IQinVision HD Megapixel Cameras Installed At Texas Department Of Aging And Disability (DADS)

Over 3,200 IQeye H.264 HD megapixel cameras were installed in 336 buildings on the 12 campuses

The Texas Department of Aging and Disability Services (DADS) was established in September 2004 by the Texas Legislature, when it consolidated the Mental retardation services and state school programs of the Department of Mental Health; Community care, nursing facilities, and long term care regulatory services of the Department of Human Services; and Aging services and programs of the Department on Aging. DADS administers long-term service and support for the aging and for persons with cognitive and physical disabilities. DADS houses and provides badly-needed services to more than 2,000 residents in 12 State Supported Living Centers (SSLC). 

The Challenge

The Texas Department of Aging and Disability’s mission is to provide a comprehensive array of aging and disability services, support, and opportunities that can be easily accessed in local communities. In June 2009, to further support the DADS mission, the 81st Texas Legislature passed Senate Bill 643, requiring that video surveillance equipment be installed in all DADS facilities for the purpose of detecting and preventing the exploitation or abuse of residents and clients.

After passage of the legislation, DADS issued a Request for Offer to provide all the “…hardware; software; labor; and materials to install, configure, test and maintain complete turnkey video solutions for video surveillance systems at the 12 SSLCs of the DADS network throughout the state of Texas.

The Solution

The DADS installation, which started in January 2010, utilizes IQinVision HD megapixel cameras, OnSSI Ocularis video management software, Zyxel network switches, and Dell Servers to provide the interactive video-monitoring interface.

The installation comprises more than 3,200 IQeye H.264 HD megapixel cameras installed in 336 buildings on the 12 campuses. The project includes IQeye Alliance-pro and 4-Series dome cameras, and an end-to-end network infrastructure with 35 miles of fiber optic cable to connect all the buildings together on each campus. Knight and IQinVision won this high-profile contract by offering a scalable solution using new technology that achieved DADS’ security goals while saving the state money in terms of number of cameras needed and in installation and long-term maintenance costs.

“The timing of the project allowed us to do a couple of interesting things that yielded significant benefits to the state,” said Chris Hugman, Vice President at Knight Security. “Image quality is critical to this customer, so we used IQeye megapixel resolution cameras throughout. Secondly, we were able to incorporate the latest H.264 Main Profile video encoding, which gives better bandwidth and storage efficiency. The result has been superior quality images with manageable network and storage requirements—the customer has been very pleased with the clarity and performance.”  

The Highlights

• The DADS project is one of the largest, all megapixel camera installations in the world. Over 3,200 IQeye HD megapixel cameras were installed in 336 different buildings, on 12 separate campuses, over the span of just one year.

• The overall project was completed on budget, ahead of schedule, and the reports from DADS to date are that the primary project objective to ensure quality care for all residents is being met in full.

• Knight chose IQinVision HD Megapixel camera technology to achieve project objectives because they were confident in the IQeye camera’s superior area of video coverage and the quality of the camera’s images to ensure accurate observation of staff activity.

• By choosing IQeye HD megapixel cameras, DADS installed substantially fewer cameras compared to SD cameras, and still covered more area in each building. This saved installation time and cost and cut future maintenance expenses.

• The IQinVision cameras selected feature H.264 Main Profile compression, the highest performing H.264 compression profile with the most efficient bandwidth consumption—enabling the state to maintain an extended video archive without paying for exorbitant storage capacity.

• Chris Hugman, Knight Security’s executive project manager, “We weren’t the lowest bid, but we received high marks on our management approach and our overall project design. We were convinced that megapixel quality images were essential to DADS objectives to carefully monitor the quality of care for their residents. With the IQeye cameras you can zoom in to get the details of activity anywhere in a room.”