Surveillance Takes A Village
The 3.3-square-mile North Shore enclave of Kings Point is launching a far-reaching surveillance network that can compare the license plate of every car going into the village against federal and state crime databases such as most-wanted lists, stolen vehicle alerts and suspected terrorist files.
When the project is completed, 44 cameras will monitor 19 entrances into the village in what may be one of the most extensive municipal tracking programs anywhere.
The number of cameras equals about one for every 120 people in the village of 5,305 people. Kings Point, a community of million-dollar homes, sits on the Great Neck peninsula, surrounded on three sides by water.
It's not as if Kings Point suffers from a crime wave, though it did have 19 property crimes and one violent crime in 2010. You just can't be too careful.
Mayor Michael Kalnick said the tracking program is necessary to protect residents, but privacy and civil rights groups consider it an overreaching intrusion.
"Crime will always be out there," Kalnick said. "Do you wait for it to happen? I think no."
Fortunately, Kalnick has yet to consider enacting a law requiring every non-resident to enter the village to submit to a cavity search. After all, you don't want to wait for crime to happen, do you?
The problem, of course, is that there's nothing facially wrong with the use of cameras to monitor every car that drives into the village. License plates are public, and there is no right to drive without government taking note of them. Indeed, the NYSCLU doesn't like the initiative, but the worst they can say about it is that it seems like overkill.
"When we talk about installing an intense surveillance system like these, there needs to be intense public debate," said Samantha Fredrickson, the Nassau County chapter director of New York Civil Liberties Union. "It's just another example of the government watching and keeping track of what we do in our personal time. It just doesn't seem necessary."
It's not necessary. It's a choice made by a village that can afford to make such choices. At the same time, it reflects the potential of technological achievement and overarching desire for security. For the moment, Kings Point is an early adopter. Others will follow. It certainly gives new meaning to Allen Funt's old tag line, "smile, you're on Candid Camera," but it's not likely to be nearly as funny.
It's not a matter of the village being able to afford the surveillance system. It is likely that they probably got a grant to install the entire system. In fact, the availability of the grant would mean that the village did not do this entirely at their own initiative. We need to look to the Federal government to discover the origin of this pernicious plan to undermine the balance of power between the citizen and the government. Knowledge is power. True, I don't know offhand how they got their money, but my working assumption is that it was through a Federal grant, likely from the Justice Department or the Department of Homeland Security.
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While that would make sense, it wasn't the case here. The Village paid for it on its own, and floated a bond to so. Just a little village making the decision to surveil everyone because they could.
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Alas, I shall have to retool my working assumptions! Guess it's a matter for the local taxpayer, then. But if local government there is anything like mine, it runs on automatic pilot. I would still look for an angle, such as exactly how he came to decide to install the system. Was he approached by a security company? Did he know anyone in the company? The village board had to vote on the measure, I would think.
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That's an excellent point, and I don't know the answer. An awful lot of money going into cameras for such a small village. Maybe a wayward son in law? I have no clue where the idea came from.
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I am 100% for electronic monitoring as it frees up officers for enforcement.
Cameras operate 24/7 and can be played back - something people can't do.
They now have 44 more eyes on the street
and that is cost effective.
Fines for a few red light violations will help pay the upkeep.
Rights. The cameras are not going to hurt you.
People are not aware of just how many cameras are used today by both private and enforcement. It is a good thing that is getting better.
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I suspect some people would prefer not to be watched quite so much. As for its cost-effectiveness, that's based on one's assumptions. Given the absence of any real crime, it's likely extremely ineffective. Red light fines won't come close to paying for the cameras or the maintenance, but assuming they work, they will definitely be more effective than the police, assuming effective means always on.
That said, what are the being effective doing? Checking license plates of people passing through for fun against warrants, tickets and stolen cars? It doesn't strike me as doing much to help anybody in the village.
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Any idea what kinds of restrictions would apply to accessing that data?
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Restrictions? Plenty of time to worry about that later. At the time of the article, they hadn't given any thought to restrictions. So many things for a little village to think about, it could give a mayor a headache.
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