CIA moves headquarters, central station location as part of facility upgrade

FISHKILL, N.Y.--Commercial Instruments and Alarm Systems Security, a full-service security company serving residential and commercial accounts and doing fire installation, has nearly completed a total upgrade of its facilities. The administrative offices moved here from Poughkeepsie at the end of 2005 and CIA's central station and showroom were scheduled to transition in the middle of April, after Security Systems News went to press. In total, the move will be from 5,000 to 8,000 square feet. More important, however, is the location and quality of the facilities, said CIA president John Lombardi, a past president of the New York Burglar and Fire Alarm Association and a current member of the Central Station Alarm Association executive board. "I was in an industrial-type business area. I said, 'If I'm going to go after the high end, I need to be in a more contemporary looking building and a better area." This points to a side of the business where Lombardi has seen strong growth, virtual guarding. "There's a certain level of clientele," said Lombardi, "that are looking for video verification, so they can look in to see what's going on when the alarm activates. Now another level wants, when you press the intercom button, for us to answer the phone at the monitoring station." He said this remote guarding has worked everywhere from a celebrity's home to a museum to an industrial complex. "We're marketing ourselves as a security center ... They're recognizing that they need a guard, but may be not all the time. We're doing the hourly checks, keeping an eye on the fire alarms, all that stuff." He said they stop short of crisis management, though. CIA currently is a one-location company, with 35 employees operating in the Hudson Valley region within about an hour of the home office here.