Business owners, residents, and even visitors to the community of Benton Harbor have a new way to help stem crime in the city thanks to the city’s adoption of a new smartphone app by the Department of Public Safety clearing the way for automatic, anonymous, tips to authorities.
Dan McGinnis, Director of the Benton Harbor Department of Public Safety says the new tool will increase his team’s crime-fighting arsenal. It’s a new personalized smartphone app to help residents and business owners connect with the department to find information, view alerts, and submit anonymous tips from a smartphone.
Developed by tip411, the Benton Harbor DPS app will put a powerful new crimefighting tool into the hands of community members of all ages.
McGinnis says, “Our mission is to partner with the community to solve problems and improve public safety in a manner that is fair, impartial, transparent, and consistent.” He adds, “We believe our new tip411 app will help engage residents to partner with us and help fight crime.”
The tip411 system is 100-percent anonymous, as the technology removes all identifying information before police see the tips and there is no way to identify the sender.
Terry Halsch is President of tip411 nationwide. He says, “We’ve listened to feedback from partners like Benton Harbor and have built a more advanced and innovative product to help departments better engage their communities,” and points out, “The Benton Harbor DPS app powered by tip411 will greatly improve the public’s access to agency alerts, social media channels, important information, and more to help fight crime.”
Within the next 4 weeks, residents will be able to download the BH app on their smartphones.
Residents in Benton Harbor without a smartphone can send an anonymous text tip via their cell phone to police by texting keyword BHPD to 847411 (tip411).
Anonymous web tips will also be able to be submitted through the department’s website at bhcity.us/police. Stay tuned.
