This school year, HCISD has set up a security camera monitoring center as an additional layer of safety and security.
“Every campus throughout the district has both internal cameras as well as external cameras,” Director of Emergency Management and School Safety Danny Castillo said. “The focus of the center is to provide a 360-surveillance monitoring of our campuses.”
Security guards at the center have real-time surveillance and the ability to switch their camera monitoring.
The surveillance at the center is intended to work with all other layers of security in place, including security staff at each campus.
“They have communication with all of our security teams assigned throughout the district as well as campus administrators at each and every campus,” Castillo said. “In the event they observe some behavior or some activity that needs to be investigated, they have that ability to contact and have that real-time communication with staff that is on the ground there on the campus.”
Castillo emphasized the importance of having multiple layers of security and continuing to develop a culture of safety throughout the district and the community.
“We cannot be completely dependent on technology,” Castillo said. “We encourage parents and community members that if they see something, say something. Communicate anything that feels or looks suspicious or out of place at any of our campuses. When they report it to us, that is just another layer that is spread throughout our entire community and provides us much more of a manner by which we can ensure the safety of our campuses.”
