This week the city of Selma installed three security fiber optic cameras along Water Avenue. One that looks towards the Old Depot Museum, another surveys the area by the St. James Hotel and Downtown Sports Bar and another looks down the road towards the Edmund Pettus Bridge.

The real-time security footage feeds into the Selma Police Department and if crowds gather, those monitoring the footage will be able to quickly notify on-duty officers.

We cannot help but smile about this — not only because that’s a natural reaction to seeing a camera, but because it means that Selma is taking steps to increase the security of an area that desperately needs it.

With the cameras in place and the live-feed streaming 24-hours a day, directly to the police department, we are hopeful that the crime rate and incidents that occur along Water Avenue will see a drastic decrease.

Any measure we can take as a city to beef up our security and protect both those who live here and the buildings we live and work in, is progress.

Selma Chief of Police William T. Riley said the area would benefit from the surveillance and increased security in general.

“We are putting a lot of money into the downtown area and we cannot let individuals tear it down,” Riley said. “We have to police the city, we can’t be babysitting the clubs and protecting our citizens.”

We have to agree with him. The police department already has eight officers who are on duty each night during the 2 a.m. closings of the clubs in the entertainment area and they should not have to focus all of their attention on one area when there is an entire city to patrol.

The city plans to install more cameras for other areas in the downtown district, which we see as just another means to help Selma be a better, safer place for us all.Our city should be constantly moving foreword and continually progressing, and we think the addition of security cameras is a great addition to that movement.