Cape May installing system at hotspots for surveillance
CAPE MAY — For more than a year, the city has been working on planning a surveillance camera system in various locations around Cape May.
Police Chief Dekon Fashaw and representatives from Gridless, a Pennsauken-based company, gave a presentation on the proposal during a City Council meeting May 20.
“A few years back, we looked at tightening up security for the mall, parks and any city-owned properties,” Fashaw said. “The biggest thing for us was the retail theft along the Washington Street Mall, which we wanted to narrow in on.”
Fashaw said a plan to get more cameras on the mall will be done in collaboration with the Washington Street Mall Management Co. Cameras will also be placed along the beachfront, parks and, eventually, the new police department building.
During a previous meeting, Fashaw said security cameras are up and running at Cape May Beach Patrol headquarters and several on the Promenade, the Washington Street Mall and Kiwanis Park. Cameras will be installed on both bridges into the city. The Promenade phase is delayed due to the upcoming repaving.
“We give you the ability to put cameras in locations where traditional camera systems are unable to go without Verkada [security cameras],” Gridless representative Tom McNeely said. “All we need is an internet connection from that camera and you’re getting 30 days’ retention on cameras.”
McNeely said users could search for specs within the security system using terms like “guy in a white baseball hat” and the system searches footage to find them.
“If you have a location where you don’t have any infrastructure, we can do solar battery communications,” McNeely said. “We expect these devices to be in the field for an excess of 10 years and provide you with enterprise-grade infrastructure being power and communication.”
McNeely said Verkada has a good warranty program and will ship replacement cameras overnight if there are any issues. He showed council views from the cameras installed on Washington Street Mall.
Councilwoman Lorraine Baldwin asked if the cameras have a 360-degree view. McNeely said the cameras have multi-sensors with four individual heads, and since they are on a pole, the view does not go all the way around.
McNeely added that pole work and putting a wireless signal down the Promenade must be done prior to camera installation.
Cameras are also installed at Kiwanis Park, allowing the police to track the license plates of vehicles entering and leaving the parking lot.
“That was a discussion the mayor and manager and I had when we first thought this up,” Fashaw said. “It pulls tags of vehicles pulling in. The same [license plate recognition] technology that we have in our police cars is in this system.”
McNeely added that the police can search the system for specific license plates, and it will pull up results from all of the cameras. He said Gridless has recently installed cameras in Stone Harbor and Cape May County bridges.
“That’s an excellent overview and I think one of the reasons is the chief did a lot of work to get this done,” Mayor Zack Mullock said. “Thank you, too, to Paul [Dietrich] for your support. It’s important for taxpayers to see what they’re paying for and how good this technology is.”
Custodial maintenance services
Council discussed the need to hire a vendor, BTS Cleaning Services LLC, for $42,000 in custodial maintenance services for daily operations through August 2025.
Resident Stacey Sheehan questioned City Council about why there were no days, hours or locations listed, as well as about the services provided.
“It’s essentially the entire season, to have two beach cleaners in the evening time,” City Manager Paul Dietrich said. “Public Works did an exhaustive search and we advertised at different price points to hire.”
Dietrich added that the employees would work from 4 to 9 p.m. at the beachfront, Lyle Lane, Ocean Avenue and Kiwanis restrooms.
“All the restrooms that remain open in the evening will be taken care of and cleaned up,” Dietrich said.
In lieu of hiring three to four seasonal staff, Dietrich said the outsourcing is to replace seasonal workers they were not able to hire, noting Public Works was unable to find qualified applicants to work those schedules. There were no volunteers from Public Works staff.
Baldwin said she would like management to go back out and look at other options.
“We’re looking at $44 to $47 an hour for two people to do this work versus the contractual $84 an hour,” Baldwin said. “I think it’s substantial to say that maybe we want to give it another go around and see if we can advertise for employees.”
Dietrich said there was not enough time to put it out to bid before the season or advertise for employees.
Mullock asked Superintendent of Public Works Eric Prusinski his opinion on being able to find employees to do this work.
“We’ve been advertising since 2024 for seasonal help,” Prusinski said. “They are not coming.”
Dietrich said no one was interested in the seasonal help positions during the city’s recent job fair.
“We ran an enhanced salary for that, our normal seasonal help is $17-$18 and we upped it to $20 an hour and we got no responses,” Dietrich said. “Eric did the analysis, and we talked about us advertising at $23 an hour and that’s when it became more cost effective to use an outside source.”
Prusinski said he is short four people right now. With managing time off and scheduling, he said the spots for evening shifts will not be filled.
“Even paying $23 an hour, it doesn’t surprise me you’re not getting any workers,” Deputy Mayor Maureen McDade said. “People just don’t want to do it.”
McDade asked when the cleaning services begin, and Prusinski said Friday, May 23. Baldwin and McDade agreed that looking into options differently next year and during January or February might help the council be more creative.
“It sounds like that’s actually what happened, and you basically waited until now to hire someone and it didn’t happen,” Mullock said.
Dietrich said after no prospects came from the job fair, Prusinski started looking at what he had available.
Other business
In other news, the 2025 budget passed unanimously. Mullock thanked CFO Kevin Hanie, auditor Leon Costello, Dietrich and Deputy City Manager Justin Riggs for their hard work.
Dietrich said Public Works completed laying down beach mats for one continuous loop from Howard Street to the promenade. He thanked Public Works for getting that done prior to the start of the season.
Councilman Steve Bodnar said Columbia University students working on the water sustainability report had finished their project and submitted the final report.
“It’s a really fine product and a great group of students,” Bodnar said. “Thank you to them for the work they did and the Cape May staff who met with them and worked with them.”
Bodnar added the results are under the Environmental Commission on the city’s website for residents to view.
Councilman Shane Meier reminded residents who may have trees of heaven, which are havens for spotted lanternflies, to contact the city for removal. The city has a $20,000 grant to help eradicate lanternflies and their habitat.
By RACHEL SHUBIN/Special to the Star and Wave
