

The center is integrated with advanced technologies such as multi-channel unified communication, video analytics software and Global Positioning System location tracking. The video analytics software, for instance, helps the PSCC monitor closed circuit television (CCTV) cameras installed around the city.

With the new system, IBM Philippines said in a statement that “the PSCC now has a centralized operations dashboard where agencies can integrate and process information in real time, significantly improving their response time to emergencies.”

The IOC project began on June 26 last year when the city government signed an agreement with IBM Philippines for its establishment.

“Davao City turned to IBM to transform and enhance its public safety capabilities, improve the quality and speed of services delivered by its PSCC, and provide the ability to scale its resources to match the city’s rapid growth,” Mariels Almeda-Winhoffer, president and country general manager of IBM Philippines, said.