The Fort Washington Golf and Country Club in Fresno, California, renowned for its lush fairways and perfectly manicured greens, is one of the finest private golf, dining, and entertainment venues in the San Joaquin Valley. The membership is committed to maintaining the integrity of the course's original design while implementing the changes necessary to continue to challenge golfers at all levels.

Along with course upgrades, the membership is also committed to ensuring the security of the property, its assets, and most importantly, its members. To do so, The Fort needed to replace the analog video surveillance system it had in place for over 15 years with one that offered better quality and was more effective.

“The previously installed cameras were very poor quality, so when an incident occurred we could not really see what happened,” said Alan Ehnes, Fort Washington’s Director of Golf. “And when we took the video recordings to the police department, the image quality was so poor they couldn’t enhance it beyond a blurred image.”

With this in mind management determined that an IP surveillance system utilising megapixel cameras was the best choice in terms of quality and growth potential. “Once we saw the clarity and detail of the images captured by the Arecont Vision cameras, we didn’t want to waste time. We knew that they were the right choice for us,” Ehnes said.

The Fort uses Exacqvision video management system (VMS) software to monitor live and recorded video from each of the cameras. The cameras are connected to a single large screen monitor so club personnel can see all the cameras at all times.

The Fort’s management team collaborated on the design of the system with Matson Alarm Company, also located in Fresno, California, who delivered the installation. The system comprises one Arecont Vision Megaview AV3226PMIR 3 megapixel wide dynamic range (WDR) camera, one Megavideo Compact AV5115DNv1 5 megapixel camera with 8-80 mm lens, and three Surroundvideo AV12186DN 12 megapixel 180˚ WDR panoramic IP cameras. With these five cameras, The Fort’s personnel are able to view a much larger coverage area with significantly greater detail than with its previous system.

Not long after the system was installed, the club got a glimpse of how beneficial the Arecont Vision cameras’ capabilities would be.

Ehnes recalls, “We experienced a problem about a month and half after we installed the new IP surveillance system at The Fort. Someone drove onto the property after hours, parked, entered the clubhouse, stole keys out of a purse in the coatroom, and then proceeded to steal their car. We called up the video recordings taken with our new Arecont Vision cameras and were able to easily determine when and what happened. We were able to watch a woman drive into our parking lot, get out of her car, and leave with the stolen vehicle. With the level of detail the cameras picked up, the car license plate and perpetrator could easily be identified. We turned that surveillance over to the police and two days later she was arrested.”