SAN DIEGO — San Diego Police announced Monday it will be installing Smart Streetlights and license plate readers in Hillcrest immediately, citing safety concerns over the upcoming Pride parade and a rise in crime targeting the LGBTQ community.
"This neighborhood we're standing in today has seen alone, over the last the four years, the most incidents of hate throughout our entire city, and today we're saying enough is enough," said SDPD Chief Scott Wahl during a news conference at Rich's in Hillcrest.
He said 14 cameras will be installed in Hillcrest. According to a map released by SDPD, several cameras will be going up near University Avenue and Park Boulevard as well as University Avenue and 6th Avenue.
Chief Wahl said this is an urgent matter, and given the parade is less than two weeks away, the department will be exercising the exigency clause, which he said means approval by the San Diego City Council and the Privacy Advisory Board is not required.
In May, there were a series of pellet gun shootings at several bars in Hillcrest. No one was ever arrested. SDPD said it's continuing to investigate the case as a potential hate crime.
Meanwhile, outside Rich's, a handful of protesters from Trust SD Coalition held signs, accusing the department of bypassing the usual requirements and oversight and installing the cameras without any public input.
"We're terribly concerned that they're using Pride as an excuse to expand mass surveillance," said Frances Yasmeen Motiwalla of Trust SD Coalition.
"There's a lot of concerns with this.," added co-member David Avitia, "most especially that the community did not have any input prior to this actually happening."
"We don't believe the primary way you protect the public is by using surveillance," said Seth Hall of Trust SD Coalition. "A camera is not going to to come to your rescue when you have something happen to you."
"If they want to make a change to mass surveillance systems they need to go through the approval process that we all agreed on," he added.
"I understand concerns that people have regarding an invasion of privacy," said Chief Wahl. "I realize also there's going to be differences of opinion on whether this is urgent or exigent. When you look at what the law says, the surveillance ordinance, with an imminent threat, that applies to all technology, all surveillance technology when that ordinance was written. When I say we're following the letter of the law, we're also following the spirit of the law."
"It's not like a drone we can launch within minutes, this technology takes weeks to install and put into place so that urgency starts now. If we get an imminent threat hours before the Pride parade, we will not have the time to install these cameras," he added.
This move is being applauded by the owner of Rich's bar on University Avenue.
"Being able to catch people form doing stupid stuff is the way to deter others from coming and doing the same," Ryan Bedrosian said.
However, Hillcrest resident Jason Kordestani. a manager of Mo's (speaking for himself and not on behalf of his employer), does not believe more surveillance technology is the solution.
"I'm more in favor of having more police in our neighborhoods, getting to know our community members, talking to business owners, business management and really building a connection where we know where they are," he told CBS 8.
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