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Municipality of San Juan integrates AI into police operations

The island’s capital invested $119,000 in advanced surveillance technology.

The San Juan Municipal government announced it has integrated artificial intelligence (AI) into its police operations to combat vehicle theft and other crimes in Puerto Rico’s capital.

At a press conference at the San Juan Municipal Police Operations Center, San Juan Mayor Miguel Romero-Lugo said that through an agreement between the Municipality of San Juan and the central government’s Department of Public Safety (DSP), the goal is to improve public safety and the efficiency of police operations with the use of advanced technology that interconnects electronic monitoring on the main access roads to San Juan.

The municipality invested $119,000 for software that integrates AI to use with the security camera system owned by the central government, Romero-Lugo explained. Another $122,000 has been allocated to hire and pay six auxiliary police agents, which the mayor said will be a recurring expense.

“This collaboration and teamwork with the Department of Public Safety is a significant advance in our effort to maximize the most advanced technology available to provide surveillance and as a tool against vehicle theft and other related crimes,” said Romero-Lugo, listing human trafficking, robberies and aggressions on the list of incidents to be monitored.

“The implementation of artificial intelligence in our surveillance systems not only increases our response capacity but also promotes greater security for all residents of San Juan,” he said.

“AI applied to vehicle license plate recognition systems allows for fast and accurate identification of vehicles in real time,” he added. “These systems use cameras and optical character recognition software to capture images of license plates, convert them into digital text and compare them with databases of vehicles of interest; in addition, they can take photographs of vehicles of interest with a resolution of up to 8 megapixels.”

“This automated process, which only takes milliseconds, helps our municipal police identify and track stolen cars, vehicles involved in criminal activities, or those related to wanted individuals,” Romero-Lugo said.

The license plate reading cameras and the alerts generated are monitored from the operations center by assigned personnel, made up of six municipal police officers, and complement the 327 body cameras that the administration has acquired. Of these, 127 will be assigned to the new police officers who are about to graduate, the mayor said.

“These systems allow police to receive immediate alerts when a vehicle of interest is detected, significantly reducing response times and increasing police intervention capacity. In addition, these technologies can operate under challenging conditions, such as low lighting and adverse weather conditions, ensuring their functionality in different scenarios,” he said.

AI surveillance has been incorporated on the following nine roads in San Juan: Marina Street in Old San Juan; Kennedy Avenue to Bayamón; at the intersection of Ponce de León Avenue and Canals Street; intersection of PR-22 with PR-18 to Caguas; PR-26 to San Juan in the Minillas Tunnel; the marginal of PR-26 in the area of the Placita de Santurce; on the exit of PR-26 at the Minillas Tunnel toward Carolina; PR-52 from San Juan to Caguas; and Luis Muñoz Rivera Avenue.

Romero-Lugo said the municipality will consider expanding the use of technology to other operational areas.

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