SEATTLE — As business leaders and major event operators call for more surveillance cameras following the Bite of Seattle shooting, grassroots groups will be holding rallies against mass surveillance.
On Monday, seven members of the Community not Cameras coalition will tour Seattle’s Real-Time Crime Center and hold a press conference with Seattle Indivisible to share their experience of the Seattle Police Department’s surveillance network.
The press conference is open to the public and will take place at Seattle City Hall’s grand staircase leading up to council chambers at 12:45 p.m.
Also happening on Monday, a rally against automated license plate readers (ALPRs) will be held at Renton City Hall to coincide with “National Week of Action Against ALPRs.”
Renton City Council voted to pause its Flock cameras in May, then voted in July to cover all 24 ALPRs; however, no decision has been made whether to renew its Flock contract, which is set to expire later this year.
“We know that in other places in the country, it’s being used to track people who are accessing legal abortion care, reproductive care, gender affirming care, and we also know that ICE and CBP are using surveillance infrastructure on our immigrant neighbors,” said Kathleen Carson, President of Seattle Indivisible.
She believes the cameras need to be fully disabled and taken down.
“Once that data exists, it’s open to all kinds of use and misuse,” said Carson.
Some law enforcement agencies say they are seeing success with ALPRs.
The King County Sheriff’s Office posted this video, saying a Flock camera helped them arrest a suspect who led them on a pursuit through South King County.
Flock claims its devices have helped solve more than a million crimes last year but this week, the company rolled out new safety changes, such as automatic lockouts for suspicious searches and cutting data storage time from 30 to 7 days.
“A genuine reduction would be a matter of minutes, not days,” says Carson.
Carson isn’t convinced the changes are enough but she says communities can change the minds of city council members on ALPRs.
“We can take this back. We do, as citizens have the opportunities to say you know we don’t actually like this,” said Carson.
Seattle Indivisible will be meeting on S. Grady Way in front of Renton City Hall to rally against Flock and surveillance tech starting at 5pm, before moving into council chambers at 7pm on Monday.
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