Southland area commander Inspector Mike Bowman made the plea to elected members during the council’s infrastructural services committee meeting yesterday.
Insp Bowman, along with Inspector Jon Bisset and Sergeant Holly Mauheni, gave an overview of the present situation.
Invercargill has nine CCTV cameras in the city but only one is working.
"We cannot see number plates, we cannot recognise faces. We can get a rough colour of their clothing or the car," Sgt Mauheni said.
Insp Bisset said in that the past 12 months there had been 193 missing people in the city and 550 burglaries.
"There is a whole lot of opportunity in that space where investment right across the city would greatly enhance the safety of the individuals and hold some of those people to account."
Police also received 427 calls about possible self-harm incidents and as those were made usually from a mobile phone the cameras could help locate callers and get them the help they needed, he said.
Insp Bisset believed a better camera system could have helped in recent incidents in the area.
The extensive search for Invercargill man Raymond Horne, who was missing for more than a month before being found dead, could have been different if a better system had been in place.
"It was thousands of man hours invested in that search, you know, that is potentially thousands of man hours that we could be investing solving someone’s burglary in their house or preventing someone dying on our roads," Insp Bisset said.
Cr Rebecca Amundsen asked, given it was a tool for the police’s use, why the council should pay for it.
"I think it is a community responsibility because it is not the police responsibility to have cameras in the community ... we are part of this community and we are a part of trying to keep people safe," Insp Bowman said.
Insp Bisset wanted a wider system which covered not only the CBD but other areas of the town, including South city, the city’s entrances and Bluff.
Councillors created a group to examine the project.
A budget of $300,000 was indicated for the project and the proposal put in the 2022-23 annual plan.--
