Why Ocean Beach Should Be Wary of Police Surveillance Cameras Being Installed

Frank Gormlie November 2, 2015 9 Comments

Ocean Beach has just been notified that the City of San Diego intends to install ten police surveillance cameras along OB’s waterfront, from the Pier to the River. This project has been announced lately at recent community meetings, such as the OB Town Council.

And it has been announced as a done-deal by police representatives, and they will be going up sometime over the next weeks or so, sometime between the end of November to the first of the New Year – and will cost $25,000 to install.

Without knowing who from the community has requested them, the appearance of police officers telling community members that they are installing surveillance cameras for their benefit is somewhat unsettling.

Putting aside the Constitutional and privacy issues just for a moment, let’s look at what we know so far.

City to Install Police Surveillance Cameras Along OB Waterfront

Frank Gormlie November 2, 2015 5 Comments

10 Cameras Will Go Up Between End of November and Jan. 1st

It was announced by police representatives at the last OB Town Council meeting that the City will be installing police surveillance cameras along the waterfront of Ocean Beach. Ten cameras will be set up between the OB Pier and the San Diego River, sometime between the end of November and the first of the year.

Lt. Carter of the Western Division presented the project at the Wed., Oct. 28th meeting. The cameras will be installed “at key locations”, he said, indicating that these would be high-crime areas. One is definitely going up at the OB Pier and the others will need city-supplied juice for their locations. They won’t be pointed at any residences, Lt Carter assured the crowd, and will be pointed down.

“This is not Big Brother,” he said. They won’t be secret cameras, he continued, in fact, they will have signs indicating their presence. “They’re not there to spy on anyone”, but can be referred to if something does occur. Their recordings can be viewed – and if relevant – copied into a case file. It’s costly to store all the data and recordings, so they’ll re-record ever so often.

The project budget is $25,000, Lt Carter said. Before the cameras are installed, the project has to have its budget request go through City Purchasing, then a contractor has to be determined. So, the audience was told, they will go up sometime between “the end of November and the first of the year.”

The Day After the Day of the Dead

Jim Miller November 2, 2015 0 Comments

day of the dead robot

By Jim Miller

It’s the day after the Day of the Dead, a Mexican holiday which traditionally is both a time of remembrance of lost loved ones and a moment when the dead mock the pretenses of the living. Death is the leveler of rich and poor, proud and humble.

It reminds us that, in the end, all our bones are equal.

As Octavio Paz observes in “The Day of the Dead” from his classic book The Labyrinth of Solitude, “Death is a mirror which reflects the vain gesticulations of the living. The whole motley confusion of acts, omissions, regrets and hopes which is the life of each of us finds in death, not meaning or explanation, but an end.”