REQUEST FOR CITY COUNCIL ACTION
DATE: 08/02/2023
TO: Honorable Mayor and City Council Members
FROM: Police Department & Information Technology Department
SUBJECT:
Title
AWARD OF CONTRACT TO CONVERGINT TECHNOLOGIES FOR PURCHASING, INSTALLING, AND CONFIGURING POST-INCIDENT VIDEO ANALYTICS SOFTWARE
End
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:
This staff report asks City Council to award the Request for Proposals 23-058RH to Convergint Technologies for BriefCam software to provide Post-Incident Video Analytics to assist the Police Department with criminal investigations and Information Technology and Public Works with Public Records Requests.
RECOMMENDED ACTION:
Recommended action
That the City Council:
a. Award Request for Proposals 23-058RH for the Post-Incident Video Analytics to Convergint Technologies of Placentia, CA, and waive all minor irregularities in the bidding document as submitted by the said bidder.
b. Authorize the City Manager, or his designee, to execute the contract with Convergint Technologies of Placentia, CA, for $216,228 as agreed to in Request for Proposals 23-058RH.
c. Authorize the City Manager, or his designee, to issue a purchase order, with minor changes in the term and conditions, to Convergint Technologies for $216,228 for the Post-Incident Video Analytics software for Fiscal Year 2024 and issue purchase orders not to exceed $25,000 per year for two additional years for the maintenance and support of the video analytics software through June 30, 2026.
d. Authorize the City Manager, or his designee, to negotiate and execute non-substantive extensions, amendments, and change orders up to 10% or $21,622 of the original contract amount as provided by Corona Municipal Code Section 3.08.070(I).
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BACKGROUND & HISTORY:
In June 2019, the Police Department applied for a grant from the State of California Office of Emergency Services through the City of Riverside for the Urban Areas Security Initiative (UASI) Program to fund a video analytics program. The grant application was approved, and the department received a grant award letter for $72,000 in April 2021 to support regional preparedness strategies. Final project approval and authorization to spend the funding was received by the Police Department in April 2022.
The UASI program provides risk-based grants to assist high-threat, high-density areas in preventing, protecting against, mitigating, responding to, and recovering from acts of terrorism and other threats. This program provides grantees the funding to purchase resources designed to be regional assets and shared on a mutual-aid basis. UASI grants improve community resiliency by providing agencies with vital funding needed to access technology and equipment that would otherwise be cost-prohibitive.
With the proliferation of video evidence, the Police Department must often conduct exhaustive searches of raw camera footage from all sources collected as evidence. This manual search requires a significant amount of time and creates considerable room for error. The Corona Police Department has utilized post-incident video analytics from a vendor to conduct an examination of video footage and found the software to provide significant man-hour savings. The software completed a search in less than two hours that took a detective 25 hours to search manually, and it also identified some information that had been overlooked during the manual search.
ANALYSIS:
Due to significant technological advances from the initial grant application, research into technological advances and a new scope of work had to be completed with the Police and Information Technology Departments before a Request for Proposals (RFP) could be issued.
A Request for Proposal (RFP), 23-058RH, was initiated for this Project in March 2023; 15 prospective companies downloaded the bids, and two vendors responded to the RFP and were evaluated.
The evaluation team reviewed the proposals based on the following criteria:
(1) Qualification of Firm
(2) Qualification of Personnel
(3) Project Understanding and Approach
(4) Customer Service/Response Time
The results of the scoring process are summarized as follows:
|
Rank |
Company |
|
1 |
Convergint Technologies |
|
2 |
ADT Commercial LLC |
Based on the proposal scoring analysis, Convergint Technologies possesses the skills and experience necessary to execute the scope of work for the program successfully. Convergint Technologies will work in partnership with BriefCam to specifically design the video analytics software to meet the needs of the Police Department. With this understanding, staff recommends awarding the contract to Convergint Technologies.
In addition to enhancing the investigative capabilities of the Police Department, the use of Convergint’s analytics software will be a regional resource to assist allied agencies during complex, multi-jurisdictional incidents and investigations. This is a critical component of the UASI program.
The Information Technology and Public Works Departments will also find value in the product. These departments handle numerous Public Records Requests from the public requesting security and traffic camera footage from the City. Many of these requests seek footage from multiple cameras. These requests often take between 2-4 hours to complete, but have taken multiple days on occasion. Utilizing BriefCam, these departments will be able to reduce staff time dramatically. This use of video analytics software demonstrates the tremendous capability of this resource.
The City’s camera solution, Genetec, integrates directly with BriefCam, which will save additional time exporting footage from the camera system and importing video into BriefCam for analysis. BriefCam has further capabilities that could be of interest to the City in a Phase 3 deployment providing a real-time observation of the City’s cameras and utilizing artificial intelligence to alert the City of events. These items and the future of the City’s camera network will be discussed in the Fall Workshop.
FINANCIAL IMPACT:
Funding for the one-year video analytic software in the amount of $216,228 is available in the General Fund, $72,000 will be funded through the FY 2020 UASI Grant and the remaining $144,228 will be funded from the Capital Improvement Project No. TC-2014-01, City Unified Camera Project. Future maintenance costs will also be funded through the City Unified Camera Project.
ENVIRONMENTAL ANALYSIS:
This action is exempt pursuant to Section 15061(b)(3) of the Guidelines for the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), which states that a project is exempt from CEQA if the activity is covered by the common sense exemption that CEQA applies only to projects that have the potential for causing a significant effect on the environment. Where it can be seen with certainty that there is no possibility that the activity in question may have a significant effect on the environment, the activity is not subject to CEQA. This action approves the contract of the video analytics software and there is no possibility this will have a significant effect on the environment. Therefore, no environmental analysis is required.
PREPARED BY: JASON MORRIS, LIEUTENANT & KYLE EDGEWORTH, DEPUTY CHIEF INFORMATION OFFICER
REVIEWED BY: ROBERT NEWMAN, CHIEF OF POLICE & CHRIS MCMASTERS, CHIEF INFORMATION OFFICER
Attachments:
1. Exhibit 1 - Convergint Proposal-City of Corona-RFP-No-23-058RH
2. Exhibit 2 - City of Corona Purchase Order Terms and Conditions - Redlined