Dave Summers’ NBC7 report on the new OB group, Citizens Against Privacy Abuse, was the lead story last night – Tuesday – at 11pm. Frank Gormlie, one of the organizers of CAPA, was interviewed by Summers for it. Here’s the online version:
Grassroots Ocean Beach Group Fights Public Surveillance
The Citizens Against Privacy Abuse opposes 10 newly installed security cameras
By Dave Summers/ NBC7
An Ocean Beach group wants to block the city’s plan to install 10 surveillance cameras and point them at the public.
Proponents say 24-hour surveillance of the public space between Dog Beach and the Ocean Beach Pier will help solve crimes, protect businesses and visitors. The 10 cameras cost the city $25,000.
But the new group Citizens Against Privacy Abuse (CAPA) says the real crime would be surrendering public freedoms to a Big Brother-style community monitoring.
“There was no community discussion, no community debate,” said Frank Gormlie, the group’s organizers and OB Rag publisher.
CAPA is growing; so far two dozen people — including members of town council, the planning board and local businesses — have joined.
Their fight may be an uphill battle. Lighthouse Ice Cream owner Carol Ladigus joins other businesses on Newport Avenue in welcoming the extra eyes.
“I have cameras all over this place in here. I think I am used to them. I think most people are used to them. I think we would feel safer,” Ladigus said.
“People are going to think twice if they know there are more cameras out in the community before they even try anything,” South Beach bartender Julia Jacobs said.
The cameras would record 24 hours a day without live monitoring except during large events like street fairs and the July 4th holiday.
The recordings are under San Diego police control, but who else sees them or how they are used has not yet been explained.
“If people are free, and they are free to stay and live on their beach, then they need to be free and secure in the knowledge that the government, the police are not watching them. Not watching them in real time or some later time,” Gormlie said.
Ocean Beach is already under surveillance. Cameras mounted on private buildings are monitoring public space. There is even a website broadcasting the boardwalk and beach 24 hours a day.
It may feel like everybody is doing it, but CAPA says not everybody wants them.
San Diego City Councilwoman Lorie Zapf, who represents Ocean Beach’s District 2, secured the money and streamlined the camera project. Staffers say it will be implemented by the first of the year.
CAPA members are trying to first create a community forum to debate the issue.
{ 8 comments… read them below or add one }
Harassment, is what they are.
Here’s the video:
The problem i have with the cameras, and many other things…is that we, the people, are not included in the decision….this country is no longer for the people, by the people….its just shoved down our throats…and we don’t want it…….like the new flight plan, the fluoride in the water, seaworld…..i don’t remember voting on all that.
Let’s say we ask the brown shirts at Homeland Security to give OB and/or San Diego a lot of money to develop a viewing room at all the libraries. All the “live feeds” of all the cameras in the city are fed to the screens in the viewing room. Anyone, any time can view anything on the screens whenever the libraries are open. Even footage from the cops’ belly-button cams could be fed to the viewing rooms. We are all members of the Village, so we should all become the Watchers Watching the Watchers Watching the Watched.
And gosh, what a platform for more advertising!
Surveillance is how the NAZIs ID’d the people who were considered a threat to public safety and/or National Security; Juden, Gay, Homeless, non-White and other undesirables. These people were captured, taken to the Concentration Camps and executed just for being alive. Any questions?
It seems as though the OB Merchant’s Assn. has no problem with the cameras going up.
I know there are some fights, maybe even attacks, and illegal activities at the beach, some of which should not be illegal. Where do the merchants, the people that live on the cliffs, and residents that don’t live on the beach think the illegal activity will go. The last person I know of to be killed in OB was a young man in the ally by the Arizona bar. The beach is an open area that already has many eyes on it. I believe it was proposed that the camera money be used for bicycles for cops. To me, that’s a better idea. If the cameras go in, I hope Surfriders has access them, and every time someone leaves their toxic chemical cigarette butt on the beach, someone goes out and makes them pick it up and knocks them on the head!
According to this news article the cameras are up??
http://www.cbs8.com/story/30555674/police-surveillance-cameras-to-go-up-in-ocean-beach
So much for dialogue with Zapf’s office….remember that Point People when Conrad Wear tries to run for office…..how respectful he is to the community !!!!! That’s right Conrad and Zapf don’t care …dey just gonna do what dey wanna do and poo poo to you!
OB Dude – watch it again. The reporter says by the first of the year.