A downtown wireless network and surveillance camera program will be deployed over the next few months as part of a pilot program in the downtown Central Business District (CBD).

City Council unanimously adopted a resolution (AR-128-19) during its regular monthly public meeting Monday night for the purchase and installation of a “wireless mesh network and associated security camera system within the downtown area.”

The governing body awarded a $91,448.92 contract to North Arlington-based Johnston Communications Voice & Data under the Union County Cooperative Pricing System (UCCP). Funding was approved as part of an earlier bond ordinance.

Johnston Communication was one of two vendors to submit a proposal for the mesh network and cameras, winning the bid over Hackensack-based Eastern Datacom, a state contract vendor.

The resolution indicates the “addition of surveillance cameras will improve public safety.” Reported crime in Rahway has continued to fall, following regional and national trends over the past two decades. Most recently, reported crime in Rahway was down about 19 percent in 2018, according to federal data.

Police Chief John Rodger earlier this year said he was aiming to have the pilot program installed by summer. The point-to-point wireless mesh network would originate at City Hall and build from site to site, he said, with the ability to grow from any node in the system. The pilot would begin with installation at four points: Irving Street and Milton Avenue; Main and East Cherry streets, Irving Street and Elizabeth Avenue and Irving Street and Central Avenue.

The pilot program was among the items mentioned by Mayor Raymond Giacobbe, Jr. in his 2018 State of the City address.

A mesh network, or meshnet, is where “each node is connected to every other node in the network.” Devices speak to each another, thus, “they’re more than a series of ‘hot spots’ with Internet access; the mesh remains a network whether or not it’s connected to the Internet.”