The ACCESS Taskforce, or the Alliance of Companies and Communities to Enhance Safety and Security, is an effort to increase community safety by reducing retail crime. It was put to the test in Opelika, Alabama and Paducah, Kentucky. Nearly 50 mobile surveillance units were deployed to retail parking lots. Once the units were placed, retailers, police, and city officials shared data with the Loss Prevention Research Council (LPRC) who helped track trends and anonymize the data. This data helped participants get ahead of crime to make their cities safer.
“One of the largest retailers in the world reported that 90% of all their losses were due to 10% of the known offenders in their database. Now, with that said, the offenders that are hitting these different retailers are not just hitting one retailer... [So] it takes a network to defeat a network. As soon as one retailer catches on to an offender, they might move on, wait until it cools down, target another [retailer], and then maybe come back to that original retailer. Or they might move to a different place with a different group of retailers; therefore you’re going to have to share information so that you stem the crime patterns that are occurring.”
CORY LOWE
DIRECTOR OF RESEARCH, LOSS PREVENTION RESEARCH COUNCIL
“The primary thing that the CEOs want to talk about, is how to better safeguard their employees, their team members, [and] how to safeguard their customers.”
READ HAYES
DIRECTOR, LOSS PREVENTION RESEARCH COUNCIL
“When they have something stolen…that winds up costing other customers like me additional money, because…they’ve got to make a profit. So if we can slow that down or eliminate that—deter it—I think all of us are going to be much better off.”
GARY FULLER
MAYOR OF OPELIKA , ALABAMA
“Having some extra tools available to us…like the camera systems…really bring that extra kind of force multiplier for us that’s going to help us be able to solve some of these things, keep an eye on what’s going on, and give us some opportunities to really customize our response to what’s going on.”
SHANE HEALEY
CHIEF OF POLICE , OPELIKA , ALABAMA
Just as it did with Opelika and Paducah, the mission of the ACCESS Taskforce is to make communities safer by increasing collaboration between retailers, local government, law enforcement, and solution providers. If you would like to learn more about the ACCESS Taskforce or to read the full report from LPRC, visit lvt.com/access.
