King County Housing Authority (KCHA) is one of the largest housing authorities in the state of Washington, consisting of over 90 residential properties and over 500 employees. They help serve the community by providing affordable housing, rental housing, and rental assistance to more than 50,000 people across King County, Washington. With such an expansive, ever-growing scope of properties, KCHA began discovering issues and inefficiencies with their security systems.
The Problems
- Fragmented and aging on-prem access control and video surveillance systems
- High maintenance costs and dependency on physical servers
- Limited remote visibility and management
- Inconsistent security standards across locations
- Inability to easily and consistently scale security across current and new properties
These challenges facing KCHA led to inefficiencies for both centralized security teams and property managers. They decided it was time to address these problems.
The Goals
KCHA assessed their various challenges and identified clear goals to achieve:
- Standardize systems across all sites
- Transition from on-prem to cloud-based security
- Improve remote monitoring, management, and reporting
- Reduce lifecycle costs and infrastructure dependency
- Enhance resident and staff safety
But one goal had to come first: find the right partner to develop, implement, and execute a plan to achieve the other goals.
Finding a Security System Integration Partner
KCHA issued a competitive RFP to find the partner best suited to modernizing their aging security systems. This RFP used a weighted scoring model to help ensure an objective selection. Formal interviews were conducted and vendors gave solution presentations. From these, points were awarded for different criteria, such as technical product solutions, vendor experience, cost and value, implementation plan, and service model. LONG achieved the highest score and was awarded the bid. We were specifically chosen for our:
- Technical alignment; proposed full migration to cloud-based services which best addressed KCHA’s challenges
- Proven multi-site deployment experience
- Comprehensive migration strategy and phased implementation plan
- Collaboration between engineering, project management, and service teams
The Security System Equipment
LONG proposed a full migration from their legacy security systems to Avigilon Alta Cloud Platform (a Motorola Solutions Company), specifically because of their access control and video surveillance system features. These products would help KCHA get centralized management, mobile and remote monitoring, and eliminate expensive, hard-to-maintain on-prem servers.
Avigilon Alta Cloud-Based Access Control
- Cloud-managed door controllers
- Mobile credentials and remote provisioning
- Real-time access monitoring
Avigilon Alta Cloud VMS
- Cloud video management systems (VMS)
- AI-enabled analytics for event detection
- Remote live and recorded video access
The Implementation
A phased rollout was developed and implemented for the full security system migration, consisting of 4 main steps.
- Assessment and Standardization
- Site audits of existing systems were performed
- Standardized deployment templates were developed
- Pilot Deployment
- Select properties received the initial rollout
- System performance and workflows were validated at these properties
- Full Portfolio Rollout
- Sequenced deployment was adopted to help minimize resident disruption
- Parallel operation during cutover from legacy systems
- Training and Adoption
- Performed staff training for centralized and on-site users
- Completed documentation and delivered support resources
The Results
Because of the appropriate product selection and deliberate implementation plan, KCHA successfully upgraded their aging legacy security systems to superior, modernized ones. They now benefit from enhanced security and operations. The results were immediate and evident. KCHA gained:
- A unified, integrated system for better security, efficiency, and long-term sustainability
- A single platform to monitor and manage all locations and simplified administration
- Real-time visibility, insights, and analytics across all properties that allow for faster incident response
- A reduction in IT overhead and complexity
- Scalability – the cloud-based infrastructure enables easier expansion and onboarding for new locations
- Cost savings – the elimination of on-prem servers reduced maintenance and legacy infrastructure costs
Their security systems have never been more reliable and easier to use. and their staff and residents have never been more secure.
There was also another beneficial outcome: KCHA gained a partner they can trust beyond the project. LONG not only offers security system service and post-installation support but is dedicated to setting KCHA up for long-term success. After the completion of this project, LONG helped KCHA sign on to WSIPC, a contracting vehicle they can leverage to complete additional security improvement initiatives they have. KCHA is better secured and now prepared for the future as well.
Ponha Lim, Vice President of Safety & Security for King County Housing Authority, had this to say about this project and working with LONG:
“Our three-year partnership with LONG Building Technologies has transformed how King County Housing Authority approaches safety and security. The deployment of the Avigilon platform has greatly improved our ability to enhance safety and security for residents and staff. Avigilon cloud-based cameras not only enhances investigative capabilities and strengthens collaboration with local law enforcement, but also provides critical support to our staff in their lease enforcement responsibilities. LONG’s dedication, technical expertise, and commitment to our mission have made them a trusted long-term partner.”
