I spent a brief amount time working with smart city tech. You might be surprised just how many cameras and sensors already exist that are monitoring you at any moment as you walk down the street. The issue usually isn’t that there’s no evidence for crimes, it’s that investigating those mostly petty crimes, outside of secure areas is an extremely low priority for police departments. For example, I’ve had the police reject my video evidence of a hit and run where the driver admitted to it on camera, because they didn’t want to spend resources investigating something that didn’t result in a death.

I stopped working with smart city tech because I felt there’s only two realistic directions it can go: Excessive surveillance by the police, or excessive surveillance by people whose only interest is selling whatever data they can collect about you in public spaces to advertisers and other 3rd parties.

Crime statistics for DC: 2020 vs 2019

https://mpdc.dc.gov/page/district-crime-data-glance

So most of their claims were wrong. Motor vehicle theft was up 50%. Robbery, burglary, and other theft were down. There were 5 more cases of arson.

"Defund the police" folks would point out that the increase in crime likely stems from an ineffective safety net during the pandemic and the ensuing economic difficulties it has caused.