CITY OF SANTA CRUZ
809 Center Street
Santa Cruz, California 95060
CITY COUNCIL AGENDA
Regular Meeting - November 28, 2023
10:30 A.M. CLOSED SESSION, ZOOM/COURTYARD CONFERENCE ROOM 12:30 P.M. ORAL COMMUNICATIONS, CONSENT, GENERAL BUSINESS AND PUBLIC
HEARINGS, ZOOM/COUNCIL CHAMBERS
The meeting may be viewed remotely, using any of the following sources:
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Correspondence to be included in the agenda packet must be received by 5:00 pm on Monday, November 27th
PLEASE NOTE:
Council may take a break(s) as needed.
Requests for extra speaking time on items other than Oral Communications must be made by 5:00 p.m. on Sunday, November 26th by emailing the Mayor and the City Clerk.
Approval will be confirmed via email.
[email protected] [email protected]
November 28, 2023 City Council 2
The City of Santa Cruz does not discriminate against persons with disabilities. Out of consideration for people with chemical sensitivities we ask that you attend fragrance free. Upon request, the agenda can be provided in a format to accommodate special needs. Additionally, if you wish to attend this public meeting and will require assistance such as an interpreter for American Sign Language, Spanish, or other special equipment, please call the City Clerk’s Department at 420-5030 at least five days in advance so that we can arrange for such special assistance, or email [email protected]. The CalRelay system number: 1-800-735-2922.
Si desea asistir a esta reunión pública y necesita ayuda - como un intérprete de lenguaje de señas americano, español u otro equipo especial - favor de llamar al Departamento de la Secretaría de la Ciudad al 420-5030 al menos cinco días antes para que podamos coordinar dicha asistencia especial o envié un correo electrónico a [email protected]. El número del sistema Cal-Relay es: 1-800-735-2922.
Agenda and Agenda Packet Materials: The City Council agenda and the complete agenda packet containing public records, which are not exempt from disclosure pursuant to the California Public Records Act, are available for review on the City’s website:
www.cityofsantacruz.com/government/city-council-meetings and at the Office of the City Clerk located at 809 Center Street, Room 9, Santa Cruz, California, during normal business hours.
Agenda Materials Submitted after Publication of the Agenda Packet: Pursuant to Government Code §54957.5, public records related to an open session agenda item submitted after distribution of the agenda packet are available at the same time they are distributed or made available to the legislative body on the City’s website at: www.cityofsantacruz.com/government/city-councilmeetings and are also available for public inspection at the Office of the City Clerk, 809 Center Street Room 8, Santa Cruz, California, during normal business hours, and at the Council meeting.
Need more information? Contact the City Clerk’s office at 831-420-5030. 10:30 AM
Closed Session
1. Real Property Negotiations (Government Code §54956.8) Property: 140 Front Street
APN: 005-053-27
Owner: Seaside Company
City Negotiator: Bonnie Lipscomb
Negotiating Parties: City of Santa Cruz, Seaside Company, and Golden State Warriors
Under Negotiation: Price, terms of payment, or both
2. Conference With Legal Counsel – Liability Claims (Government Code §54956.95)
Claimant: Lorraine H. Coppolino
Claim against the City of Santa Cruz
November 28, 2023 City Council 3
Closed Session (continued)
3. Conference With Legal Counsel – Anticipated Litigation (Government Code §54956.9(d)(2))
Significant exposure to litigation (one potential case to be discussed)
4. Conference with Legal Counsel - Anticipated Litigation (Government Code §54956.9(d)(4))
Initiation of litigation (one potential case to be discussed)
5. Public Employee Performance Evaluation/Conference with Labor Negotiators (Government Code §54957, §54957.6)
Unrepresented employee: City Manager
Agency designated representative: City Attorney
November 28, 2023 City Council 4
City Council
12:30 PM
Call to Order
Roll Call
Oral Communications Announcement – Members of the public may address Council on matters not on the agenda, but within the jurisdiction of the Council. 30 minutes is allocated for Oral Communications. No extra time for groups will be granted.
Oral Communications
Presiding Officer's Announcements
Statements of Disqualification
Additions and Deletions
City Attorney Report on Closed Session
Council Meeting Calendar
6. The City Council will review the meeting calendar attached to the agenda and revise it as necessary.
Consent Agenda
7. Resolution Extending the Local Emergency Declaration in Connection with the December 2022 and January 2023 Winter Storms (CA/CM) Resolution extending by sixty days the Local Emergency Declaration in connection with the December 2022 and January 2023 winter storms.
November 28, 2023 City Council 5
Consent Agenda (continued)
8. Minutes of the November 14, 2023 City Council Meeting (CC) Motion to approve as submitted.
9. Resolution Ordering an Election, Requesting the County to Conduct the Election, and Requesting Consolidation of the Election to be Held on March 5, 2024, for the Purpose of Placing the Housing for People Citizen Initiative Measure on the Ballot (CC)
Motion to:
1) Accept the certificate of verification of signatures for the Housing for People citizen initiative petition, and
2) Adopt a resolution ordering an election to be held on March 5, 2024, consolidating the election for the purpose of adding the measure to the ballot, and directing the City Attorney to prepare an impartial analysis in accordance with the requirements of Elections Code 9280.
10. EMC Research, Inc. – First Amendment to Contract (CM) Motion authorizing the City Manager to execute a $51,000 amendment in a form approved by the City Attorney to the agreement with EMC Research, Inc. for public opinion research and polling services. The City Manager is authorized to execute future contract amendments within the approved budget.
11. Santa Cruz County Civil Grand Jury Response (CM)
Motion to authorize the Mayor to submit responses to the Santa Cruz Civil Grand Jury on behalf of the Santa Cruz City Council for the Honoring Commitments to the Public report.
12. 2024 Legislative Program (CM)
Motion to approve the 2024 Legislative Program.
13. Liability Claim Filed Against the City of Santa Cruz (FN) Motion to reject the liability claim of 1) Lorraine H. Coppolino, based on staff recommendation.
November 28, 2023 City Council 6
Consent Agenda (continued)
14. Resolution Amending the City of Santa Cruz Classification and Compensation Plans: Implementation of Statutory and Regulatory Requirements for Publicly Available Pay Schedules – All Departments (HR)
Resolution amending the City of Santa Cruz Classification and Compensations Plans by implementing the CalPERS requirements for publicly available pay schedules per California Code of Regulations 570.5.
15. Fiscal Year (FY) 2024 State Homeland Security Program Grant Proposal – Automated License Plate Readers (PD)
Motion to:
1) Approve the attached FY 2024 State Homeland Security Program Grant proposal letter and direct staff to send the letter to the Santa Cruz County Office of Response, Recovery, and Resilience, Authorized Body of Five no later than December 31, 2023, and
2) Approve the installation of automated license plate readers within Santa Cruz city limits, purchased with funds received through the FY 2024 State Homeland Security Program Grant.
16. Consulting Engineering Services for Wastewater Treatment Facility Capital Improvement Projects – Amendment 1 to Agreement (PW) Motion to authorizing the City Manager to execute Amendment 1 in a form approved by the City Attorney to the Agreement with Brown and Caldwell (San Jose, CA) in the amount of $3,950,000 to provide additional engineering services for Wastewater Treatment Facility capital improvement projects. The Director of Public Works is authorized to execute contract amendments within the approved budget.
November 28, 2023 City Council 7
Consent Agenda (continued)
17. Monterey Bay Sanctuary Scenic Trail (Rail Trail) Segment 7 Phase 2 (c401413) – Budget Adjustment, Construction Management Services Contract Amendment No. 1, and Design and Construction Support Services Contract Amendment No. 8 (PW)
Motion to:
1) Approve a resolution amending the FY 2024 budget to appropriate funds in the amount of $2,950,000 from Wastewater enterprise (m409659) and Measure D portions of Rail Trail Segment 8 & 9 (C401804), Pavement (c400809), Pavement (c400810), Bay Drive (c402304), to Monterey Bay Sanctuary Scenic Trail (Rail Trail) Segment 7 Phase 2 Project (c401413);
2) Approve Contract Amendment 1 with WSP USA, Inc. (San Jose, CA) to provide Construction Management Services for the Rail Trail Segment 7 Phase 2 Project (c401413) and authorize the Director of Public Works to execute the contract amendment in a form approved by the City Attorney. The Director of Public Works is authorized to execute future contract amendments within the approved budget; and 3) Approve Contract Amendment No. 8 with RRM Design Group for additional design changes and bid and construction support related to Rail Trail Segment 7 Phase 2 and authorize the Director of Public Works to execute the contract amendment in a form approved by the City Attorney. The Director of Public Works is authorized to execute future contract amendments within the approved budget.
18. Murray Street Bridge Seismic Retrofit (c409321) - Contract Amendment 11 (PW)
Motion authorizing the City Manager to execute Contract Amendment 11 in a form approved by the City Attorney to the Agreement with TRC Engineers, Inc. to provide services for design completion, final coordination, and construction support for the Murray Street Bridge Seismic Retrofit Project. The Director of Public Works is authorized to execute future contract amendments within the approved budget.
November 28, 2023 City Council 8
Consent Agenda (continued)
19. Grant of Easement to Pacific Gas and Electric Company (WT/PR) Resolution authorizing and directing the City Manager to execute a Grant of Easement in a form to be approved by the City Attorney, located in the City of Santa Cruz and designated as APN 004-321-06, to Pacific Gas and Electric Company, to construct, install, operate, and maintain facilities for distribution of electric energy upon the terms and conditions as set forth to serve the Pure Water Soquel facilities located at the City’s Wastewater Treatment Facility.
20. Approval of the Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) Radio Upgrade Project and Approval of California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) Exemption and Award of Agreement to Telstar Instruments (WT)
Motion to:
1) Approve the SCADA Radio Upgrade Project and find the project exempt under CEQA;
2) Accept the proposal of Telstar Instruments for the SCADA Radio Upgrade project in the amount of $199,107.00 and to authorize the City Manager, or designee, to execute an agreement in a form to be approved by the City Attorney and reject all other proposals; and 3) Authorize the Water Director to approve change orders with Telstar Instruments in a form to be approved by the City Attorney for amounts that are within the approved adjusted budget.
End Consent Agenda
November 28, 2023 City Council 9
Public Hearing
21. 1800, 1812, 1818 Soquel Avenue: CP22-0142 (APN 011-041-63, -64, -65) Appeal of the Planning Commission Approval of the Development Proposal at 1800 Soquel Avenue Involving a Nonresidential Demolition Authorization Permit to Demolish an Existing Commercial Building, Boundary Line Adjustment to Merge Three Parcels, Design Permit, Special Use Permit, and Density Bonus Request Involving Waivers to Development Standards, Including Exceeding Height and Floor Area Ratio (FAR) and a Reduction in Bike Parking, Open Space, Storage and Indoor Common Space Requirements, to Construct a Four-Story MixedUse Project Consisting of Approximately 2,889 Square Feet of Ground Level Commercial Space, and 84 Residential Units on a Parcel Located in the CC (Community Commercial) Zone District and Within the Eastside Business Improvement Plan Area. Environmental
Determination: Categorical Exemption. Owner: 1800 Soquel LLC. (PL) Resolution to deny the appeal and uphold the Planning Commission’s acknowldgement of the environmental determination (Categorical Exemption Section 15332, Class 32) and approval of the Nonresidential Demolition Authorization Permit; Boundary Adjustment; Density Bonus request, including for waivers to exceed height and FAR and reduce bike parking, open space, storage, and indoor common space requirements; and Design and Special Use Permits, based on the findings listed in the draft resolution and the Conditions of Approval attached as Exhibit “A.”
General Business
22. 10-year Citywide Long Range Financial Plan (FN)
Receive an update from Baker Tilly on the development of a 10-year Citywide Long Range Financial Plan (CWLRFP).
November 28, 2023 City Council 10
General Business (continued)
23. Resolution Requesting the Placement of a Sales and Use Tax Ballot Measure on the March 2024 California Statewide Primary Election (CN) Motion to:
1) Accept a report regarding the recent work of the City Council Budget and Revenue Ad Hoc Committee;
2) Adopt a resolution requesting that the consolidated March 2024 California Statewide Primary Election include a general purpose onehalf of one percent retail transaction and use tax measure; and 3) Support the measure for the purpose of authorizing arguments; provide direction regarding the authors; directing the City Attorney to prepare the impartial analysis; and providing direction to the City Manager regarding the preparation of the fiscal analysis, as appropriate.
24. San Lorenzo River Levee Letter of Map Revision Application Submittal Update (PW)
Receive information on the progress of San Lorenzo River Levee Certification and Letter of Map Revision Application Submittal to the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
25. An Ordinance Requiring Delivery Companies to Provide a Service Enabling Customers to Tip Delivery Drivers (CN)
Introduce for publication an ordinance adding Chapter 5.11 to the Santa Cruz Municipal Code to require delivery companies to offer tipping option to residential delivery customers.
November 28, 2023 City Council 11
Consent Public Hearings
26. Municipal Code Amendments Relating to Flexible Density Units (FDUs) Responding to Modifications Requested by the California Coastal Commission (PL)
Motion to:
1) Adopt a resolution acknowledging receipt of the resolution of certification from the California Coastal Commission, including the suggested modifications, and
2) Introduce for publication an ordinance amending Part 16 of Chapter
24.12 of the Municipal Code related to Flexible Density Units in response to action by the California Coastal Commission.
27. 2nd Reading and Final Adoption of Ordinance No. 2023-12 Amendments to Title 18 of the Municipal Code Creating an Energy Reach Code for Newly Constructed Buildings with the Intent to Provide Developers with a Range of Options that Will Meet Goals to Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions Associated with Fossil Fuel Citywide (PL/CM)
Motion to adopt Ordinance No. 2023-12 amending Municipal Code Title 18 – Buildings and Construction, amending Section 18.04.030 and adding Chapter 18.15 to adopt local amendments to Title 24, Part 6 of the California Code of Regulations (California Energy Code) implementing an energy reach code with an intent to provide developers with a range of options that will also meet goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions associated with fossil fuel use citywide. CEQA determination: These amendments are consistent with the Negative Declaration approved for the City of Santa Cruz 2030 Climate Action Plan adopted by City Council on September 13, 2022. The ordinance is also exempt from CEQA under the general rule, 15061(b)(3), and per CEQA Guidelines Section 15308, Class 8, Actions by Regulatory Agencies for Protection of Natural Resources.
Presentation
28. Election of New Vice Mayor for 2024
Elect a new Vice Mayor for the 2024 term.
Adjournment
November 28, 2023 City Council 12
INFORMATION ITEMS PREVIOUSLY DISTRIBUTED TO CITY COUNCILMEMBERS ADDENDUM TO CITY COUNCIL AGENDA – NOVEMBER 28, 2023
29. Parks and Recreation Department: Seargent Charles Derby Skate Park – Skateboard Park Addition - 11/2/23 (PKFYI 78)
MAYOR'S PROCLAMATIONS
ADDENDUM TO CITY COUNCIL AGENDA – NOVEMBER 28, 2023
30. Proclaiming November 19, 2023 as “Myrna Britton Day” and encouraging all citizens to join in honoring her for her service to the city, county, and country.
Advisory Body Appointments
The following positions are vacant. Council will make the appointments at a future meeting.
County Latino Affairs Commission One opening – at-large nomination Historic Preservation Commission One opening – at-large nomination Sister Cities Committee Three openings – at-large nominations Water Commission One opening – to be appointed by Vice Mayor Golder
Public Hearing
If, in the future, you wish to challenge in court any of the matters on this agenda for which a public hearing is to be conducted, you may be limited to raising only those issues which you (or someone else) raised orally at the public hearing or in written correspondence received by the City at or before the hearing.
Any person seeking to challenge a City Council decision made as a result of a proceeding in which, by law, a hearing is required to be given, evidence is required to be taken, and the discretion in the determination of facts is vested in the City Council, shall be required to commence that action either 60 days or 90 days following the date on which the decision becomes final as provided in Code of Civil Procedure Section 1094.6 Please refer to code of Civil Procedure 1094.6 to determine how to calculate when a decision becomes “final.” The 60-day rule applies to all public hearings conducted pursuant to the City’s Zoning Ordinance, Title 24, Santa Cruz Municipal Code. The 90-day rule applies to all other public hearings.
Meeting Type
Holiday
Jewish Holiday
Regular Meeting
Special Meeting
Study Session (will be added as scheduled)
Budget Hearing
DATE Location Meeting Type
December 7/8
Courtyard Conf. Room Closed Session - Closed to the Public Zoom/Council Chambers Council Regular Meeting - Open to the Public December 25
December 26 Meeting Cancelled - CITY COUNCIL DARK
City Hall Closure - Christmas Day
Hanukkah (City observed - sundown to sundown)
Please note: Meeting times are not final and are likely to change City Council Meeting Calendar for 2023
December 12
6.1 City Council
AGENDA REPORT
DATE: 11/08/2023
AGENDA OF: 11/28/2023
DEPARTMENT: City Attorney/City Manager
SUBJECT: Resolution Extending the Local Emergency Declaration in Connection with the December 2022 and January 2023 Winter Storms (CA/CM) RECOMMENDATION: Resolution extending by sixty days the Local Emergency Declaration in connection with the December 2022 and January 2023 winter storms.
BACKGROUND: Storms in December 2022 and January 2023 caused significant flooding, infrastructure damage, and other storm impacts, including downed trees and impacts to persons experiencing homelessness. On January 4, 2023, the City Manager issued a “Proclamation of Existence of Local Emergency.”
DISCUSSION: Chapter 2.20 of the City of Santa Cruz Municipal Code, at Section 2.20.030, empowers the Director of Emergency Services to proclaim the existence or threatened existence of a local emergency when the City is affected or likely to be affected by a public calamity or disaster, subject to confirmation by the City Council at the “earliest practicable time.” During the existence of such emergency, the Director of Emergency Services is also authorized, pursuant to Section 2.20.040(1), to “[m]ake and issue rules and regulations on matters reasonably related to the protection of life and property as affected by such emergency,” also subject to confirmation by the City Council “at the earliest practicable time.” In view of the facts and circumstances described above, on January 4, 2023, the City Manager declared the existence of a local emergency in the City of Santa Cruz. The City Council ratified the emergency declaration by Resolution No. NS-30,085 at its January 10, 2023 regular meeting.
At its regular meetings on January 24, 2023, March 14, 2023, May 9, 2023, June 27, 2023, August 22, 2023, and October 10, 2023, the Council adopted Resolution Nos. NS-30,095, NS30,116, NS-30,145, NS-30,166, NS-30,187, and NS-30,208, further extending the declaration of emergency by 60 days.
The attached resolution, if adopted by the City Council, would extend the emergency declaration related to the December 2022 and January 2023 winter storms emergency by an additional 60 days, to January 27, 2024.
FISCAL IMPACT: Actions taken by the City during a declared emergency are potentially recoverable from Cal OES (California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services) and FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency).
7.1 Prepared By:
Stephanie Duck
Deputy City Attorney
Submitted By:
Tony Condotti
City Attorney
Approved By:
Matt Huffaker
City Manager
ATTACHMENTS:
1. RESOLUTION.DOCX
7.2 RESOLUTION NO. NS-XX,XXX
A RESOLUTION OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF SANTA CRUZ EXTENDING
THE LOCAL EMERGENCY DECLARATION IN CONNECTION WITH THE DECEMBER 2022 AND JANUARY 2023 WINTER STORMS
WHEREAS, Santa Cruz Municipal Code section 2.20.030 empowers the City Manager, as the director of emergency services, to proclaim the existence or threatened existence of a local emergency when the City is affected or likely to be affected by a public calamity, subject to confirmation by the City Council at the earliest practicable time; and WHEREAS, on December 30 and 31st, 2022, the City of Santa Cruz experienced a major rain event (the "December 2022 Atmospheric River Winter Storm"); and WHEREAS, as a result of the December 2022 Atmospheric River Winter Storm, flooding, debris from trees, and mud impacted the San Lorenzo River and adjacent areas, including the Tannery area, San Lorenzo Park, and the beach. The San Lorenzo River reached
22.1 feet. Rainfall amounts exceeded 7 inches in the mountains over a 24-hour period; and WHEREAS, soil conditions in the City of Santa Cruz remain saturated as a result of the December 2022 Atmospheric River Winter Storm, and another powerful storm event occurred on January 4 and 5th, 2023, increasing flooding and other storm impacts, including downed trees, major infrastructure damage, and impacts to persons experiencing homelessness; and
WHEREAS, the County of Santa Cruz proclaimed the existence of a local emergency in the County on January 3, 2023; and
WHEREAS, in light of the foregoing and pursuant to his authority as Emergency Services Director, on January 4, 2023, the City Manager declared the existence of a local emergency (the "Emergency Proclamation"); and
WHEREAS, at its January 10, 2023 meeting, the City Council adopted Resolution No.
NS-30,085 declaring the existence of a State of Emergency in connection with the December 2022 and January 2023 winter storms, confirming the January 4, 2023 Emergency Proclamation by the Director of Emergency Services; and WHEREAS, at its regular meetings on January 24, 2023, March 14, 2023, May 9, 2023, June 27, 2023, August 22, 2023, and October 10, 2023, the Council adopted Resolution Nos. NS-30,095, NS-30,116, NS-30,145, NS-30,166, NS-30,187, and NS-30,208, further extending the declaration of emergency by 60 days; and
WHEREAS, damage to City infrastructure from the December 2022 and January 2023 winter storms is extensive and as a result, the City’s emergency response to the December 2022 and January 2023 winter storms will likely be ongoing.
7.3 RESOLUTION NO. NS-XX,XXX
2 NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the City Council of the City of Santa Cruz (City Council) as follows:
A. That the City Council hereby declares that the local emergency declaration adopted at its January 10, 2023 regular meeting by Resolution No. NS-30,085, and extended on January 24, 2023 by Resolution NS-30,095, on March 14, 2023 by Resolution NS-30,116, on May 9, 2023 by Resolution NS-30,145,on June 27, 2023 by Resolution NS-30,166, on August 22, 2023 by Resolution NS-30,187, and on October 10, 2023 by Resolution NS30,208, shall be extended an additional sixty (60) days from its adoption pursuant to California Government Code Section 8630, et seq., by this Resolution; and B. This resolution shall remain in full force and effect and shall thereafter terminate on the sixtieth (60th) day after its adoption, unless earlier terminated or further extended by subsequent City Council action.
PASSED AND ADOPTED this 28th day of November, 2023, by the following vote:
AYES:
NOES:
ABSENT:
DISQUALIFIED:
APPROVED: __________________________
Fred Keeley, Mayor
ATTEST: ___________________________
Bonnie Bush, City Clerk Administrator
7.4 MINUTES ARE UNOFFICIAL UNTIL APPROVED BY COUNCIL
City of Santa Cruz
809 Center Street
Santa Cruz, California 95060
MINUTES OF A CITY COUNCIL MEETING
November 14, 2023
12:45 PM
Mayor Keeley opened the City Council Closed Session at 12:47 p.m. in a public meeting via Zoom and in Council Chambers, for the purpose of announcing the agenda, and receiving public testimony.
Roll Call
Present: Councilmembers Newsome, Brown, Watkins, Brunner, KalantariJohnson; Vice Mayor Golder; Mayor Keeley.
Absent: None.
Staff: City Manager M. Huffaker, Assistant City Manager L. Schmidt, City Attorney T. Condotti, Director of Information Technology K. Morgan, Deputy City Clerk Administrator J. Wood, City Clerk Administrator B.
Bush.
Public Comment
Mayor Keeley opened the public comment period at 12:48 p.m. There were no speakers. Mayor Keeley closed the public comment period at 12:49 p.m., at which time the meeting was closed to the public and Council adjourned to the Courtyard Conference Room.
8.1 November 14, 2023 CITY COUNCIL MINUTES 6619
Closed Session
1. Conference With Legal Counsel – Liability Claims (Government Code §54956.95) 1) Claimant: Barbara Jeanne Lawrence
2) Claimant: Zita Morrow
Claims against the City of Santa Cruz
Council received a status report, took up under agenda item 12, and no reportable action was taken.
2. Conference With Legal Counsel – Anticipated Litigation (Government Code §54956.9(d)(2))
Significant exposure to litigation (two potential cases to be discussed) Council conferred with legal counsel and took no reportable action.
8.2 November 14, 2023 CITY COUNCIL MINUTES 6620
City of Santa Cruz
809 Center Street
Santa Cruz, California 95060
MINUTES OF A CITY COUNCIL MEETING
November 14, 2023
1:45 PM
Call to Order – Mayor Keeley called the meeting to order at 1:59 p.m. in Council Chambers.
Roll Call
Present: Councilmembers Newsome, Brown, Watkins, Brunner, KalantariJohnson; Vice Mayor Golder; Mayor Keeley.
Absent: None.
Staff: City Manager M. Huffaker, Assistant City Manager L. Schmidt (via Zoom), City Attorney T. Condotti, Director of Information Technology K.
Morgan, Director of Economic Development and Housing B. Lipscomb, Chief of Police B. Escalante, Interim Library Director E. Howard, Director of Planning and Community Development L. Butler, Chief of Fire R. Oatey, Water Director R. Menard (via Zoom), Director of Public Works N. Nguyen (via Zoom), Sustainability and Climate Action Manager T. Wise-West, Deputy Building Official J. McLucas, Principal Planner M.
VanHua, Principal Management Analyst V. Pearson, Deputy City Clerk Administrator J. Wood, City Clerk Administrator B. Bush.
Oral Communications Announcement - The Mayor provided a brief announcement about Oral Communications.
Oral Communications
At 2:00 p.m. Mayor Keeley opened Oral Communications for members of the public who wished to speak regarding items not listed on the City Council agenda.
Unidentified person spoke regarding the Downtown Plan that was discussed at the previous meeting.
Rhonda Reyna spoke regarding domestic violence, and asked Council to cease the Domestic Violence Awareness program, stating it is a waste of taxpayer money.
8.3 November 14, 2023 CITY COUNCIL MINUTES 6621
Oral Communications (continued)
Garrett spoke regarding a grant application proposal discussed at the previous meeting for preserving and promoting housing affordability and climate resilience.
Unidentified person spoke regarding the attacks on Palestine being funded by the United States government and asked Council to take a public stance against it.
Brad Snyder spoke regarding the high-density development downtown.
Unidentified person spoke asking Council to pass a resolution calling for a ceasefire on the attacks on Palestine.
At 2:14 p.m. Mayor Keeley closed Oral Communications.
Presentations
3. Arts and Economic Prosperity Study Results
Director of Economic Development B. Lipscomb spoke and introduced Jim Brown, Executive Director of the Santa Cruz County Arts Council, who gave a presentation on the Arts and Economic Prosperity Study results.
4. Mayoral Proclamation Declaring November 25, 2023 as Small Business Saturday Councilmember Kalantari-Johnson presented a proclamation to Director of Economic Development B. Lipscomb declaring November 25, 2023 as Small Business Saturday.
5. Friends of the Library to Present a Check for the Branciforte and Garfield Park Library Projects
Janis O’Driscoll, President of Friends of the Santa Cruz Public Libraries, spoke and presented a check to the City for the Branciforte and Garfield Park Library Projects.
Presiding Officer's Announcements – Mayor Keeley called on Councilmember Brunner to make an announcement about the United Against Hate Week events taking place across Santa Cruz County November 13—20, 2023.
Statements of Disqualification – None.
8.4 November 14, 2023 CITY COUNCIL MINUTES 6622
Additions and Deletions – City Clerk Administrator B. Bush announced that item 19 has been continued to the meeting of November 28, 2023.
City Attorney Report on Closed Session – See page 6619 for the report.
Council Meeting Calendar
6. The City Council reviewed and did not revise the meeting calendar attached to the agenda.
Consent Agenda
Vice Mayor Golder made a comment on item 8.
Councilmember Brown made a comment on item 16.
Mayor Keeley opened the public comment period. The following person spoke:
Unidentified person spoke regarding item 13.
Mayor Keeley closed the public comment period.
MOTION: Councilmember Watkins moved, seconded by Councilmember Newsome, to approve the Consent Agenda.
ACTION: The motion carried unanimously with the following vote.
AYES: Councilmembers Newsome, Brown, Watkins, Brunner, KalantariJohnson; Vice Mayor Golder; Mayor Keeley.
NOES: None.
ABSENT: None.
DISQUALIFIED: None.
7. Minutes of the October 24, 2023 City Council Meeting (CC) Motion carried to approve as submitted.
8. Resolution Setting the Regular Meeting Schedule for the Calendar Year 2024 (CC)
Resolution No. NS-30,235 was adopted setting the 2024 City Council meeting calendar.
8.5 November 14, 2023 CITY COUNCIL MINUTES 6623
Consent Agenda (continued)
9. Cooperative Retail Management Fund Budget Adjustment (ED) Resolution No. NS-30,236 was adopted amending the FY 2024 budget to allocate $190,000 of Cooperative Retail Management assessment funding to the Downtown Management Corporation.
10. Award Contract for Elevator Maintenance Services (FN) Motion carried to:
Award a contract, via a cooperative purchasing agreement, for the citywide purchases for Elevator Maintenance Services to Otis Elevator Company in Monterey, California for a 3-year term; and
Authorize the City Manager or designee to execute the agreement and any amendments within the approved operating budget.
11. Award Contract for Fuel, Oil, and Lubricants (FN)
Motion carried to award a contract for citywide purchases for on-call fuel, oil, and lubricants, to Tom Lopes Distributing, Inc. DBA Western States Oil (Western States Oil), San Jose, California in the amount not to exceed $1.5 million over 5 years and to authorize the City Manager to execute an agreement in a form approved by the City Attorney with Tom Lopes Distributing, Inc. DBA Western States Oil.
12. Liability Claims Filed Against the City of Santa Cruz (FN) Motion carried to reject the liability claims of 1) Barbara Jeanne Lawrence, and 2) Zita Morrow, based on staff recommendation.
8.6 November 14, 2023 CITY COUNCIL MINUTES 6624
Consent Agenda (continued)
13. Consideration to Add a Single-Family Residence Located at 118 Ortalon Circle in the R-1-10 (Single-Family Residence) Zone District to the City's Historic Building Survey. (Environmental Determination: Not a Project Subject to CEQA (Sec. 15061(b)(3), General Rule/Common Sense Exemption) Owners: Michael and Rachel Lewis, Filed 8/9/2023 (PL)
Resolution No. NS-30,237 was adopted adding the residence located at 118 Ortalon Circle to the City's Historic Building Survey, based on the noted findings.
14. San Lorenzo Park Redesign (c301907) – First Amendment to Agreement for Landscape Architectural Services and Budget Adjustment (PR) Motion carried to:
Approve and authorize the City Manager to execute an amendment to the professional services agreement with Bionic Landscape, Inc. for redesigning San Lorenzo Park, in a form approved by the City Attorney. The Director of Parks and Recreation is authorized to execute contract amendments within the approved project budget; and
Adopt Resolution No. NS-30,238 amending the FY 2024 budget and appropriating $40,000 from the Parks Facilities Tax Fund account and amending the Parks and Recreation Capital Investment Program budget from $100,000 to $140,000 in c301907 (San Lorenzo Park Redesign).
15. Award Contract for Trailer Jet (PW)
Motion carried to award a contract for the purchase of one replacement Trailer Jet from O’Brien Hydro-Jetting and Vacuum Systems, (Marietta, OH) in the amount of $107,856.69.
16. Striping Improvements at San Lorenzo Boulevard (c400809) (PW) Motion carried to approve the design and installation of traffic striping at San Lorenzo Boulevard (between Laurel Street and Jessie Street).
End Consent Agenda
8.7 November 14, 2023 CITY COUNCIL MINUTES 6625
Public Hearing
17. Amendments to Title 18 of the Municipal Code Creating an Energy Reach Code for Newly Constructed Buildings with the Intent to Provide Developers with a Range of Options that Will Meet Goals to Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions Associated with Fossil Fuel Citywide (PL/CM)
Sustainability and Climate Action Manager T. Wise-West and Deputy Building Official J. McLucas gave a presentation and responded to Council questions.
Farhad Farahmand, Advanced Energy Consultant with TRC Companies, Inc., responded to Council questions.
Director of Planning and Community Development L. Butler responded to Council questions.
Chief of Fire R. Oatey responded to Council questions.
Principal Planner M. VanHua responded to Council questions.
Mayor Keeley opened the public comment period. The following people spoke.
Unidentified person
Garrett
Jacqueline Griffith
Pete Kennedy
Susan Cavalieri
Peter Bagnall
Sophia Schwirzke
James Blomquist
Unidentified person
Mayor Keeley closed the public comment period.
8.8 November 14, 2023 CITY COUNCIL MINUTES 6626
Public Hearing (continued)
17. Amendments to Title 18 of the Municipal Code Creating an Energy Reach Code for Newly Constructed Buildings with the Intent to Provide Developers with a Range of Options that Will Meet Goals to Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions Associated with Fossil Fuel Citywide (PL/CM) (continued) MOTION: Councilmember Brown moved, seconded by Councilmember Brunner, to introduce for publication Ordinance No. 2023-12 amending Municipal Code Title 18 – Buildings and Construction, amending Section
18.04.030 and adding Chapter 18.15 to adopt local amendments to Title 24, Part 6 of the California Code of Regulations (California Energy Code) implementing an energy reach code with an intent to provide developers with a range of options that will also meet goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions associated with fossil fuel use citywide.
FRIENDLY AMENDMENT: Councilmember Watkins requested to direct staff to amend the ordinance to clarify that it is not applicable to remodels, expansions, or existing structures of any kind and return to Council for a second reading and final adoption. Councilmembers Brown and Brunner accepted.
ACTION: The motion carried unanimously with the following vote.
AYES: Councilmembers Newsome, Brown, Watkins, Brunner,
Kalantari-Johnson; Vice Mayor Golder; Mayor Keeley.
NOES: None.
ABSENT: None.
DISQUALIFIED: None.
8.9 November 14, 2023 CITY COUNCIL MINUTES 6627
General Business
18. FY 2023 Development Impact Fee Annual Report for Childcare and Public Safety Impact (Police and Fire) Fees (PL)
Principal Management Analyst V. Pearson gave a presentation and responded to Council questions.
Chief of Fire R. Oatey spoke and responded to Council questions.
Director of Planning and Community Development L. Butler responded to Council questions.
Water Director R. Menard responded to Council questions.
Mayor Keeley opened the public comment period. There were no speakers.
Mayor Keeley closed the public comment period.
MOTION: Councilmember Watkins moved, seconded by Vice Mayor Golder, to:
Accept and approve the attached FY 2023 Impact Fee Report for the Childcare and Public Safety Impact Fees; and
Direct staff to explore the potential applicability of the Childcare and Public Safety Impact Fees to 100 percent affordable housing projects.
ACTION: The motion carried with the following vote.
AYES: Councilmembers Newsome, Brown, Watkins, Brunner,
Kalantari-Johnson; Vice Mayor Golder.
NOES: Mayor Keeley.
ABSENT: None.
DISQUALIFIED: None.
19. An Ordinance Requiring Delivery Companies to Provide a Service Enabling Customers to Tip Delivery Drivers (CN)
This item was continued to the meeting of November 28, 2023 and was not discussed.
Adjournment – Vice Mayor Golder moved, seconded by Councilmember Newsome, to adjourn. By consensus City Council adjourned at 4:48 p.m.
8.10 November 14, 2023 CITY COUNCIL MINUTES 6628
Respectfully Submitted:
Julia Wood, Deputy City Clerk Administrator
Attest:
Bonnie Bush, City Clerk Administrator
Approved:
Fred Keeley, Mayor
8.11 City Council
AGENDA REPORT
DATE: 11/07/2023
AGENDA OF: 11/28/2023
DEPARTMENT: City Clerk
SUBJECT: Resolution Ordering an Election, Requesting the County to Conduct the Election, and Requesting Consolidation of the Election to be Held on March 5, 2024, for the Purpose of Placing the Housing for People Citizen Initiative Measure on the Ballot (CC)
RECOMMENDATION: Motion to:
1) Accept the certificate of verification of signatures for the Housing for People citizen initiative petition, and
2) Adopt a resolution ordering an election to be held on March 5, 2024, consolidating the election for the purpose of adding the measure to the ballot, and directing the City Attorney to prepare an impartial analysis in accordance with the requirements of Elections Code 9280.
BACKGROUND: On October 9, 2023, a citizen initiative petition, “Housing for People,” was submitted to the City Clerk for verification of signatures. The City Clerk, upon a prima facie count, determined there were more than the required number of actual signatures and delivered the petition to the County Clerk for further verification and certification. The County Clerk has certified that the petition had the minimum amount of signatures required for placement on the March 5, 2024 ballot. The certification is attached.
On October 24, 2023, Council directed the preparation of an impact report for the Housing for People measure, which will be presented to Council on January 23, 2024.
DISCUSSION: The resolution being presented orders the placement of the “Housing for People” measure on the March 5, 2024 ballot, and directs the City Attorney to prepare an impartial analysis in accordance with the requirements of Elections Code 9280.
Arguments for and/or against the measure, as well as the City Attorney’s impartial analysis, are due December 15, 2023. Council may provide guidance on and appoint signers for or against the measures, if desired.
FISCAL IMPACT: The cost of the election is estimated to be in the range of $110,709 to $184,515 based on figures from the Santa Cruz County Elections Department. This amount may fluctuate, based on the number of registered voters at the time of the election and the number of items the City places on the ballot.
9.1 Prepared By:
Bonnie Bush
City Clerk
Submitted By:
Laura Schmidt
Assistant City Manager
Approved By:
Matt Huffaker
City Manager
ATTACHMENTS:
1. RESOLUTION.DOCX
2. COUNTY CERTIFICATE OF EXAMINATION OF INITIATIVE PETITION.PDF
9.2 RESOLUTION NO. NS-30,
RESOLUTION OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF SANTA CRUZ ORDERING AN
ELECTION, REQUESTING COUNTY ELECTIONS TO CONDUCT THE ELECTION, REQUESTING CONSOLIDATION WITH THE PRIMARY ELECTION ON MARCH 5, 2024 FOR THE PURPOSE OF ADDING THE CITIZEN INITIATIVE MEASURE “HOUSING FOR PEOPLE” TO THE BALLOT, AND DIRECTING THE CITY ATTORNEY TO PREPARE AN
IMPARTIAL ANALYSIS OF THE MEASURE
WHEREAS, pursuant to Elections Code Section 10002, the governing body of any city may by resolution request the Board of Supervisors of the County of Santa Cruz to permit the county elections official to render specified services to the city relating to the conduct of an election; and
WHEREAS, the resolution of the governing body of the city shall specify the services requested; and
WHEREAS, pursuant to Elections Code Section 10002, the city shall reimburse the county in full for the services performed upon presentation of a bill to the city; and WHEREAS, pursuant to Elections Code Section 10400, whenever two or more elections of any legislative or congressional district, public district, city, county, or other political subdivision are called to be held on the same day, in the same territory, or in territory that is in part the same, they may be consolidated upon the order of the governing body or bodies or officer or officers calling the elections; and
WHEREAS, pursuant to Elections Code Section 10400, such election for cities and special districts may be either completely or partially consolidated; and WHEREAS, pursuant to Elections Code Section 10403, whenever an election called by a district, city, or other political subdivision for the submission of any question, proposition, or office to be filled is to be consolidated with a statewide election, and the question, proposition, or office to be filled is to appear upon the same ballot as that provided for that statewide election, the district, city or other political subdivision shall, at least 88 days prior to the date of the election, file with the board of supervisors, and a copy with the elections official, a resolution of its governing board requesting the consolidation, and setting forth the exact form of any question, proposition, or office to be voted upon at the election, as it is to appear on the ballot. Upon such request, the Board of Supervisors may order the consolidation; and
WHEREAS, pursuant to Elections Code Section 10418, if consolidated, the consolidated election shall be held and conducted, election boards appointed, voting precincts designated, candidates nominated, ballots printed, polls opened and closed, voter challenges determined, ballots counted and returned, returns canvassed, results declared, certificates of election issued, recounts conducted, election contests presented, and all other proceedings incidental to and connected with the election shall be regulated and done in accordance with the provisions of law
9.3 regulating the statewide or special election, or the election held pursuant to Section 1302 or 1303, as applicable.
WHEREAS, the resolution requesting the consolidation shall be adopted and filed at the same time as the adoption of the ordinance, resolution, or order calling the election; and WHEREAS, various district, county, state, and other political subdivision elections have been called to be held on March 5, 2024.
NOW THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED AND ORDERED that the City Council of the City of Santa Cruz hereby orders an election to be called and consolidated with any and all elections also called to be held on March 5, 2024 insofar as said elections are to be held in the same territory or in territory that is in part the same and requests the Board of Supervisors of the County of Santa Cruz to order such consolidation under Elections Code Sections 10401, 10403, and 10418.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED AND ORDERED that the City of Santa Cruz hereby requests the Board of Supervisors to permit the Santa Cruz County Elections Department to provide any and all services necessary for conducting the election and agrees to pay for said services, and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED AND ORDERED that the Santa Cruz County Elections Department shall conduct the election for the attached measure to be voted on at the March 5, 2024 election.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED AND ORDERED that the Santa Cruz County Elections Department is requested to print the attached measure text exactly as filed or indicated on the filed document in the County Voter Information Guide for the March 5, 2024 election. Cost of printing and distribution of the measure text will be paid for by the City.
Pursuant to its right, title, and authority under Section 3 of Article XI of the California Constitution and Sections 1415(a)(2) and 9255(b)(1) of the California Elections Code, the City Council hereby calls an election to be held in the City of Santa Cruz on Tuesday, March 5, 2024 for the purpose of submitting to the voters the following measure (and such other questions as the City Council may hereafter order to be presented to the voters):
Measure “___” Housing for People (see Exhibit A for full text) Shall the City of Santa Cruz Municipal Code be amended (retroactively to June Yes 1, 2023) to: (1) prohibit further amending the City’s General Plan, or Zoning Code or associated maps, to increase allowable building heights or Floor Area Ratios (FARs) for all residential and non-residential development projects in all zoning districts without prior voter approval; and (2) require developments thirty or more housing units to provide at least 25% inclusionary housing units (at unspecified levels of affordability)?
No
9.4 BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, the City Council hereby directs the City Clerk to transmit a copy of the measures to the City Attorney. The City Attorney shall prepare an impartial analysis of the measures showing the effect of the measure on the existing law and the operation of the measure.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, if any section, subsection, sentence, clause, or phrase of this resolution is, for any reason, held to be invalid or unconstitutional, such decision shall not affect the validity or constitutionality of the remaining portions of this resolution. The City Council hereby declares that it would have passed this resolution, and each section, subsection, sentence, clause or phrase hereof, irrespective of the fact that any one or more sections, subsections, sentences, clauses or phrases be declared invalid or unconstitutional.
PASSED AND ADOPTED this 28th day of November, 2023 by the following vote:
AYES:
NOES:
ABSENT:
DISQUALIFIED:
APPROVED: ______________________________
Fred Keeley, Mayor
ATTEST: _________________________________
Bonnie Bush, City Clerk Administrator
9.5 RESOLUTION NO. NS-30,XXX
EXHIBIT A
AN INITIATIVE MEASURE PROPOSING AN ORDINANCE THAT: (1) PROHIBITS THE SANTA CRUZ CITY COUNCIL FROM AMENDING THE CITY’S GENERAL PLAN OR
ZONING ORDINANCE IN A WAY THAT INCREASES ALLOWABLE HEIGHT LIMITS
OR FLOOR AREA RATIOS FOR DEVELOPMENT PROJECTS, WITHOUT A PRIOR VOTE OF THE PEOPLE; AND (2) INCREASES THE CITY’S INCLUSIONARY HOUSING REQUIREMENTS TO AT LEAST 25% FOR DEVELOPMENTS WITH 30 OR MORE
HOUSING UNITS
BE IT ORDAINED by the people of the City of Santa Cruz:
SECTION 1. TITLE.
The title of this ordinance shall be “Housing for People: An ordinance to provide sustainable, healthy, human-scale, housing design by requiring a vote of the people for any proposed building height and density increases beyond what is currently allowed, and to address the housing affordability crisis by increasing the required percentage of affordable units from 20% to 25% in new housing developments of 30 or more units.
SECTION 2. PURPOSES.
Purposes of the ordinance are as follows:
1. To require an affirmative vote of the people to increase the building height and density limits in the city’s General Plan or Zoning Ordinance. The people of the City of Santa Cruz have a democratic right to vote on amendments to the General Plan and/or Zoning Ordinance that would allow the construction of enormous, high-rise buildings with little to no affordable housing.
2. To prevent future development from exceeding the already significant height and density limits allowed in the current General Plan without an affirmative vote of the people.
3. To increase the low and moderate housing affordability requirements to at least 25% of new units for developments with 30 or more housing units (from the existing 20% requirement).
SECTION 3. FINDINGS.
It is hereby found and determined as follows:
1. The 2012 update to the Santa Cruz City General Plan (General Plan) significantly increased density and height limits along the City’s major corridors.
2. The State Density Bonus law allows individual developments to exceed both the density and height limits of proposed developments by 30-50% beyond what is set in the General Plan if affordability requirements are met.
3. Recently adopted state laws remove the City’s discretion to deny, or make infeasible, any proposed housing or multi-use development consistent with the General Plan and State Density Bonus Law, despite the potentially significant impacts they may have on existing neighborhoods, including impacts of traffic, noise, light pollution, air pollution, loss of sunlight; and on the city as a whole with impacts to water resources, open-space, city
9.6 infrastructure, city services, and overall visual quality.
4. The result of recent General Plan amendments increasing density and height limits, combined with recent State laws, is that major developments are likely to be constructed at heights and Floor Area Ratios (FARs) out of scale with surrounding neighborhoods, and thus will be inconsistent with the visual character of the City.
5. Any future amendments to the General Plan that permit height or FAR increases could have a devastating effect on the City’s beauty and quality of life, including impacts on access to sun and light, the city’s infrastructure and increase in traffic and climate-causing emissions.
6. The uniqueness of Santa Cruz as a diverse community with the feel of a small town could be lost forever with buildings at heights and with FAR beyond those allowed in the existing General Plan and further increased by the State Density Bonus law.
7. The majority of the City Council has approved moving forward with a Downtown Plan Expansion General Plan Amendment that would allow an unlimited number of concrete towers of up to 12-stories tall (with no height limit in feet specified) in a 29-acre area south of Laurel Street.
8. The San Lorenzo River riparian corridor adjacent to the downtown area is an important visual amenity and environmental resource that could be severely damaged by the proposed building heights in the proposed Downtown Plan Expansion project.
9. The multiple 12-story towers that would be allowed in the Downtown Plan Expansion area south of Laurel could easily be twice as tall and bulky as the massive building being constructed at Pacific/Laurel/Front, and twice as tall as the Dream Inn and the Palomar Hotel, and would fundamentally change the visual character and beauty of the City forever.
10. Approval of 12-story height limits (with no objective height limit in feet) throughout the 29- acre Downtown Plan Expansion project area would set a dangerous precedent and likely lead to pressures for buildings of similar and greater heights elsewhere in the City.
11. Once the proposed height limit increases in the Downtown Plan Expansion project are approved and incorporated into the General Plan, they would be essentially irreversible, and state law would require that developments consistent with them be approved irrespective of any damaging impacts they would have on the City’s visual quality, climate-changing emissions and character.
12. The City of Santa Cruz is in the middle of a housing cost crisis which is most serious for its lower and moderate income residents, yet the City’s 20% affordable inclusionary requirement is rarely met due to application of the State Density Bonus law, often resulting in a net of less than 13% of the new units being affordable.
13. As one of the least affordable cities in the country, the City needs to respond better to its affordable housing crisis by increasing requirements on market rate developments to provide more housing for moderate and lower income families.
14. The City’s existing affordable housing requirements are insufficient to meet the need to adequately counter the affordable housing crisis.
15. The proposed Downtown Plan Expansion project would result in the loss of a significant amount of existing affordable housing and displace low-income, disabled and other residents.
9.7 16. The existing General Plan allows for an increase of 8,364 residential units (thought the current state goal is 3736 units) and the draft Housing Element (Appendix G) states the city has a build-out capacity (which is available space under EXISTING zoning) to add 8,364 more units. This number of additional units is more than adequate to provide for the housing that Santa Cruz needs to contribute to meet the state housing goals of 3,736 by 2031, thus we do not need to allow 12 story buildings to meet our current RHNA housing target.
17. This initiative, if adopted, would produce more affordable housing while ensuring that city residents play a key role in decision-making on land use policy.
SECTION 4. IMPLEMENTATION
1. POLICIES. It is hereby determined that the following policies are approved:
1. The Santa Cruz City Council shall not adopt amendments to the City’s General Plan or Zoning Ordinance that increase the allowable height limits or Floor Area Ratios (FAR) for development projects, which are greater than the height limits and FAR in effect in the City’s General Plan as of June 1, 2023 (or the earliest date allowed by law), without a prior vote of the people approving the proposed increase. 2. The inclusionary housing requirements shall be increased from the existing 20% to at least 25% for developments with 30 or more housing units.
2. CITY COUNCIL ACTIONS. In order to carry out the policies contained in this ordinance the City Council is directed to take the following actions: 1. Codify the following policy in the City’s Zoning Ordinance Section 24.06.080: 2. Height Limits. No amendments to the General Plan or Zoning Ordinance that would increase allowable height limits or Floor Area Ratios (FAR) for development projects shall be adopted without a prior vote of the people approving the proposed increase. 3. Amend the Zoning Ordinance to increase the inclusionary requirements to at least 25% for developments with 30 or more housing units.
SECTION 5. SEVERABILITY. If any portion of this ordinance is hereafter determined to be invalid, all remaining portions of this ordinance shall remain in full force and effect, and to this extent, this ordinance are severable.
SECTION 6. EFFECTIVE DATE. This ordinance shall take effect June 1, 2023 or as early as possible as provided by the State of California Elections Code and/or pertinent case law.
9.8 9.9
9.10 City Council
AGENDA REPORT
DATE: 11/10/2023
AGENDA OF: 11/28/2023
DEPARTMENT: City Manager
SUBJECT: EMC Research, Inc. – First Amendment to Contract (CM) RECOMMENDATION: Motion authorizing the City Manager to execute a $51,000 amendment in a form approved by the City Attorney to the agreement with EMC Research, Inc. for public opinion research and polling services. The City Manager is authorized to execute future contract amendments within the approved budget.
BACKGROUND: In April 2023, the City Manager’s Office initiated a Request for Proposals (RFP) for public opinion research and polling services and subsequently awarded contracts to the top two respondents, EMC Research, Inc. (EMC) and Fairbank, Maslin, Maullin, Metz & Assoc. (FM3). The associated agreements were each for a not to exceed $99,000.
Subsequently, the City executed statements of work for two surveys with EMC: sugarysweetened beverage and a half-cent sales tax.
1. Sugary-Sweetened Beverage Tax Poll – $36,200
Polling services related to a potential ballot measure for a sugary-sweetened beverage tax to be placed on a 2024 ballot.
2. Half-Cent Sales Tax Poll – $39,700
Polling services related to a potential ballot measure for a half-cent sales tax to be placed on a 2024 ballot.
DISCUSSION: Contracts over $100,000 must go to Council and an additional survey for West Cliff plus potential follow-up work will mean that this threshold will be exceeded.
Staff recommends a contract amendment to EMC for a grand total of $150,000.
FISCAL IMPACT: Funds are available in the FY 2024 City Manager’s Office and Public Works budgets.
Prepared By:
Emeline Nguyen
Principal Management
Analyst
Submitted By:
Laura Schmidt
Assistant City Manager
Approved By:
Matt Huffaker
City Manager
10.1 ATTACHMENTS:
1. EMC RESEARCH FIRST AMENDMENT.PDF
2. EMC RESEARCH CONTRACT.PDF
10.2 City of Santa Cruz Professional Services Agreement for Professional Polling and Public Opinion Outreach September 2023 (Form Rev.01/23) Page 1
Professional Services Agreement With
EMC RESEARCH
For
PROFESSIONAL POLLING AND PUBLIC OPINION RESEARCH
THIS AGREEMENT for professional services is made by and between the City of Santa Cruz (“City”) and EMC Research, Inc. (“Consultant”) (each is referred to individually as a “Party” and collectively, as the “Parties”) as of July 1, 2023 (the “Effective Date”).
NOW, THEREFORE, in consideration of each other’s mutual promises, the Parties hereto agree as follows:
SECTION 1: SCOPE OF WORK
Consultant will furnish services as defined and described in the Scope of Work, attached hereto as Exhibit A and incorporated herein.
SECTION 2: RESPONSIBILITIES OF CONSULTANT
All work performed by Consultant, or under Consultant’s direction, shall be rendered in accordance with the generally accepted practices, and to the standards of, Consultant's profession. Consultant represents and agrees that Consultant: (i) is fully experienced and properly qualified to perform the work and services provided for herein, (ii) has the financial capability required for the performance of the work and services, and (iii) is properly equipped and organized to perform the work and services in a competent, timely, and proper manner, in accordance with the requirements of this Agreement.
Consultant shall not undertake any work beyond the Scope of Work set forth in Exhibit A, included in the Consultant’s Proposal to Conduct Research on Potential Ballot Measures dated June 9, 2023, unless such additional work is approved in advance and in writing by City. The cost of such additional work shall be reimbursed to Consultant by City on the same basis as provided for in Section 4. Each project conducted under the Scope of Work will be on a case-by-case basis with individual statements of work.
If, in performing the work, it is necessary to conduct field operations, security and safety of the job site will be the Consultant's responsibility excluding, the security and safety of any facility of City within the job site which is not under the Consultant's control.
Consultant shall meet with Laura Schmidt, Assistant City Manager of the City Manager’s Office, hereinafter called "Director", or other designated and authorized City personnel, or third parties as necessary, on all matters connected with carrying out of Consultant’s services described in Exhibit A. Such meetings shall be held at the request of either Party. Review and City approval of completed work shall be obtained monthly, or at other intervals as may be mutually agreed upon during the course of this Agreement. Review, approval, or acceptance of Consultant’s work by City or others shall not relieve Consultant from responsibility for errors and omissions in Consultant’s work.
SECTION 3: RESPONSIBILITIES OF THE CITY
City shall make available to Consultant all necessary data and information in the City's possession and shall actively assist Consultant in obtaining such information from other agencies and individuals as needed. Consultant is entitled to reasonably rely upon the accuracy and completeness of such data and information, and Consultant shall provide City prompt written notice of any known defects in such data and information.
The Director may authorize a staff person to serve as his or her representative. The work in progress shall be reviewed at such intervals as may be mutually agreed upon between the Parties. The City will be the sole judge of
10.3 City of Santa Cruz Professional Services Agreement for Professional Polling and Public Opinion Outreach September 2023 (Form Rev.01/23) Page 2
acceptable work, provided that such approval will not be unreasonably withheld or delayed. If the work is not acceptable, City will inform Consultant of the changes or revisions necessary to secure approval.
SECTION 4: FEES AND PAYMENT
For services actually performed, the City will compensate Consultant at the rates set forth in the Fee Schedule detailed in Exhibit A, pages 16 and 25, and in accordance with the terms set forth therein. Payment for Consultant's services in carrying out the entire Scope of Work shall be made within the budget limit, or limits shown, upon Exhibit A. Such payment shall be considered the full compensation for all personnel, materials, supplies, and equipment used by Consultant in the Scope of Work. Markups shall not be charged for any approved sub-consultants or subcontractors.
Consultant agrees that the payments to Consultant specified in this Section 4 will constitute full and complete compensation for all obligations assumed by Consultant under this Agreement. Where conflicts regarding compensation may occur, the provisions of this section apply.
Variations from the budget for each task which are justified by statements indicating personnel time expended and submittal of a revised budget are only allowed with prior City approval; however, in no event shall the total fee charged for the Scope of Work set forth in Exhibit A exceed an annual budget of $99,000 without advance written City authorization in the form of an amendment or change order.
Invoices shall detail the time worked by each class of employee on each task and the expenses incurred for which billing is made. Invoices shall indicate the percentage completion of each work task as identified in the Scope of Work in Exhibit A and the overall percentage of completion of the total required services. Unless otherwise specified in the fee schedule, payments shall be made monthly by the City within 30 days based on itemized invoices from the Consultant which list the actual costs and expenses.
All invoices shall contain the following affidavit signed by Consultant (if individual) or by a principal of Consultant’s firm (if Consultant is an entity):
"I hereby certify [or as principal of Consultant] that the charge of (Insert invoice amount) as summarized above and shown in detail on the attachments is a fair and reasonable use of public funds, is in accordance with the terms of Agreement dated (Insert Agreement Date), and has not been previously paid."
This Agreement is contingent upon the appropriation of sufficient funding by the City for the services covered by this Agreement. If funding is reduced or deleted by the City for the services covered by this Agreement, the City has the option without penalty or liability to either terminate this Agreement or to offer an amendment to this Agreement indicating the reduced amount.
SECTION 5: TRAVEL REIMBURSEMENT POLICY
The City shall not be responsible for any travel, meal, or lodging reimbursements to Consultant and/or Consultant’s employees.
SECTION 6: CHANGES IN WORK
City may negotiate changes in the Scope of Work. No changes in the Scope of Work shall be made without the written approval of City and Consultant. Any change requiring compensation in excess of the sum specified in Section 4 shall be approved in advance in writing by the City. Only City’s authorized representative(s) is authorized to approve changes to this Agreement on behalf of City.
10.4 City of Santa Cruz Professional Services Agreement for Professional Polling and Public Opinion Outreach September 2023 (Form Rev.01/23) Page 3
SECTION 7: TERM AND SCHEDULE
The term of this Agreement shall be from the Effective Date of this Agreement and terminating June 30, 2025, upon completion of the Scope of Work. At the option of the City, this Agreement may be renewed for up to two additional 2-year terms under the same contractual terms and conditions by letter agreement.
Before undertaking any work under this Agreement, City will specify in a written authorization the parameters of the research to be conducted with an individual statement of work for that project. Consultant shall begin work as specified in said written authorization (e.g., Notice to Proceed) to perform services. The written authorization to perform work shall not be issued until after this Agreement has been approved and authorized by the City.
The Work Schedule for completion of the work shall be as shown upon Exhibit A, pages 11 and 12,. In the event that major changes are ordered, the schedule for completion as stated in Exhibit A may be adjusted by City so as to allow Consultant a reasonable period of time within which to complete any additional work which may be required as a result of the ordered changes.
Neither party will be held responsible for delay or default caused by declared emergencies, natural disasters, or any Force Majeure event which is beyond the party's reasonable control. Consultant will, however, make all reasonable efforts to remove or eliminate such a cause of delay or default and will, upon the cessation of the cause, diligently pursue performance of its obligations in this Agreement.
The City reserves the right to obtain the item(s) and/or services covered by this Agreement from another source during any on-going suspension of service due to the circumstances outlined above.
Consultant acknowledges that it is necessary for Consultant to complete its work on or before the completion date set forth in Exhibit A in order to allow the City to achieve its objectives for entering into this Agreement. The Parties therefore agree that time is of the essence in the performance of this Agreement.
SECTION 8: TERMINATION
The City may terminate the Agreement for any reason by providing written notice to Consultant not less than 10 calendar days prior to an effective termination date.
The Consultant may terminate the Agreement for cause by providing written notice to the City` not less than 30 calendar days prior to an effective termination date.
The City may, at its option, allow Consultant to cure its failure to perform within 10 business days (or longer period authorized in writing by the City) from the date of the City’s termination notice. The termination shall be become effective if Consultant has not cured within the specified time period to the City’s satisfaction.
Consultant may terminate this Agreement for cause if the City fails to cure a material default in performance within a period of 30 calendar days (or such longer period agreed to by the Consultant), from date of the Consultant’s written termination notice specifying the default in performance.
Upon notice of termination by either the City or Consultant, the Consultant will immediately act to not incur any additional obligations, costs or expenses, except as may be reasonably necessary to terminate its activities. The City’s only obligation to the Consultant will be just and equitable payment for services authorized by, and received to the satisfaction of, the City up to and including the effective date of termination less any amounts withheld. All finished or unfinished work or documents procured or produced under the Agreement will become property of the City upon the termination date. In the event of Consultant’s failure to perform pursuant to the Agreement, the City reserves the right to obtain services elsewhere and Consultant will be liable for the difference between the prices
10.5 City of Santa Cruz Professional Services Agreement for Professional Polling and Public Opinion Outreach September 2023 (Form Rev.01/23) Page 4
set forth in the terminated Agreement and the actual cost to the City. Termination of the Agreement pursuant to this paragraph shall not relieve the Consultant of any liability to City for additional costs, expenses, or damages sustained by City due to failure of the Consultant to perform pursuant to the Agreement. City may withhold any payments to Consultant for the purpose of set-off until such time as the exact amount of damages due City from Consultant is determined. After the effective date of termination, Consultant will have no further claims against the City under the Agreement. No other compensation will be payable for anticipated profit on unperformed services.
SECTION 9: INSURANCE
Prior to the beginning of and throughout the duration of the Agreement, Consultant will maintain and comply with the Insurance Requirements as set forth in Exhibit B. Consultant will insure the City against claims for injuries to persons or damages to property which may arise from or in connection with the performance of the work hereunder. The insurance coverages required shall not in any way limit the liability of the Consultant.
SECTION 10: INDEMNIFICATION
Consultant agrees, to the fullest extent permitted by law, to indemnify, defend, and hold harmless the City, its officials, officers, employees, agents, and volunteers (collectively, “Indemnitees”) from and against any and all liability, claim, action, loss, injury, damage, judgment, or expense, including attorneys’ fees and costs (“Losses”) caused by or resulting from the negligence, recklessness, or willful misconduct of Consultant, Consultant’s officers, employees, agents, or subcontractors in any way related to this Agreement. Consultant’s duty to indemnify and hold harmless Indemnitees shall not apply to the extent such Losses are caused by the sole or active negligence or willful misconduct of Indemnitees. Consultant’s obligation to defend shall arise regardless of any claim or assertion that Indemnitees caused or contributed to the Losses.
In the event this Agreement involves the performance of design professional services by Consultant, Consultant’s officers, employees, agents, or subcontractors, Consultant’s costs to defend Indemnitees shall not exceed the Consultant’s proportionate percentage of fault per Civil Code §2782.8. This section shall survive the termination or expiration of this Agreement.
SECTION 11: EQUAL EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITY/NON-DISCRIMINATION POLICIES City’s policies promote a working environment free from abusive conduct, discrimination, harassment, and retaliation; and require equal opportunity in employment for all regardless of race, religious creed (including religious dress and grooming practices), color, national origin (including language use restrictions), ancestry, religion, disability (mental and physical), medical condition, sex, gender (including gender identity and gender expression), physical characteristics, marital status, age, sexual orientation, genetic information (including family health history and genetic test results), organizational affiliation, and military or veteran status, or any other consideration made unlawful by local, State or Federal law. City requires Consultant to comply with all applicable Federal and State and local equal employment opportunity laws and regulations, and Consultant is responsible for ensuring that effective policies and procedures concerning the prevention of abusive conduct, discrimination, harassment, and retaliation exist in Consultant’s business organization. The City’s current Equal Employment Opportunity and Non-Discrimination policies to which this Section applies may be viewed at http://www.codepublishing.com/CA/SantaCruz/?SantaCruz09/SantaCruz0983.html and http://www.cityofsantacruz.com/home/showdocument?id=59192.
SECTION 12: LEGAL ACTION/ATTORNEYS’ FEES
If any action at law or in equity is brought to enforce or interpret the provisions of this Agreement, the prevailing party shall be entitled to reasonable attorneys’ fees in addition to any other relief. The laws of the State of California, with jurisdiction in the Santa Cruz County Superior Court, shall govern all matters relating to the validity, interpretation, and
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effect of this Agreement and any authorized or alleged changes, the performance of any of its terms, as well as the rights and obligations of Consultant and the City.
SECTION 13: AMENDMENTS
This Agreement may not be amended in any respect except by way of a written instrument which expressly references and identifies this particular Agreement, which expressly states that its purpose is to amend this particular Agreement, and which is duly executed by the City and Consultant. Consultant acknowledges that no such amendment shall be effective until approved and authorized by the City’s authorized representative. No representative of the City is authorized to obligate the City to pay the cost or value of services beyond the scope of services set forth in Exhibit A.
Such authority is retained solely by the City Manager, Director, or their designee. Unless expressly authorized by the City Manager or Director, Consultant’s compensation shall be limited to that set forth in Section 4, Fee Schedule.
SECTION 14: MISCELLANEOUS PROVISIONS
1. Project Manager/Key Staff. Director reserves the right to evaluate and confer with Consultant regarding the project manager or other key staff assigned by Consultant to perform the work under this Agreement. Consultant shall replace the project manager or key staff upon Director’srequest due to Director’s concern about their performance, or City shall have the right to terminate this Agreement. Otherwise, no change in assignment by the Consultant may occur without prior written approval of the City.
2. Consultant Services Only. Consultant is employed to render professional services only and any payments made to Consultant are compensation solely for such professional services.
3. Independent Contractor. In the performance of this Agreement, it is expressly understood that Consultant, including each of Consultant’s employees, agents, subcontractors or others under Consultant’s supervision or control, is an independent contractor solely responsible for its own acts and omissions, and shall not be considered an employee of the City for any purpose. Consultant agrees to comply with AB5, codified at Labor Code section 2750.3, and shall indemnify, defend and hold harmless the City, its officials, officers, employees, and agents against any claim or liability, including attorneys’ fees and costs, arising in any manner related to this Agreement that an employee, agent or others under Consultant’s supervision or control was misclassified.
4. Consultant Not an Agent. Except as City may specify in writing, Consultant shall have no authority, express or implied, to act on behalf of City in any capacity whatsoever as an agent. Consultant shall have no authority, express or implied, pursuant to this Agreement to bind City to any obligation whatsoever.
5. Subcontractors. Consultant shall obtain prior approval of the City prior to subcontracting of any work pursuant to this Agreement. If at any time, the City determines any subcontractor is incompetent or unqualified, Consultant will be notified and will be expected to immediately cancel the subcontract. Consultant shall require and verify that all subcontractors maintain insurance meeting all of the requirements stated herein, including naming the City of Santa Cruz, its officers, officials, employees, agents, and volunteers as additional insureds. Any modification to the insurance requirements for subcontractors must be agreed to by the City in writing.
6. Assignment. This Agreement shall not be assigned without first obtaining the express written consent of the Director or after approval of the City Council. Neither party may assign this Agreement unless this Agreement is amended in accordance with its terms.
7. Conflicts of Interest. Consultant agrees to comply with conflict of interest lawsin performing the work and services under this Agreement. Consultant covenants (on behalf of Consultant and Consultant’s employees, agents, representatives, and subcontractors) that there is no direct or indirect interest, financial or otherwise, which would conflict in any manner or degree with the performance of services required under this Agreement. Consultant
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acknowledges and agrees to comply with applicable provisions of conflict of interest law and regulations, including the CA Political Reform Act, Sections 1090 and 87100 of the Government Code, and the City’s conflict of interest code. Consultant will immediately advise City if Consultant learns of a conflicting financial interest of Consultant during the term of this Agreement.
8. City Property. The work, or any portion, of Consultant in performing this Agreement shall become the property of City. The Consultant may be permitted to retain copies of such work for information and reference in connection only with the provision of services for the City. All materials and work product, whether finished or unfinished, shall be delivered to City upon completion of contract services or termination of this Agreement for any reason.
Consultant acknowledges and agrees that the work product shall be considered a work made for hire within the meaning of the patent and copyright laws of the United States; and Consultant agrees that all copyrights which arise from creation of project-related documents and materials pursuant to this Agreement shall be vested in the City and Consultant waives and relinquishes all claims to copyright or other intellectual property rights in favor of City. Any work product related to this Agreement shall be confidential, not to be used by the Consultant on other projects or disclosed to any third party, except by agreement in writing by the City, or except as otherwise provided herein.
Consultant’s final deliverables shall comply with Section 508 (29 U.S.C. Section 794d) accessibility requirements, as applicable.
9. Intellectual Property and Indemnity. Consultant represents to City that, to the best of Consultant’s knowledge, any Intellectual Property (including but not limited to: patent, patent application, trade secret, copyright and any applications or right to apply for registration, computersoftware programs or applications, tangible or intangible proprietary information, or any other intellectual property right) in connection with any services and/or products related to this Agreement does not violate or infringe upon any Intellectual Property rights of any other person or entity.
To the fullest extent permitted by law, Consultant agrees to indemnify, defend, and hold harmless City, its officials, officers, employees, and agents, from any and all claims, demands, actions, liabilities, damages, or expenses (including reasonable attorneys’ fees and costs) arising out of a claim of infringement, actual or alleged, direct or contributory, of any Intellectual Property rights in any way related to Consultant’s performance under this Agreement or to the City’s authorized intended or actual use of Consultant’s product or service under this Agreement. This provision shall survive termination or expiration of this Agreement.
If any product or service becomes, or in the Consultant’s opinion is likely to become, the subject of a claim of infringement, the Consultant shall, at its sole expense: (i) provide the City the right to continue using the product or service; or (ii) replace or modify the product or service so that it becomes non-infringing; or (iii) if none of the foregoing alternatives are possible even after Consultant’s commercially reasonable efforts, in addition to other available legal remedies, City will have the right to return the product or service and receive a full or partial refund of an amount equal to the value of the returned product or service, less the unpaid portion of the purchase price and any other amounts, which may be due to the Consultant. City shall have the right to retrieve its data and proprietary information at no charge prior to any return of the product or termination of service.
10. Confidentiality.
a. Consultant shall not acquire any ownership interest in data and information (“City Data”) received by Consultant from City, which shall remain the property of the City. Certain information may be considered confidential (“Confidential Information”). Confidential Information shall mean all information or proprietary materials (in every form and media) not generally known to the public and which has been or is hereafter disclosed or made available directly or indirectly to Consultant through any means of communication, either verbally or in writing even if it has not been designated in writing as “Confidential” to Consultant in connection with this Agreement. Unless otherwise required by law, Consultant shall not,
10.8 City of Santa Cruz Professional Services Agreement for Professional Polling and Public Opinion Outreach September 2023 (Form Rev.01/23) Page 7
without City’s written permission, use or disclose City Data and/or Confidential Information other than in the performance of the obligations under this Agreement. As between Consultant and City, all City Confidential Information shall remain the property of the City. Consultant shall not acquire ownership interest in the City’s Confidential Information.
b. Consultant shall be responsible for ensuring and maintaining the security and confidentiality of City Data and Confidential Information, protect against any anticipated threats or hazards to the security or integrity of City Data and Confidential Information, protect against unauthorized access to or use of City Data and Confidential Information that could result in substantial harm or inconvenience to City or any end users; and ensure the proper return and/or disposal of City Data and Confidential Information upon termination of this Agreement with notice to the City.
c. Consultant shall take appropriate action to address any incident of unauthorized access to City Data and Confidential Information, including addressing and/or remedying the issue that resulted in such unauthorized access, notifying City as soon as possible of any incident of unauthorized access to City Data and Confidential Information, or any other breach in Consultant’s security that materially affects City or end users; and be responsible for ensuring compliance by its officers, employees, agents, and subcontractors with the confidentiality provisions hereof. Should confidential and/or legally protected City Data be divulged to unauthorized third parties, Consultant shall comply with all applicable federal and state laws and regulations, including but not limited to California Civil Code sections 1798.29 and 1798.82 at Consultant’s sole expense. Consultant shall not charge City for any expenses associated with Consultant’s compliance with these obligations.
d. Consultant shall defend, indemnify and hold harmless City, its officials, officers, employees and agents against any claim, liability, loss, injury or damage (including attorneys’ fee and costs) arising out of, or in connection with, the unauthorized use, access, and/or disclosure of City Data and/or Confidential Information by Consultant and/or its agents, employees or subcontractors, excepting only loss, injury or damage caused by the sole negligence or willful misconduct of the City. This provision shall survive the termination or expiration of this Agreement.
11. Consultant's Records. Consultant shall maintain accurate accounting records and other written documentation pertaining to the costs incurred relating to this Agreement for examination and audit by the City, State, or federal government, as applicable, during the period of this Agreement, and for a period of at least five (5) years from the date of the final City payment for Consultant's services, or date of the termination of this Agreement, whichever is later. If Consultant engages a subcontractor to perform work related to this Agreement with a cost of $10,000 or more over a 12-month period, such subcontract shall contain these same requirements. This provision shall survive the termination of this Agreement.
12. California Public Records Act. City is a public agency subject to the disclosure requirements of the California Public Records Act (“CPRA”). If Consultant’s proprietary information is contained in documents or information submitted to City, and Consultant claims that such information falls within one or more CPRA exemptions, Consultant must clearly mark such information “Confidential and Proprietary,” and identify the specific lines containing the information. In the event of a request for such information, City will make best efforts to provide notice to Consultant prior to such disclosure. If Consultant contends that any documents are exempt from the CPRA and wishes to prevent disclosure, it is required to obtain a protective order, injunctive relief, or other appropriate remedy from a court of law in Santa Cruz County before the City is required to respond to the CPRA request. If Consultant fails to obtain such remedy within the time the City is required to respond to the CPRA request, City may disclose the requested information without any liability. Consultant further agrees that it shall defend, indemnify and hold City harmless against any claim, action or litigation (including but not limited to all judgments, costs, and attorney’s fees) that may result from denial by City of a
10.9 City of Santa Cruz Professional Services Agreement for Professional Polling and Public Opinion Outreach September 2023 (Form Rev.01/23) Page 8
CPRA request for information arising from any representation, or any action (or inaction), by the Consultant.
13. Compliance with Laws. All activities of Consultant, its employees, subcontractors and/or agents will be carried out in compliance with all applicable federal, state, and local laws and regulations. Consultant further agrees to comply with the covenant of good faith and fair dealing and other provisions of Santa Cruz Municipal Ordinance chapter 3.09, or otherwise Consultant may be subject to penalties including being declared an irresponsible contractor.
14. Licensure. Consultant agrees that Consultant, its subcontractors and/or agents (if any) has/have complied with all applicable federal, state, and local licensing requirements and agrees to provide proof of a current City of Santa Cruz Business Tax Certificate if:
• Consultant, its subcontractor(s) and agent(s) or its business is/are located in the City of Santa Cruz; • Will perform actual work in the City of Santa Cruz for 6 or more days annually; or • Will use company vehicles to deliver within the City of Santa Cruz for 6 or more days annually.
For additional information and licensing requirements, view the City’s Business Licenses and Permits webpage or call the Revenue and Taxation division at 831/420-5070.
15. Living Wage. Every contract for services to the City for $10,000 or more, is subject to City of Santa Cruz Living Wage Ordinance number 2000-25. If applicable, Consultant agrees to comply with the requirements of the Living Wage ordinance as provided in Santa Cruz Municipal Code Chapter 5.10.
16. Prevailing Wages for Public Work. To the extent that the work or services to be performed under this Agreement may be considered a “public work” (construction, alteration, demolition, or repair work) pursuant and subject to Labor Code section 1720 et seq., Consultant (and any subconsultant performing the work or services) shall conform to any and all prevailing wage requirements applicable to such work/and or services under this Agreement. Consultant (and any subconsultant) shall adhere to the prevailing wage determinations made by the Director of Industrial Relations (DIR) pursuant to California Labor Code Part 7, Chapter 1, Article 2, applicable to the work, if any. All workers employed in the execution of a public works contract (as such term is defined California Labor Code section 1720 et seq. and section 1782(d)(1)) must be paid not less than the specified prevailing wage rates for the type of work performed. (CA Labor Code sections 1720, 1774 and 1782.) To the extent applicable to the scope of work and services under this Agreement, Consultant agrees to be bound by the state prevailing wage requirements, including, but not limited to, the following:
a. If a worker is paid less than the applicable prevailing wage rate owed for a calendar day (or any portion thereof), Consultant shall pay the worker the difference between the prevailing wage rate and the amount actually paid for each calendar day (or portion thereof) for which the worker(s) was paid less than the prevailing wage rate, as specified in Labor Code section 1775; b. Consultant shall maintain and make available payroll and worker records in accordance with Labor Code sections 1776 and 1812;
c. If Consultant employs (and/or is legally required to employ) apprentices in performing the work and/or services under this Agreement, Consultant shall ensure compliance with Labor Code section 1777.5; d. Consultant is aware of the limitations imposed on overtime work by Labor Code sections 1810 et seq. and shall be responsible for any penalties levied in accordance with Labor Code section 1813 for failing to pay required overtime wages;
e. Consultant shall post a copy of the applicable wage rates at each jobsite at a location readily available to its workers.
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f. Any failure of Consultant and/or its subconsultant to comply with the above requirements relating to a public work project shall constitute a breach of this Agreement that excuses the City’s performance of this Agreement at the City’s sole and absolute option and shall be at the sole risk of Consultant. Consultant on behalf of itself and any subconsultant, agree to indemnify, defend and hold harmless the City and its officials, officers, employees, and agents from and against any and all claims, liabilities, losses, costs, expenses, attorney’s fees, damages, expenses, fines, financial consequences, interest, and penalties, of any kind or nature, arising from or relating to any failure (or alleged failure) of the Consultant and any subconsultant to pay prevailing wages or to otherwise comply with the requirements of prevailing wage law relating to a public work.
g. Consultant acknowledges that it and/or any subconsultant may not engage in the performance of any contract for public work unless currently registered with the DIR and qualified to perform public work pursuant to Labor Code section 1725.5 [with limited exceptions from this requirement for bid purposes only under Labor Code section 1771.1(a)].
17. Storm Water Requirements. To the extent applicable to the Scope of Work under this Agreement, Consultant, Consultant’s employees, subcontractors, and agents are required to abide by the applicable City of Santa Cruz Storm Water Best Management Practices (BMPs) for the duration of the work. The City’s mandatory Storm Water BMPs, which are listed according to the type of work, operations, or business, are located on the City website at: https://www.cityofsantacruz.com/government/city-departments/public-works/stormwater/bestmanagement-practices
18. Dispute Resolution. The Parties agree to attempt in good faith to resolve through negotiation any dispute, claim or controversy arising out of or relating to this Agreement. Either party may initiate negotiations by providing written notice in letter form to the other party, setting forth the subject of the dispute and the relief requested.
Promptly upon such notification, the Parties shall meet at a mutually agreeable time and place in order to exchange relevant information and perspective, and to attempt to resolve the dispute. In the event that no resolution is achieved, and if, but only if, the parties mutually agree, then prior to pursuing formal legal action, the parties shall make a good faith effort to resolve the dispute by non-binding mediation or negotiations between representatives with decision-making power, who, to the extent possible, shall not have had substantive involvement in the matters of the dispute. To the extent that the dispute involves or relates to a public works project, the Parties agree to attempt to resolve the dispute by complying with the claims process as set forth in Public Contract Code sections 9204(e), 20104-20104.6, but without waiving the requirements of the California Tort Claims Act, Gov’t Code section 800 et seq. unless otherwise agreed to by the Parties.
19. Force Majeure. Neither party hereto shall be considered in default in the performance of its obligation hereunder to the extent that the performance of any such obligation is prevented or delayed by an act of God, natural disaster, pandemic, acts of terrorism, war, a strike, lockout or other labor difficulty, or other peril, which is beyond the reasonable control of the affected party and without the negligence of the respective Parties. Each party hereto shall give notice promptly to the other of the nature and extent of any Force Majeure claimed to delay, hinder or prevent performance of the services under this Agreement. Each Party will, however, make all reasonable efforts to remove or eliminate such a cause of delay or default and will, upon the cessation of the cause, diligently pursue performance of its obligations in this Agreement. In the event either party is prevented or delayed in the performance of its respective obligation by reason of such Force Majeure, the only remedy is that there may be an equitable adjustment of the schedule based on City’s sole discretion.
20. Complete Agreement. This Agreement, along with any attachments, is the full and complete integration of the Parties’ agreement with respect to the matters addressed herein, and that this Agreement supersedes any previous written or oral agreements between the Parties with respect to the matters addressed herein. Unless otherwise stated,
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to the extent there is any conflict between this Agreement and Exhibit A, or any other agreement (written or oral), the terms of this Agreement shall control.
21. Severability. The unenforceability, invalidity or illegality of any provision(s) of this Agreement shall not render the other provisions unenforceable, invalid or illegal.
22. Waiver. Waiver by any party of any portion of this Agreement shall not constitute a waiver of the same or any other portion hereof.
23. Governing Law. This Agreement shall be governed by and interpreted in accordance with California law.
24. Contract Interpretation. Each party acknowledges that it has reviewed this Agreement and that the normal rule of construction to the effect that any ambiguities are to be resolved against the drafting party shall not be employed in the interpretation of this Agreement.
25. MacBride Principles/Peace Charter. City of Santa Cruz Resolution NS-19,378 (7/24/90) encourages all companies doing business in Northern Ireland to abide by the MacBride Principles and Peace Charter.
26. Notices. If either party shall desire or is required to give notice to the other such notice shall be given in writing, via email, and concurrently delivered by: (a) personal delivery, in which case notice is effective upon delivery; (b) overnight courier (i.e., Federal Express) with charges prepaid or charged to the sender’s account, in which case notice is effective when delivered; (c) priority U.S. Mail, in which case notice shall be deemed delivered on the second business day after the deposit thereof with the U.S. Postal Service. Notices shall be addressed to recipient as follows:
To CITY:
City Manager’s Office
ATTN: Suzanne Haberman
809 Center Street, Room 10
Santa Cruz, CA 95060
[email protected]
831-420-5014
To CONSULTANT:
EMC Research
Jessica Polsky-Sanchez
2001 Broadway, Suite 110
Oakland, CA 94612
[email protected]
510-844-0680
Changes to the above information shall be given to the other party in writing ten (10) business days before the change is effective.
27. Counterparts. The Parties may execute this Agreement in two or more counterparts, which shall, in the aggregate, be deemed an original but all of which, together, shall constitute one and the same instrument. A scanned, electronic, facsimile or other copy of a party’s signature shall be accepted and valid as an original.
28. Warranty of Authority. The signatories to this Agreement warrant and represent that each is authorized to execute this Agreement and that their respective signatures serve to legally obligate their respective representatives, agents, successors and assigns to comply with the provisions of this Agreement. [SIGNATURES ON FOLLOWING PAGE]
10.12 City of Santa Cruz Professional Services Agreement for Professional Polling and Public Opinion Outreach September 2023 (Form Rev.01/23) Page 11
Approved As To Form:
By: _____________________________ Date: __________________ Office of the City Attorney, Ashley Wheelock
CITY OF SANTA CRUZ
By: _____________________________ Date: __________________ Matt Huffaker
City Manager
CONSULTANT
By: _____________________________ Date: __________________ Printed: ___________________________ Title: __________________ By: _____________________________ Date: __________________ Printed: ___________________________ Title: __________________ Corporation – 2 officer signatures required (one from each group, unless person signing holds officer positions in both Group 1 and 2):
Group 1: Chief Executive Officer, Chairman of the Board, President, or Vice President; Group 2: Secretary, Assistant Secretary, Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer, Assistant Treasurer Oct 5, 2023
10.13 City of Santa Cruz Professional Services Agreement for Professional Polling and Public Opinion Outreach September 2023 (Form Rev.01/23) Page 12
EXHIBIT A: SCOPE OF WORK, FEE SCHEDULE, WORK SCHEDULE
10.14 Proposal for Professional Polling and Public Opinion Research Prepared for:
City of Santa Cruz
Submitted by:
EMC Research, Inc.
June 9, 2023
Contact:
Jessica Polsky-Sanchez | Principal
2001 Broadway, Suite 110
Oakland, CA 94612
(510) 844-0680
Exhibit A
10.15 Table of Contents
Submittal 1: Proposal Cover Page .......................................................................4 Submittal 2: RFP Questionnaire ..........................................................................5 Qualifications, Experience, and References......................................................... 5 1) List of Successful Ballot Measures ............................................................... 5 2) Data Demonstrating Success Rate ............................................................... 6 3) Current Clients............................................................................................. 8 Proposed Work Plan............................................................................................ 8 4) Proposed work, deliverables, and schedule................................................. 8 5) Understanding of City Needs and Scope of Project.................................... 12 6) Recommended Approach and Methods.................................................... 12 7) Management Plan ..................................................................................... 13 8) EMC Tasks vs City Tasks............................................................................. 15 9) Suggested Modifications ........................................................................... 15 10) Subcontractors ........................................................................................ 15 11) Environmental Conservation Practices .................................................... 15 Submittal 3: Cost Proposal................................................................................16 Submittal 4: Local Preference Certification .......................................................17 Submittal 5: Non-Collusion Declaration ............................................................17 Written Proposal ..............................................................................................18 EMC Background............................................................................................... 18 Principal Office Information........................................................................... 19
10.16 EMC Qualifications, Expertise, and Experience.................................................. 19 Team Qualifications, Expertise, and Experience ................................................ 20 Jessica Polsky-Sanchez, Principal ................................................................... 20 Technical Approach and Work Plan................................................................... 21 Cost Proposal .................................................................................................... 22 References ........................................................................................................ 22 Budget Breakdown ...........................................................................................25
10.17 Submittal 1: Proposal Cover Page
Proposal Deadline
Proposals are due no later than 5:00 pm 6/9/2023. All proposals will be e-mailed to [email protected] or delivered to the City of Santa Cruz City Manager Department, 809 Center Street, Room 10, Santa Cruz, California, 95060 before the due date.
Proposal Response Sheet
The undersigned, upon acceptance, agrees to furnish the following in accordance with the specifications and terms and conditions per City of Santa Cruz “Request for Proposals for Professional Polling and Public Opinion Research” at the prices indicated herein.
The undersigned, under penalty of perjury, declares not to be a party with any other business to an agreement to propose a fixed or uniform price in connection with this proposal.
The unsigned declares under penalty of perjury that she/he is authorized to sign this document and bind the business or organization to the terms of this Proposal.
The undersigned recognizes the right of the City of Santa Cruz to reject any or all proposals received and to waive any informality or minor defects in proposals received.
The undersigned declares under penalty of perjury that the information contained in this Proposal and all accompanying documents are true and correct.
Proposer Name: EMC Research, Inc.
Address: 2001 Broadway, Suite 110, Oakland, California 94612 Telephone Number: (510) 844-0680
Fax Number: (510) 844-0690
E-mail address: [email protected]
Signature of Authorized Representative:
Printed Name of Authorized Representative: Jessica Polsky-Sanchez Addenda
Proposer acknowledges receipt of addenda to this RFP.
How many addenda were issued for this solicitation? ___1_____
10.18 EMC Research Proposal to City of Santa Cruz -5-
Submittal 2: RFP Questionnaire
Qualifications, Experience, and References
1) List of Successful Ballot Measures
EMC Research has vast experience polling voters in your community, as we have conducted research among voters in Santa Cruz County regarding revenue measures since 2017, as well as research for private efforts around other important issues such as transportation, housing, and open space.
Some of our recent city and public agency clients for which we have conducted research to gauge revenue measure feasibility include:
Alameda County Transit......................................................................................................Public Transit Tax Alameda County Congestion Management Agency ...........................Transportation Sales Tax, Vehicle Fee Alameda County.......................................................................................................... Sales Taxes and Bonds Alameda Unified School District .................................................................................... Bond and Parcel Tax Berryessa Union School District..................................................................................... Bond and Parcel Tax Brawley School District ...........................................................................................................................Bond Cabrillo Unified School District ...................................................................................... Parcel Tax and Bond Cambrian School District................................................................................................ Parcel Tax and Bond Campbell Union School District ..............................................................................................................Bond Castro Valley Unified School District.............................................................................. Parcel Tax and Bond Chico Area Recreation and Park District.........................................................................................Parcel Tax Chico Unified School District...................................................................................................................Bond City of Chico ..................................................................................................................................... Sales Tax City of Citrus Heights........................................................................................................................ Sales Tax City of Davis…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………Sales Tax City of Emeryville ................................................................................................................................Various City of Foster City.......................................................................................................... Levee Bond Measure City of Gilroy .................................................................................................................................... Sales Tax City of Oakland...................................................................................................Multiple Revenue Measures City of Rancho Cucamonga ..................................................................................................................... LLAD City of Redwood City................................................................................................................ Sales Tax, TOT City of Rialto.............................................................................................................................................UUT City of Riverside ..............................................................................................................................Parcel Tax City of Upland .................................................................................................................................. Sales Tax Contra Costa Community College District.............................................................................................. Bond Contra Costa Transportation Authority .................................................................. Transportation Sales Tax Cupertino School District............................................................................................... Parcel Tax and Bond Davis Joint Unified School District ................................................................................. Parcel Tax and Bond Emery Unified School District ........................................................................................ Parcel Tax and Bond Fremont Union High School District .............................................................................. Parcel Tax and Bond Los Altos School District................................................................................................. Parcel Tax and Bond Los Angeles Unified School District.........................................................................................................Bond Los Gatos Union School District..................................................................................... Parcel Tax and Bond Los Gatos-Saratoga High School District........................................................................ Parcel Tax and Bond Mark Twain School District.....................................................................................................................Bond Menlo Park City School District...................................................................................... Parcel Tax and Bond
10.19 EMC Research Proposal to City of Santa Cruz -6-
MidPeninsula Regional Open Space District ......................................................................Open Space Bond Mill Valley School District .............................................................................................. Parcel Tax and Bond Milpitas Unified School District...................................................................................... Parcel Tax and Bond Monterey Peninsula Unified School District.................................................................. Parcel Tax and Bond Mt. Diablo Unified School District................................................................................. Parcel Tax and Bond Moreland School District ............................................................................................... Parcel Tax and Bond Peralta Community College District............................................................................... Parcel Tax and Bond Pleasanton Unified School District..........................................................................................................Bond San Benito High School District...............................................................................................................Bond San Francisco Bay Restoration Authority............................................................. Bay Restoration Parcel Tax San Francisco County Transportation Authority...........................Transportation Sales Tax and Vehicle Fee San Francisco.............................................................................................Transportation and Housing Bond San Jose Unified School District......................................................................................................Parcel Tax Santa Clara County........................................................................................................... Sales Tax and Bond Santa Clara County Parks and Recreation Department........................................Charter Renewal Measure Santa Clara Valley Water District........................................................................Flood Protection Parcel Tax Santa Clara Valley Open Space Authority ...................................................................Open Space Parcel Tax San Ramon Valley Unified School District.......................................................................................Parcel Tax Saratoga School District..................................................................................................................Parcel Tax Sierra Sands Unified School District........................................................................................................Bond Solano County .................................................................................................................................. Sales Tax Solano County Transportation Agency ................................................................... Transportation Sales Tax Sonoma County Water Agency .......................................................................................................Parcel Tax Stanislaus County................................................................................... Marijuana Regulation and Taxation Union School District...................................................................................................... Parcel Tax and Bond West Valley-Mission Community College District.................................................................................. Bond 2) Data Demonstrating Success Rate
We recognize that the City of Santa Cruz requests data regarding our “success rate” on ballot measure polling. However, because much of our polling takes place during the ballot measure feasibility phase, rather than the campaign phase, tracking “success” can mean many different things – it can mean helping a public entity restructure the cost, mechanism, or purpose of a measure to be more responsive to the needs and sensitivities of the electorate, or it can mean an accurate determination that a ballot measure is not feasible. Thus, the purpose of this kind of polling is not as much to accurately predict the results on Election Day as it is to understand the level of support at a certain point in time, and determine how various future factors may influence the likelihood of passing the measure. Our polling and research is designed to inform strategy and ballot language wording, so the results we find in our polls often differ from actual results because clients implemented strategies based on our recommendations. In other words, our polling is a snapshot in time, not a prediction of outcomes.
Nevertheless, our research has been used countless times to help public agencies and campaigns guide the direction of their campaign strategies, determine if they should pursue a measure, and lay a roadmap to successful revenue measures. Below are a few examples of how our research has successfully helped public agencies navigate the ballot measure process.
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Santa Cruz County
EMC Research has been a trusted research partner for the County of Santa Cruz since 2017. Our research has helped the County better understand voter attitudes and priorities as they have worked to explore the feasibility of multiple ballot measures. Specifically, EMC collaborated with Team CivX (formerly TBWBH, Props & Measures) and conducted exploratory research in advance of successful Measure P (transient occupancy tax, November 2022) and Measure G (sales tax, November 2018), as well as other efforts that did not ultimately move forward to the ballot. In addition to measuring feasibility, our research informed strategic decision making around the timing of the measure(s) and potential outreach.
City of Oakland
The City of Oakland has turned to us time and time again over the past 15 years for public opinion research services. With a wealth of experience working with elected officials, presenting survey results in public meetings, and crafting public releases of survey data, EMC is able to work with diverse elected officials, staff, and other stakeholders, using the research process to help build consensus and get everyone pointed in the same direction. EMC has provided research that has led to the successful passage of many ballot measures in Oakland including the parks and homelessness services parcel tax (Measure Q, 2020), library parcel tax (Measure D, 2018; Measure C, 2022), infrastructure bond (Measure KK, 2016), police services parcel tax and parking tax (Measure Z, 2014), affordable housing and infrastructure (Measure U, 2022), and many others.
City of Walnut Creek
In 2022, EMC was hired by the city of Walnut Creek to understand community sentiment about living in Walnut Creek, measure community awareness of the city’s fiscal challenges, capture community priorities and values around city services, and gauge attitudes about revenue measures and other potential solutions to the city’s fiscal challenges. One of the challenges of this work was that the city at the time was faced with very difficult budgeting decisions, and EMC Research provided the city with granular data on how the public would approach the tough choices they faced. EMC Research conducted a mixed-mode quantitative survey including email-to-web and live telephone interviewing methodologies among residents. This was followed by a second survey to more explicitly test the feasibility of placing a city revenue measure on a future ballot. Both surveys were designed with explicit input from a subcommittee of the City Council to obtain fairly complex study design and survey results.
City of Redwood City
EMC Research worked closely with the City of Redwood City in 2018 to assess voter support for a potential sales tax measure and a potential transient occupancy tax to fund vital city services in Redwood City. The research showed that despite voter support for a TOT measure, there were some indications that placing both measures on the same ballot could potentially interfere with the success of a sales tax measure. The City ultimately moved forward with a successful sales tax measure on the November 2018 ballot.
City of Davis
EMC Research worked with the City of Davis in 2019 to understand resident satisfaction, explore preferred methods of communication about Davis news and events, and test support for renewing the City's existing 1% sales tax. The sales tax was renewed on the March 2020 ballot with nearly 83% support. In 2022 the City once again turned to EMC Research to provide updated research about resident satisfaction and perceptions around public safety. The City continues to use our research to inform City priorities and communication with residents.
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3) Current Clients
Below is contact information for recent clients for whom EMC Research currently provides or recently provided the same scope of services.
Santa Cruz County
Reference: Nicole Coburn| Title: County Administrative Officer Phone: (831)-454-2100 Email: [email protected] City of Oakland
Reference: Brittany Hines| Title: Assistant to the Director Phone: (510)-238-7078 | Email: [email protected]
City of Walnut Creek
Reference: Dan Buckshi | Title: City Manager
Phone: (925) 943-5812| Email: [email protected]
City of Redwood City
Reference: Melissa Stevenson Diaz | Title: City Manager Phone: (650) 780-7301 | Email: [email protected]
City of Davis
Reference: Mike Webb | Title: City Manager, City Manager’s Office Phone: (530) 757-5602 | Email: [email protected]
Proposed Work Plan
4) Proposed work, deliverables, and schedule
EMC Research tailors our research plan individually to every project on which we work. In this section, we have outlined the approach we believe is appropriate based on our understanding of the City of Santa Cruz’s needs as outlined in the RFP. We would work in consultation with the City to refine this plan based on team input and any changes in overall goals or budget. We believe strongly in providing innovative research options when they are most likely to yield accurate, actionable results for our clients.
Task 1: Public Opinion Polling
For this survey, EMC would work with designated City staff, consultants, and other key stakeholders to design a survey instrument, available in both English and Spanish, that is scientifically sound and will provide actionable data to inform the City’s strategic decisions. Our team will conduct a kick-off session with City staff and any other stakeholders to scope the project and work through details. The kick-off session will provide an opportunity for our team to introduce itself, and to establish the parameters for the research. At this meeting, we will discuss the content of the questionnaire, identify the questionnaire approval process, and answer any questions the City may have regarding approach or methodology.
Based on the information covered in the initial meeting, other background research, review of past polling, and any additional discussions, EMC will draft an initial questionnaire draft. This questionnaire
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draft will be thoroughly reviewed and discussed with the team and will be revised and re-circulated as needed.
The questionnaire will assess the needs and opinions of the public and determine community interests related to potential ballot measures. Our survey questionnaires are not cookie-cutter. We will work with you to develop a survey that capitalizes on our expertise while addressing your specific challenges. For example, we can design the survey to test more than one revenue mechanism (such as type of ballot measure or monetary amount) and also test messaging in favor of and opposed to the proposed ballot measures to gauge any weaknesses or areas that may require public education or outreach. We will not begin any data collection until all parties are satisfied with the final survey instrument.
We manage and oversee all aspects of the data collection process, including determining the sample universe, setting up quotas, monitoring interviews in real time, and verifying and reviewing the data.
Prior to fielding the survey, we test the instrument to ensure it is understandable, logical, programmed correctly, and flows in a coherent manner. Throughout the data collection process, we verify the accuracy of data coding and data entry, ensure the collected data meets the prescribed sampling plan, and ensure data integrity. With each night of interviewing, EMC Research staff tracks demographic and geographic variables (such as age, ethnicity, and zip code) to ensure that they are falling within the appropriate proportions as compared with the overall population.
A trusted phone bank vendor performs the calls for the telephone portion of the survey. They conduct the survey with live interviewers, reaching both landlines and cell phones. Interviewers dial the known cell phone numbers by hand as required by law. All telephone interviewing is conducted by trained, professional interviewers experienced in administering phone surveys. An overview of the study's objectives, a review of the sample, and question-by-question specifications are supplied to the interviewers. The questionnaire is reviewed in its entirety with the interviewers, emphasizing instructions regarding call-back procedures, respondent selection, termination points, skip patterns, and acceptable probes and clarifications for open-ended questions. Interviewer calls are monitored nightly by an on-site supervisor and remotely by EMC Research staff to ensure that all procedures are properly followed.
EMC Research oversees the programming of the web survey for the online portion and tests the survey to make sure it is running correctly. EMC writes email invitations to the survey and sends targeted invitations and reminders to ensure a representative sample. We perform a “soft launch”, where the survey is sent to a small number of respondents, to cross-check that there are no errors before the main portion of fielding begins. Our online data is checked daily and tabulated with phone data to ensure that responses across the board are representative of the entire Santa Cruz community, and not just those who are most likely to be engaged and respond to a survey.
Throughout data collection for all quantitative surveys regardless of mode, EMC Research staff will closely monitor the data to track the survey’s representativeness and ensure that the sample universe accurately reflects the targeted population. For many of our quantitative studies, we have expanded our resident sampling approaches to strengthen the representation of traditionally underrepresented and underserved communities. We develop inclusive and equitable methodologies with robust and inclusive sampling frames, supported by stratification and oversampling strategies to ensure greater inclusion of respondents from those communities in the research. Throughout each project’s scoping, design, and data collection, we strive to provide representative data, overall, and within diverse respondent
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subgroups across gender, ethnicity, education level, sexual orientation, country of origin, disability status, homeowners and renters, household income ranges, and primary language spoken, to ensure diverse voices are fully represented and heard. Additionally, we utilize weighting adjustments, as needed, to ensure our overall results fully reflect the diversity of the audiences our clients serve.
In summary for Task 1, EMC will complete the following:
• Develop a final research plan in consultation with the client team. • Work with City staff and consultants to develop a survey instrument for a voter opinion survey, with a methodology that allows for a statistically valid sampling of City registered voters. • Conduct a statistically valid survey, including the sample size based on City of Santa Cruz demographics, that gauges the public’s support for or against a ballot measure, including potential draft ballot measure language.
• Translate the survey into Spanish and other languages as needed and implement methods to mitigate language barriers.
• Monitor data collection daily to ensure the process is going according to plan, and adjust strategies as needed to ensure a representative sample of the City’s population. • Meet initially with City staff and elected officials to design the survey and questions as well as meet regularly during the process to discuss issues, concerns, preliminary findings and recommendations.
Task 2: Polling Analysis
After data collection is complete, we will provide initial topline survey results, which show the base frequency of responses to every question in the survey. In the days following completion of interviewing, we will create a Microsoft Excel file that tabulates results of all survey questions and shows the data by significant demographic subgroups. Following delivery of the initial toplines and tabulation of results, our team will provide the City with an executive summary of the findings with a high-level overview of the survey results, and a comprehensive survey report with statistical analysis and graphical presentation of results and findings. The report will also outline the sampling and survey methods.
Finally, we will present the results to City staff and to the City Council. In reporting the results, we will provide the City with clear, concise analysis and strategic recommendations to meet the goals of the work. Our presentations are to the point and give decision-makers the tools they need to move forward based on the data, with an emphasis on making the data understandable and usable. In addition to presenting our research findings, we will remain available to provide consulting on application of the research data for as long as our research is used, at no additional charge.
In summary for Task 2, EMC will complete the following:
• Tabulate, code, clean, and weight the survey data as needed. • Perform in-depth analysis of the data, including creating cross-tabulations of voter responses based on key demographic information, such as but not limited to geography, ethnicity, age, homeownership status, etc.
• Prepare a written report of results with charts, analysis, and recommendations. • Present results and analysis to key stakeholders, staff, and the City Council as needed. • Be available for consultation on findings and strategy.
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Task 3: Ballot Measure Development
Over the course of questionnaire design, in discussion with City stakeholders, and using collected data, EMC Research will assist in crafting appropriate phrasing for potential ballot language that helps to reach the City’s strategic goals.
If further research is needed to help develop the final ballot language, we would work in consultation with the City to develop a specific plan based on your budget and research needs. Some of these research options include:
• Focus groups (online or in-person): Focus groups can be extremely useful in understanding how voters think or talk about an issue or candidate. They can also be very effective for in-depth message testing for testing reaction to media concepts. For any focus group project, EMC Research offers start to finish research services including recruiting, developing a discussion guide, moderating, securing a facility and logistics, and in-depth reporting. • Tracking polls: Tracking polls are typically shorter check-in surveys and can be conducted as needed to help us understand the impact of our communications and further refine strategies as the project progresses and the environment shifts.
Work Schedule
We work closely with our clients to ensure we know their timelines and key dates, and we anticipate each step to ensure we have the capacity and availability to perform all aspects of the work at a highquality level. EMC Research has a solid reputation for performing under tight deadlines. As a leading public policy and political strategy firm, we consistently turn around projects in short time frames and with critical strategic analysis. Our clients know us as flexible and responsive, and we regard this reputation as one of our most competitive brand attributes.
Below is a possible timeline for the recommended research scope described below for an initial quantitative survey. EMC Research is prepared to begin work on this project as soon as needed and will work with the City to develop a more specific timeline based on your needs. If additional research efforts are recommended, we can provide an updated, detailed timeline for future research projects.
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5) Understanding of City Needs and Scope of Project
We understand the purpose of this project is to conduct public opinion poll(s), evaluate the probability of voter approval of a revenue raising ballot measure(s) and present data to provide guidance on strategies for placing a revenue measure on the ballot, or trends related to placed measures on the ballot. Our recommendation for this work is to conduct a quantitative survey designed to assess the needs and opinions of the general public and to determine community interests related to potential ballot measures. The research will help us to advise the City on the feasibility of success for a revenue measure, including gathering feedback on potential measure types and rates, understanding key demographic subgroups in the electorate, and investigating potential for election success. 6) Recommended Approach and Methods
In order to achieve the goals of the research, in particular assessing the feasibility of a potential future revenue measure for the City of Santa Cruz we recommend a multilingual telephone/web hybrid survey of a random, representative sample of likely voters in the City of Santa Cruz. We estimate a possible sample size of up to 400 interviews among registered voters in the City. The methodology does not limit Timeframe Task(s) EMC Research
Deliverable City Resources
Week 1
Kick-off call to determine
objectives;
Begin drafting survey
instrument
Draft survey
instrument
1-hour kick-off call with key
stakeholders;
Previous survey instruments
and background information
Weeks 2-4
Draft, discuss, edit, revise
survey instrument with City
and community partners for
final approval
Final survey
instrument
Possible additional meetings
to review survey instrument;
Feedback/approval via email
Week 5 Program survey for data
collection
Final online/phone
programs
N/A
Weeks 6-7 Data collection Regular updates on
data collection efforts N/A
Week 8
Initial data analysis and data
cleaning Topline results N/A
Week 9
In-depth analysis, including
draft detailed report,
crosstabs, analysis,
conclusions, and
recommendations available;
Draft report and
crosstabs
Review and provide
feedback on report/findings
Week 10
Revise final report as needed;
Meeting(s) to discuss findings,
recommendations, and next
steps
Final report and
crosstabs
Meeting(s) to discuss
findings, recommendations,
and next steps
Ongoing
Additional consultation;
additional meetings or
presentations as requested;
final conclusions delivered,
ongoing consultation.
Additional reports or
memos as needed
Meeting(s) to discuss
findings, recommendations,
and next steps
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the number of completed responses, and if favorable response rates allow for additional interviews, we will include them at no additional cost. A sample of this size will have a margin of error of ± 4.9 percentage points overall. We would offer the survey in English and Spanish for all survey modes, and we anticipate an average survey length of 15 minutes when conducted by telephone.
This hybrid survey approach combines the growing reach and efficiency of online survey methodologies with more traditional telephone interviewing for those populations who prefer a live interviewer. We have found that the modes complement each other well; we are able to obtain data from a broad crosssection of respondents because those who may not answer their phone may take the survey online, and those who do not respond to the email or text survey invitation may take the survey over the phone.
Using this methodology, we would contact residents for the survey using a mix of emails, text messages and telephone calls, incorporating both cell phones and landlines.
As stated above, a sample size of 400 interviews will result in an overall margin of error of ±4.9 percentage points at the 95% confidence interval, which will provide statistically valid, representative data to help guide strategic decisions and allow for analysis of demographic differences in responses.
The sampling procedures will be consistent with generally recognized, scientifically valid sampling techniques designed to produce a survey reflective of the population.
Following the initial baseline poll, we will work with you to determine additional research if needed.
Depending on the results and timing of the baseline survey, it may be prudent to plan for a tracking survey to be conducted close to the deadline for placing a measure on the ballot to aid in making a final “go/no-go” decision. This tracking survey would likely be shorter and more focused on testing the level of support for an agreed upon measure (with language that is refined based on the results of the baseline survey) and testing key messages that may aid in voter comprehension surrounding the measure.
The methodology for a tracking survey would mirror that of the baseline with a sample size of 300 likely voters, and we anticipate an average questionnaire length of 12 minutes.
EMC would discuss the pros and cons of the tracking survey option with the client and consultant team and make a recommendation about the usefulness of this component as the time approaches.
Please see the work plan outlined in Question 4 for more details on how EMC will implement our recommended approach.
7) Management Plan
A typical project at EMC Research will have a number of internal staff assigned to ensure the work is completed on the agreed-upon timeline and with the highest quality standards. For most projects, a firm Principal is overseeing the work, including managing most client contact and contract details. Working with them would be an internal project manager, who is usually at the Director or Senior Strategy Associate level, along with Strategy, Data, and Field Associates as appropriate for the specific project.
We ensure each client gets attention from every member of our project team to handle each research request in an expedient manner. The following is a breakdown of each role in the EMC team that would be assigned to work on behalf of the City of Santa Cruz. If hired, we can commit to maintaining personnel in each project role throughout our engagement with the City:
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• Jessica Polsky-Sanchez, Principal. Principal Jessica Polsky-Sanchez will be the project lead, be available for meetings with the City to discuss the project approach and timeline, provide input on drafting the questionnaire, develop key findings and recommendations after data collection is complete, and meet with the City to discuss and present survey results. (Resume attached) • EMC Research Project Manager: EMC Research will assign a Project Manager to assist with this project. This team member will manage the overall project including its schedules, team members, and deliverables. They will also assist Jessica with leading calls to discuss the project approach and timeline, drafting the questionnaire, managing and overseeing data collection, providing data analysis, and presenting survey results. • EMC Research Strategy Associate: EMC will assign a Strategy Associate to assist with this project. This team member will assist with questionnaire edits, data collection, management, and analysis, and creation of deliverables. He or she will be supervised by senior management and all deliverables created by the Strategy Associate will be thoroughly reviewed and checked for accuracy.
• EMC Research Field Associate: EMC Research will assign a Field Associate to assist with this project. This team member will help with quality control throughout the fielding process and communicate with the approved vendors.
• EMC Research Data Associate: EMC will assign a Data Associate to assist with this project. This team member will prepare and merge the survey sample, manage data collection, code data for analysis, and provide crosstabulations. All deliverables created by the Data Associate will be thoroughly reviewed and checked for accuracy.
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8) EMC Tasks vs City Tasks
For this project, EMC Research will complete the tasks described above under Question 4 (Work Plan).
We expect the following from the City of Santa Cruz:
• Any relevant background information, including previous the City’s previous ballot measure surveys
• Timeline or deadline for results and reporting
• Input on methodological specifications and requirements, like language requirements or desired subgroup analysis
• Input and feedback on questionnaire design, including previous research that may inform the current questionnaire
• Contact person(s) to communicate project updates and for billing 9) Suggested Modifications
If hired, we would be your strategic partners throughout the entire process. While we have no suggested modifications to the scope of work listed above, as mentioned, we may work with you to recommend additional research if needed. Please see additional details on potential research options under Question 4 and Question 6.
10) Subcontractors
While EMC Research will utilize services from trusted sample, translation, and data-collection vendors, we do not plan to bring in any subcontractors to substitute the core scope of services. We would work alongside the City’s chosen strategy firm and work in partnership to help develop language, recommendations, and strategies throughout the balloting process. 11) Environmental Conservation Practices
EMC Research understands the importance of maintaining sustainable business practices. Over the last few years, we have taken steps to reduce our environmental footprint and promote sustainability to all our employees. Our efforts include, but are not limited to:
1. We use recycled copy paper and cardboard.
2. We use energy-efficient bulbs in fixtures in our office spaces.
3. Many of our employees work fully remotely, and we cover public transportation costs for our hybrid-arrangement employees commuting to physical workspaces.
4. We recycle paper waste and electronic waste and compost all food waste when possible.
5. Our deliverables are electronic by default, with printed copies only upon request.
6. Whenever possible, we encourage videoconferencing over travel.
7. We are a proud organizational partner of California Clear Air Day.
Our firm has a long history of working for clients that promote environmentally friendly policies such as plastic bag bans, forest conservation, reducing the number of commuters who drive alone, and shadegrown fair-trade coffee certification.
Our research has been influential in securing more than $200 billion dollars in taxpayer approved investments that have reduced carbon consumption through transit expansion across the United States.
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Submittal 3: Cost Proposal
The cost of the survey is determined by many factors, particularly the mode of interviews, length of the questionnaire, languages needed, and the number of interviews completed. EMC is committed to providing competitive pricing for our clients and we are happy to discuss our proposed research approach as well as other methodological options that would provide useful, actionable data within your budget. Please do not hesitate to ask if you have questions about the pricing or would like to discuss the fee for other options. We understand that you are receiving bids from other firms. Should your final decision come down to cost, we would appreciate an opportunity to price match competitive bids.
It is EMC's standard practice to bill 50% of the project upon contract approval, and the remaining 50% upon delivery of final deliverables. We will work with your team to determine an appropriate billing structure.
The pricing provided in the table below includes all costs necessary for a start-to-finish research services and deliverables outlined in our recommended approach, including ongoing consulting on usage of the data and all reporting and presentations for as long as the research is used. We can provide pricing for any additional future research projects as needed.
Please find a detailed breakdown of our pricing and line-item costs in the attached spreadsheet. Note, we use the cost of a 400n, 15-minute quantitative poll offered in English and Spanish for purposes of this pricing breakdown.
Option Number of Interviews Length Cost
Baseline Survey of Voters,
Multimodal, English &
Spanish
400
15 minutes $33,300
18 minutes $36,200
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Submittal 4: Local Preference Certification
Submittal 4 is enclosed at the end of the proposal document.
Submittal 5: Non-Collusion Declaration
Submittal 5 is enclosed at the end of the proposal document.
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Written Proposal
EMC Background
EMC Research is a national full-service opinion research firm serving an extensive and diverse range of public and private sector clients since 1989. Incorporated in Washington, EMC Research has more than twenty senior staff (CEO, Senior Principal, Principal, VP, Senior Director, and Director) across four offices, remote workers in 17 states, and nearly 60 full-time staff members. We are known for crafting insightful research tools, collecting highly accurate data, and providing analysis that answers the key strategic questions and challenges our clients face. EMC Research is proud to be a certified women-owned business.
Our expertise includes:
When you hire EMC Research, you are bringing on a partner that is truly invested in your goals. Our clients have turned to us time and time again to provide data-driven, actionable recommendations that are critical to their success. EMC Research has more than 30 years of experience developing survey methodology and work plans, including determining the appropriate number of survey questions, suggested content, and innovative ways to maximize engagement, on behalf of public agencies and local governments. We are also adept at navigating the timelines and processes a public environment brings.
We are on the cutting edge of new quantitative methodologies and approaches to addressing declining survey participation and disparities in representation. We routinely utilize email-to-web, web panels, text invitations, and address-based sampling mail-based approaches for our surveys. Our innovative spirit also extends to the tools and measures we take to manage projects, maintain quality control, and present analysis and reporting. We provide a unique combination of decades of experience paired with the innovation required to solve the challenges that have faced the industry over time. By embracing new tools and technologies as they develop, we have evolved with the industry's demands, allowing us to thrive in our fourth decade of business.
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We frequently contract with public agencies on a variety of projects, which have included a range of methodologies, from telephone surveys, online surveys, mail surveys, intercept surveys, multi-modal hybrid methodology surveys, in-person and online focus groups, one-on-one interviews, bulletin board studies, and studies utilizing advanced data analysis techniques like clustering to create segments. These projects have ranged from ad hoc work to extensive annual contracts covering many different types of research in support of strategic planning. The size of the project varies too – sometimes our surveys are of small, targeted populations, and we collect 100 responses, or sometimes we conduct a statewide survey of residents with thousands of responses. We strive to make all of our research understandable and usable for internal staff and external stakeholders.
We have learned the unique challenges and requirements of conducting research for public agencies, including presenting politically sensitive opinion research in a public setting, dealing with media inquiries, and meeting open records requirements. Our public agency clients return to EMC Research year after year because of our ability to present research findings in the local political environment, flexibly work with their needs, and handle projects of many sizes, scopes, and levels of complexity.
When you hire EMC Research, you are bringing on a collaborative partner that will be committed to helping you achieve your goals. Our clients have turned to us time and time again to provide datadriven, actionable recommendations that are critical to their success.
EMC Research has not defaulted in its performance of an agreement or project during the past five (5) years which has led the other party to terminate the agreement. There are no pending litigations, liens, or claims involving EMC Research and EMC Research has not filed for bankruptcy in the last ten (10) years.
Principal Office Information
EMC Research brings the best of both worlds to the table with the resources of a large operation and the personalized attention of a boutique firm. EMC Research has more than twenty senior staff (CEO, Senior Principals, Principals, VPs, Senior Directors, and Directors) across four offices, remote workers in 17 states, and nearly 60 full-time staff members. This work will be managed by our Public Policy & Social Marketing (PPSM) group and led by a Principal located in our Oakland, California office (see below section for resumes for key personnel). There are currently 10 staff members affiliated with our Oakland office and 11 team members in the PPSM group. This project team will have sufficient time and workload capacity to handle all tasks related to the City of Santa Cruz research.
EMC Qualifications, Expertise, and Experience
EMC Research has more than 30 years of experience conducting research on behalf of public agencies and cities across the country. We have worked for parks departments, public utilities, transit agencies, state departments of transportation, water districts, school districts, waste collection and recycling agencies, early childhood education agencies, cities, counties, and states. We have extensive knowledge of the demographics, opinions, diversity and history of residents in the state and deeply understand how the opinion leader and political dynamic interacts with public sentiment. Not only have we worked in California for decades out of our Oakland-based office, we are also long-time California residents. We are very familiar with the unique diversity of the state and the ever-evolving political and social climate, and we are always looking for opportunities to use research to help improve the quality of life for our neighborhoods and our communities.
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EMC Research has particular experience polling voters in your community, as we have provided polling to test the feasibility of a variety of revenue measures on behalf of Santa Cruz County since 2017, as well as research for private efforts around other important issues such as transportation, housing, and open space.
Some of our recent city clients include:
• City of Alameda (CA)
• City of Austin (TX)
• City of Bellevue (WA)
• City of Burien (WA)
• City of Citrus Heights (CA)
• City of Davis (CA)
• City of Emeryville (CA)
• City of Foster City (CA)
• City of Gilroy (CA)
• City of Issaquah (WA)
• City of Kirkland (WA)
• City of Milpitas (CA)
• City of Oakland (CA)
• City of Redmond (WA)
• City of Renton (WA)
• City of Redwood City (CA)
• City of Redmond (WA)
• City of Riverside (CA)
• City of Sacramento (CA)
• City of San Diego (CA)
• City of San Francisco (CA)
• City of San Jose (CA)
• City of Seattle (WA)
• City of Walnut Creek (CA)
Please see responses for Question 1 and Question 2 in Submittal 2: RFP Questionnaire for more information on our firm’s experience, ballot measure research expertise, and recent projects/clients.
As noted above, while EMC Research will utilize services from trusted sample, translation, and datacollection vendors, we do not plan to bring in any partners or subcontractors to substitute the core scope of services. EMC Research has not performed any services for the City of Santa Cruz in the past three (3) years.
Team Qualifications, Expertise, and Experience
As noted above, EMC Research Principal Jessica Polsky-Sanchez will be the project lead. Please see her biography and relevant experience below.
Jessica Polsky-Sanchez, Principal
Jessica brings her high standards for accuracy and attention to detail to every project she manages for EMC clients.
From her study of social psychology, Jessica uses her knowledge of psychological influences on decisionmaking to provide an understanding of underlying motivations. Her expertise informs her research design, and allows her analysis to look beyond the obvious to uncover unique recommendations and strategies.
Jessica truly enjoys finding solutions to client problems and helping them succeed in implementing improvements that impact everyday lives. Her clients include many public agencies, and her research has resulted in billions of dollars in revenue for local schools, parks and open space districts, successful campaigns to expand water conservation and improved access to health care for the underserved.
10.34 EMC Research Proposal to City of Santa Cruz -21-
Prior to joining EMC Research in 2007, Jessica pursued contemporary jazz dance and was a law clerk at a disability rights law firm. Jessica still loves jazz music and dance and along with her husband, enjoys cooking, hiking, and window shopping along the Bay Area’s many commercial corridors. Her spare time is consumed with her young family. Jessica has a BA in Psychology from the University of Michigan and MA in Social Psychology from San Francisco State University.
Some of Jessica’s recent projects include:
• City of Redwood City - general sales tax feasibility survey of likely 2018 voters (Role: Project Lead)
• City of Redwood City – resident satisfaction survey 2019 (Role: Project Lead) • City of Davis – resident satisfaction and general sales tax renewal survey of likely 2020 voters (Role: Project Lead)
• City of Chico - general sales tax survey of likely 2020 voters (Role: Project Lead) • City of Foster City – survey of likely 2018 voters on bond measure (Role: Project Lead) Technical Approach and Work Plan
Please see the project work plan, recommended approach, and recommended modifications as described in Submittal 2: RFP Questionnaire, specifically Questions 4, 6, and 9. Please see the below for a breakdown of hours for each staff member by task.
Research Consulting Services Principal
Director/
Senior
Strategy
Assoc.
Strategy
Assoc.
Data
Assoc.
Field
Coordinator/
Accounting
Survey Design
-meeting to review goals and previous
research 2 2 2
-prepare questionnaire 6 8 8
-meetings to review questionnaire 2 2 2
-questionnaire revisions 6 8 8
Data Collection
-prepare questions for fielding 2 4 2 4
-testing survey programs 2 4 6
-data collection oversight 4 4 4 6 7
-data checking and cleaning 4 4 6 4
Analysis and Reporting of Results
-topline report 2 4 4 2
-statistical analysis 4 8 8 10
-PPT report 5 8 10 7
-meetings to present results 2 2 2
TOTALS 33 54 60 33 21
10.35 EMC Research Proposal to City of Santa Cruz -22-
Cost Proposal
See Submittal 3: Cost Proposal for details our on proposed pricing for this project.
References
Below are select references, along with contact information and project details. Additional references are available upon request.
Santa Cruz County
Reference: Nicole Coburn| Title: County Administrative Officer Phone: (831)-454-2100 Email: [email protected] Address: 701 Ocean St. #100, Santa Cruz, CA 95060
Costs: $39,850
Dates: April-May 2022
Team Members: Emily Goodman, Principal; Quinn Hansen, Strategy Associate; Derek Shan, Data Associate; Chandler Corallo, Senior Field Associate
EMC Research has been a trusted research partner for the County of Santa Cruz since 2017. Our research has helped the County better understand voter attitudes and priorities as they have worked to explore the feasibility of multiple ballot measures. Specifically, EMC collaborated with Team CivX (formerly TBWBH, Props & Measures) and conducted exploratory research in advance of successful Measure P (transient occupancy tax, November 2022) and Measure G (sales tax, November 2018), as well as other efforts that did not ultimately move forward to the ballot. In addition to measuring feasibility, our research informed strategic decision making around the timing of the measure(s) and potential outreach.
City of Oakland:
Reference: Brittany Hines| Title: Assistant to the Director Phone: (510)-238-7078 | Email: [email protected] Address: 150 Frank H Ogawa Plaza #5215, Oakland, CA 94612
Costs: $55,450
Dates: March 2022
Team Members: Emily Goodman, Principal; Meredith Stone, Project Manager; Derek Shan, Data Associate; James Barnett, Senior Director-Field
The City of Oakland has turned to us time and time again over the past 15 years for public opinion research services. With a wealth of experience working with elected officials, presenting survey results in public meetings, and crafting public releases of survey data, EMC is able to work with diverse elected officials, staff, and other stakeholders, using the research process to help build consensus and get everyone pointed in the same direction. EMC has provided research that has led to the successful passage of many ballot measures in Oakland including the parks and homelessness services parcel tax (Measure Q, 2020), library parcel tax (Measure D, 2018; Measure C, 2022), infrastructure bond (Measure KK, 2016), police services parcel tax and parking tax (Measure Z, 2014), affordable housing and infrastructure (Measure U, 2022), and many others.
City of Walnut Creek
Reference: Dan Buckshi | Title: City Manager
Phone: (925) 943-5812| Email: [email protected] Address: 1666 N Main Street, Walnut Creek, CA 94596
10.36 EMC Research Proposal to City of Santa Cruz -23-
Costs: $33,500
Dates: January 2022
Team Members: James McClain, Principal/Project Manager; Jack Miller, Strategy Associate; James Barnett, Senior Director-Field
In 2022, EMC was hired by the city of Walnut Creek to understand community sentiment about living in Walnut Creek, measure community awareness of the city’s fiscal challenges, capture community priorities and values around city services, and gauge attitudes about revenue measures and other potential solutions to the city’s fiscal challenges. One of the challenges of this work was that the city at the time was faced with very difficult budgeting decisions, and EMC Research provided the city with granular data on how the public would approach the tough choices they faced. EMC Research conducted a mixed-mode quantitative survey including email-to-web and live telephone interviewing methodologies among residents. This was followed by a second survey to more explicitly test the feasibility of placing a city revenue measure on a future ballot. Both surveys were designed with explicit input from a subcommittee of the City Council to obtain fairly complex study design and survey results.
City of Redwood City
Reference: Melissa Stevenson Diaz | Title: City Manager Phone: (650) 780-7301 | Email: [email protected] Address: 1017 Middlefield Rd, Redwood City, CA 94063
Costs: $30,060
Dates: December 2021
Team Members: Jessica Polsky-Sanchez, Principal; Meredith Stone, Project Manager; Winston Tran, Strategy Associate; Riss Freed, Data Associate; Chandler Corallo, Senior Field Associate EMC Research worked closely with the City of Redwood City in 2018, in collaboration with TBWBH, to assess voter support for a potential sales tax measure and a potential transient occupancy tax to fund vital city services in Redwood City. The research showed that despite voter support for a TOT measure, there were some indications that placing both measures on the same ballot could potentially interfere with the success of a sales tax measure. The City ultimately moved forward with a successful sales tax measure on the November 2018 ballot.
City of Davis
Reference: Mike Webb | Title: City Manager, City Manager’s Office Phone: (530) 757-5602 | Email: [email protected] Address: 23 Russell Blvd., Suite 1, Davis, CA 95616
Costs: $41,000
Dates: April 2022
Team Members: Jessica Polsky-Sanchez, Principal; Meredith Stone, Project Manager; Cole Martiniak, Data Associate; Chandler Corallo, Senior Field Associate EMC Research worked with the City of Davis in 2019 to understand resident satisfaction, explore preferred methods of communication about Davis news and events, and test support for renewing the City's existing 1% sales tax. The sales tax was renewed on the March 2020 ballot with nearly 83% support. In 2022 the City once again turned to EMC Research to provide updated research about
10.37 EMC Research Proposal to City of Santa Cruz -24-
resident satisfaction and perceptions around public safety. The City continues to use our research to inform City priorities and communication with residents.
10.38 EMC Research Cost Breakdown
EMC Research position: Principal
Director/
Senior
Strategy
Strategy
Associate
Data
Associate
Field
Coordinator/A
ccounting
hourly rate: $170 $95 $67 $64 $63 Total Hours Cost
Research Consulting Services
Survey Design
meeting to review goals and previous research 2 2 2 6 $664 prepare questionnaire 6 8 8 22 $2,316
meetings to review questionnaire 2 2 2 6 $664
questionnaire revisions 6 8 8 22 $2,316
Data Collection
prepare questions for fielding 2 4 2 4 12 $838
testing survey programs 2 4 6 12 $836
data collection oversight 4 4 4 6 7 25 $2,153
data checking and cleaning 4 4 6 4 18 $1,284
Analysis and Reporting of Results
topline report 2 4 4 2 12 $1,116
statistical analysis 4 8 8 10 30 $2,616
PPT report 5 8 10 7 30 $2,728
meetings to present results 2 2 2
TOTALS 33 54 60 33 21 201 $18,195
Hard Costs
Telephone sample and CATI interviewing $8,505
Web hosting and programming $2,900
Email sample and distributions $440
Text sample and distributions $3,260
TOTALS $15,105
TOTAL PROJECT FEE $33,300
Breakdown for City of Santa Cruz Baseline Survey
For pricing purposes, we are including a breakdown for a 400n, 15-minute quantitative survey offered in English/Spanish
10.39 Rev. 11.15.2022 Page 4
SUBMITTAL 4 LOCAL PREFERENCE CERTIFICATION
Business Name: _____________________________________________ Local Businesses and Locally Owned Businesses must submit this certification with each bid or proposal in order to receive the 2% and additional 4% preference applied during the evaluation of any competitive process for goods, supplies, equipment, materials, services, or professional services.
Local Businesses
To qualify for the 2% local business preference, a business must meet the following criteria:
1) Does the business have an office with at least one employee located in the City of Santa Cruz? Yes No Business Address: _____________________________________________________ 2) Is the business current in the payment of all taxes, charges, assessments, or fees owed to the City of Santa Cruz?
Yes No
3) Does the business hold a valid City of Santa Cruz business license? Yes No DBA/license number: __________________________________________________ Locally Owned Businesses
To qualify for an additional 4% locally owned business preference, a business must meet the above requirements for a local business and at least 50% of the business’ owners must live in the County of Santa Cruz.
To qualify for the locally owned business preference, list all of the business’ owners and their county of residence (attach additional sheets if necessary).
Owner Name: ______________________________________ County: ________________________________ Owner Name: ______________________________________ County: ________________________________ By submitting this form, I represent that I qualify as a (check all that apply):
Local Business
Locally Owned Business
I understand that by submitting false information or failing to disclose material information in order to qualify for the preference my business will be 1) required to pay the city any difference between the contract amount and what the city’s cost would have been if the contract had been properly awarded, and 2) prohibited from bidding on any city contract or receiving any city contract for a period of three years of the discovery of facts supporting the same.
Authorized Signature: ________________________________
Name & Title: _________________________________________ Date: _______________________________ EMC Research, Inc.
Jessica Polsky-Sanchez, Principal 05/19/2023
10.40 Rev. 11.15.2022 Page 5
SUBMITTAL 5 NON-COLLUSION DECLARATION
NON-COLLUSION DECLARATION TO BE EXECUTED BY PROPOSER AND SUBMITTED WITH PROPOSAL I, ______________________________________________,
(Print Name)
am the __________________________________________ of
(Print Position/Title)
________________________________________________.
(Print Firm Name)
the party making the foregoing proposal declares that the proposal is not made in the interest of, or on behalf of, any undisclosed person, partnership, company, association, organization, or corporation; that the proposal is genuine and not collusive or sham; that the Consultant has not directly or indirectly induced or solicited any other Consultant or Sub-Consultant to put in a false or sham proposal; and has not directly or indirectly colluded, conspired, connived, or agreed with any Consultant, Sub-Consultant or anyone else to put in a sham proposal, or that anyone shall refrain from proposing; that the Consultant has not in any manner directly or indirectly, sought by agreement, communication, or conference with anyone to fix the proposal price of the Consultant or any other Consultant or Sub-Consultant, or to fix any overhead, profit, or cost element of the proposal price, or of that of any other Consultant or Sub-Consultant, or to secure any advantage against the public body awarding the contract of anyone interested in the proposed contract; that all statements contained in the proposal are true; and, further, that the Consultant has not, directly or indirectly, submitted his or her proposal price or any breakdown thereof, or the contents thereof, or divulged information or data relative thereto, or paid, and will not pay, any fee to any corporation, partnership, company association, organization, proposal depository, or to any member or agent thereof to effectuate a collusive or sham proposal.
I declare under penalty of perjury under the laws of the State of California that the foregoing is true and correct:
___________________________________________________
(Signature)
___________________________________________________
(Print Name)
___________________________________________________
(Print Title)
____________________________
(Date)
Jessica Polsky-Sanchez
05/19/2023
Jessica Polsky-Sanchez
EMC Research, Inc.
Principal
Principal
10.41 City of Santa Cruz Professional Services Agreement for Professional Polling and Public Opinion Outreach September 2023 (Form Rev.01/23) Page 13
EXHIBIT B: INSURANCE REQUIREMENTS
Consultant shall procure and maintain insurance against claims for injuries to persons or damages to property and otherwise which may arise from or in connection with the performance of the work under this Agreement and the results of that work by Consultant, its agents, representatives, employees, or subcontractors.
A. CERTIFICATE REQUIREMENTS
The City will be issued a Certificate of Insurance (a Memorandum of Understanding will not be accepted) with the following minimum requirements:
• Certificate(s) will show current policy number(s) and effective dates, • Coverage and policy limits will meet, or exceed, requirements below, • The Certificate Holder will be City of Santa Cruz, Risk Management, 1200 Pacific Ave., Suite 290, Santa Cruz, CA 95060,
• Certificate will be signed by an authorized representative, • An endorsement, if required below, will be provided to show the City, its officers, officials, employees, and volunteers as additional insureds, and
• Coverages must be maintained during the term of the Agreement with the City, unless a longer duration is required as specified below.
B. MINIMUM SCOPE AND LIMITS OF INSURANCE
Consultant acknowledges that the insurance coverage and policy limits set forth in this section constitute the minimum amount of coverage required. If Consultant maintains broader insurance coverage and/or higher limits than the minimums shown below, the City of Santa Cruz requires and shall be entitled to the broader insurance coverage and/or higher limits maintained by Consultant. Any available insurance proceeds in excess of the specified minimum limits of insurance and coverage shall be available to the City of Santa Cruz.
Coverage will be at least as broad as:
• COMMERCIAL GENERAL LIABILITY (CGL): $1,000,000 PER OCCURRENCE; $2,000,000 AGGREGATE Proof of coverage for $1 Million per occurrence and $2 Million in the aggregate including products and completed operations, property damage, bodily injury, personal and advertising injury will be provided on Insurance Services Office (ISO) Form CG 00 01 covering CGL. • PROFESSIONAL LIABILITY (ERRORS AND OMISSIONS): $2,000,000 PER OCCURRENCE OR CLAIM, $2,000,000 AGGREGATE.
Consultant will maintain insurance appropriate to Consultant’s profession; with limit no less than $2,000,000 per occurrence or claim, $2,000,000 aggregate. Insurance must be maintained, and evidence of insurance must be provided for at least five (5) years after date of completion of the services under this Agreement. If coverage is canceled or non-renewed and not replaced with another claims-made policy form with a Retroactive Date prior to the contract effective date or start of work date, Consultant must purchase “extended reporting” coverage for a minimum of five (5) years after completion of the contract of work.
• AUTOMOBILE LIABILITY:
Proof of coverage for $1,000,000 provided on ISO Form Number CA 00 01 covering any auto (Code 1), or if Consultant has no owned autos, hired, (Code 8) and non-owned autos (Code 9), per accident for bodily injury and property damage.
10.42 City of Santa Cruz Professional Services Agreement for Professional Polling and Public Opinion Outreach September 2023 (Form Rev.01/23) Page 14
• WORKERS’ COMPENSATION AS REQUIRED BY THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA, WITH STATUTORY LIMITS, AND EMPLOYER’S LIABILITY INSURANCE: $1,000,000 per accident for bodily injury or disease.
The Worker’s Compensation policy must be endorsed with a waiver of subrogation in favor of the City for all work performed by the Consultant and its employees. (Not required if Consultant provides written verification it has no employees) - If Consultant has no employees, Consultant shall complete and sign a Workers’ Compensation Exemption Declaration and Release of Liability.
C. OTHER INSURANCE PROVISIONS
The insurance policies are to comply with the following provisions:
• ADDITIONAL INSURED STATUS
The City, its officers, officials, employees, agents, and volunteers are to be covered as additional insureds on the CGL with respect to liability arising out of work or operations performed by or on behalf of Consultant including materials, parts, or equipment furnished in connection with such work or operations, products and completed operations. General liability coverage will be provided in the form of an endorsement to Consultant’s insurance at least as broad as ISO Form CG 20 10 11 85, or if not available, through the addition of both CG 20 10, CG 20 26, CG 20 33, or CG 20 38; and CG 20 37 (if a later edition is used).
o PRIMARY COVERAGE
For any claims related to this Agreement, Consultant’s and all subcontractor’s insurance coverage will be primary and non-contributory as respects the City, its officers, officials, employees, agents, and volunteers. Any insurance or self-insurance maintained by the City, its officers, officials, employees, agents, or volunteers will be excess of Consultant’s and all subcontractor’s insurance and will not contribute with it.
• NOTICE OF CANCELLATION
Each insurance policy required above shall state that the coverage shall not be canceled, except with notice to the City.
• WAIVER OF SUBROGATION
Consultant hereby grants to the City a waiver of any right to subrogation, except as otherwise not applicable, which any insurer of said Consultant may acquire against the City by virtue of the payment of any loss, including attorney’s fees under such insurance. Consultant agrees to obtain any endorsement that may be necessary to effectuate this waiver of subrogation, but this provision applies regardless of whether or not the City has received a waiver of subrogation endorsement from the insurer. • EXCESS LIABILITY/UMBRELLA INSURANCE POLICIES
Consultant may use excess liability/umbrella policies to meet the required liability limits on the condition that they provide all of the insurance coverages required herein, including, but not limited to, primary and non-contributory, additional insured, Self-Insured Retentions (SIRs), indemnity, and defense requirements. The excess liability/umbrella insurance policies shall be provided on a true “following form” or broader coverage basis, with coverage at least as broad as provided on the underlying CGL insurance. No insurance policies maintained by the additional insureds, whether primary or excess, and which also apply to a loss covered hereunder, shall be called upon to contribute to a loss until the Consultant’s primary and excess liability policies are exhausted. • DURATION OF COVERAGE
10.43 City of Santa Cruz Professional Services Agreement for Professional Polling and Public Opinion Outreach September 2023 (Form Rev.01/23) Page 15
CGL & Excess Liability/Umbrella policies for any construction related work, including, but not limited to, maintenance, service, or repair work, shall continue coverage for a minimum of 5 years for Completed Operations liability coverage. Such Insurance must be maintained and evidence of insurance must be provided for at least five (5) years after completion of the contract of work. • SELF-INSURED RETENTIONS (SIR)
Self-insured retentions must be declared to and approved by the City. City may require Consultant to purchase coverage with a lower retention or provide proof of ability to pay losses and related expenses.
The policy language shall provide, or be endorsed to provide, that the self-insured retention may be satisfied by either the named insured or City.
• ACCEPTABILITY OF INSURERS
Insurance is to be placed with insurers with a current A.M. Best’s rating of no less than A: VII, unless otherwise acceptable to the City.
• CLAIMS MADE POLICIES
If any of the required policies provide coverage on a claims-made basis:
1. The Retroactive Date must be shown and must be before the date of the contract or the beginning of contract work.
2. Insurance must be maintained, and evidence of insurance must be provided for at least five (5) years after completion of the contract of work.
3. If coverage is canceled or non-renewed, and not replaced with another claims-made policy form with a Retroactive Date prior to the contract effective date, the Consultant must purchase “extended reporting” coverage for a minimum of five (5) years after completion of contract work. • VERIFICATION OF COVERAGE
Consultant will furnish the City with original Certificates of Insurance including all required amendatory endorsements (or copies of the applicable policy language effecting coverage required by this clause) and a copy of the Declarations and Endorsement Page of the CGL policy (and CPL, automobile and any Excess Liability/Umbrella policies, as applicable) listing all policy endorsements to be approved by the City before work commences. However, failure to obtain the required documents prior to the work beginning will not waive the Consultant’s obligation to provide them. The City reserves the right to require complete, certified copies of all required insurance policies, including endorsements required by these specifications, at any time.
D. SUBCONTRACTORS
Consultant shall include their subcontractor(s) as additional insured(s) under the policies or shall furnish separate certificates and endorsements for each contractor and subcontractor. Consultant shall require and verify that all contractors and subcontractors maintain insurance meeting all the requirements stated herein, and Consultant shall ensure that City, its officers, officials, employees, agents, and volunteers are named as additional insureds on insurance required from its contractor(s) and subcontractor(s).
E. SPECIAL RISKS/CIRCUMSTANCES
City reserves the right to modify these requirements, including limits, based on the nature of the risk, prior experience, insurer, coverage, or other special circumstances and provide notice to Consultant.
10.44 First Amendment to Professional Services Agreement for Professional Polling and Public Opinion Outreach November 2023 Page 1
FIRST AMENDMENT TO PROFESSIONAL SERVICES AGREEMENT WITH EMC RESEARCH, INC.
THIS FIRST AMENDMENT (“First Amendment”), effective as of December 1, 2023 (“effective date”) to the PROFESSIONAL SERVICES AGREEMENT dated July 1, 2023, is made by and between the CITY OF SANTA CRUZ (“City”) and EMC Research, Inc. (“Consultant”). City and Consultant may be referred to individually as a “Party” and collectively, as the “Parties.”
RECITALS
WHEREAS, City and Consultant have previously entered into that certain Professional Services Agreement (“Agreement”) dated July 1, 2023, incorporated herein by this reference; and WHEREAS, City and Consultant desire to enter into this First Amendment to the Agreement to revise the contract amount, as specified herein.
AGREEMENT
NOW, THEREFORE, it is agreed between the Parties to incorporate the above Recitals hereto, and that the Agreement is hereby amended as follows:
1. Section 4 of the Agreement is hereby amended to revise the prior budget amount for potential ballot measures and polling services. The new not to exceed budget amount is in the amount of $150,000.
Except as amended by this First Amendment, all other applicable terms and conditions of the original Agreement and attachments shall remain in full force and effect. The terms of this First Amendment shall control if any conflict exists.
Each party acknowledges that it has reviewed this First Amendment and that the normal rule of construction to the effect that any ambiguities are to be resolved against the drafting party shall not be employed in the interpretation of this First Amendment.
The unenforceability, invalidity or illegality of any provision(s) of this First Amendment shall not render the other provisions unenforceable, invalid or illegal.
The Parties may execute this First Amendment in two or more counterparts, which shall, in the aggregate, be deemed an original but all of which, together, shall constitute one and the same instrument. A scanned, electronic, facsimile or other copy of a party’s signature shall be accepted and valid as an original.
The signatories to this First Amendment warrant and represent that each is authorized to execute this First Amendment and that their respective signatures serve to legally obligate their respective representatives, agents, successors and assigns to comply with the provisions of this First Amendment.
[SIGNATURES ON FOLLOWING PAGE]
10.45 First Amendment to Professional Services Agreement for Professional Polling and Public Opinion Outreach November 2023 Page 2
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, the City and the Consultant have executed this First Amendment effective as of the date first written above.
Approved As To Form:
By: _____________________________ Date: ___________
Barbara Choi, Office of the City Attorney
CONSULTANT
By: ______________________________ Date: _________________ Printed: __________________________ Title: ________________________ By: ______________________________ Date: _________________ Printed: __________________________ Title: ________________________ Signature Requirements for Corporation:
Corporation – 2 officer signatures required (one from each group, unless person signing holds officer positions in both Group 1 and 2):
Group 1: Chief Executive Officer, Chairman of the Board, President, or Vice President Group 2: Secretary, Assistant Secretary, Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer, Assistant Treasurer
CITY OF SANTA CRUZ
By: _____________________________ Date: __________________ Matt Huffaker, City Manager
11-14-2023
10.46 City Council
AGENDA REPORT
DATE: 10/05/2023
AGENDA OF: 11/28/2023
DEPARTMENT: City Manager
SUBJECT: Santa Cruz County Civil Grand Jury Response (CM) RECOMMENDATION: Motion to authorize the Mayor to submit responses to the Santa Cruz Civil Grand Jury on behalf of the Santa Cruz City Council for the Honoring Commitments to the Public report.
BACKGROUND: Each year, the Santa Cruz County Civil Grand Jury (Grand Jury) issues reports and requires certain agencies and departments to respond. This year, the Grand Jury requires a follow-up response in reference to the 2019-2020 reports:
1. DeLaveaga Golf Course – How City Policies and Practices Have Affected the Bottom Line
2. Fail in the Jail – No Lights, No Camera, No Action?
3. Homelessness: Big Problem, Little Progress – It’s Time To Think Outside The Box
4. Tangled Web – Oh, What a Mangled Web We Weave…
5. Voter Data – Keeping a Closer Eye on the Distribution of County Voter Registration Data
These reports were categorized as “Has Not Been Implemented but Will Be Implemented in the Future” and “Requires Further Analysis.”
The Grand Jury issued three reports which require responses from the Santa Cruz City Council.
These included:
1. Cyber Threat Preparedness – Phishing and Passwords and Ransomware, Oh My! Response due date: August 16, 2023 (Submitted);
2. Housing Our Workers – Essential Workers Need Affordable Housing! Response due date: August 31, 2023 (Submitted); and
3. Honoring Commitments to the Public
Response due date: September 5, 2023
City staff did not receive the Honoring Commitments to the Public report and contacted the Grand Jury for a copy. After receiving, staff coordinated with various departments to create a timeline and responses.
11.1 DISCUSSION: Following the approach of previous Councils, the Council is being requested to authorize the Mayor to respond, on behalf of the Council, to the one published Civil Grand Jury report that required responses.
After gathering feedback from various City Departments, staff has prepared responses for Council’s review. Upon approval, responses will be submitted to the Civil Grand Jury by December 7, 2023.
FISCAL IMPACT: None.
Prepared By:
Emeline Nguyen
Principal Management
Analyst
Submitted By:
Laura Schmidt
Assistant City Manager
Approved By:
Matt Huffaker
City Manager
ATTACHMENTS:
1. HONORING COMMITMENTS TO THE PUBLIC.PDF
11.2 Honoring Commitments to the Public Published on June 7, 2023 Page 1 of 14 The 2022–2023 Santa Cruz County Civil Grand Jury
Requires the
Santa Cruz City Council
to Respond by September 5, 2023
to the Findings and Recommendations listed below
which were assigned to them in the report titled
Honoring Commitments to the Public
County Agency Actions in Response to
2019–2020 Grand Jury Recommendations
Responses are required from elected officials, elected agency or department heads, and elected boards, councils, and committees which are investigated by the Grand Jury. You are required to respond and to make your response available to the public by the California Penal Code (PC) §933(c).
Your response will be considered compliant under PC §933.05 if it contains an appropriate comment on all findings and recommendations which were assigned to you in this report.
Please follow the instructions below when preparing your response.
11.3 Required Response from the Santa Cruz City Council Honoring Commitments to the Public Due by September 5, 2023 Page 2 of 14 Instructions for Respondents
Your assigned Findings and Recommendations are listed on the following pages with check boxes and an expandable space for summaries, timeframes, and explanations.
Please follow these instructions, which paraphrase PC §933.05:
1. For the Findings, mark one of the following responses with an “X” and provide the required additional information:
a. AGREE with the Finding, or
b. PARTIALLY DISAGREE with the Finding – specify the portion of the Finding that is disputed and include an explanation of the reasons why, or c. DISAGREE with the Finding – provide an explanation of the reasons why.
2. For the Recommendations, mark one of the following actions with an “X” and provide the required additional information:
a. HAS BEEN IMPLEMENTED – provide a summary of the action taken, or b. HAS NOT YET BEEN IMPLEMENTED BUT WILL BE IN THE FUTURE – provide a timeframe or expected date for completion, or c. REQUIRES FURTHER ANALYSIS – provide an explanation, scope, and parameters of an analysis to be completed within six months, or d. WILL NOT BE IMPLEMENTED – provide an explanation of why it is not warranted or not reasonable.
3. Please confirm the date on which you approved the assigned responses:
We approved these responses in a regular public meeting as shown in our minutes dated November 28, 2023.
4. When your responses are complete, please email your completed Response Packet as a PDF file attachment to both
The Honorable Judge Syda Cogliati [email protected] and The Santa Cruz County Grand Jury [email protected].
If you have questions about this response form, please contact the Grand Jury by calling 831-454-2099 or by sending an email to [email protected].
11.4 Required Response from the Santa Cruz City Council Honoring Commitments to the Public Due by September 5, 2023 Page 3 of 14 Findings
F1. The 2022-2023 Grand Jury reviewed responses to five of the 2019-2020 reports and found that, in general, commitments were kept. _X_ AGREE
__ PARTIALLY DISAGREE
__ DISAGREE
Response explanation (required for a response other than Agree):
11.5 Required Response from the Santa Cruz City Council Honoring Commitments to the Public Due by September 5, 2023 Page 4 of 14 F2. The evident coordination of responses from agencies leaves the public without independent contributions across agencies.
__ AGREE
__ PARTIALLY DISAGREE
_X_ DISAGREE
Response explanation (required for a response other than Agree):
When an agency agrees with the response of another agency or coordinates with another agency, the positive interpretation of that could be that there is synchronization and agreement of content – be that approach, subject matter expertise, next steps, etc. This alignment can be viewed as a good thing. Should the City have a partial disagreement with another agency’s response or need to clarify portions, the City would note that and do so.
11.6 Required Response from the Santa Cruz City Council Honoring Commitments to the Public Due by September 5, 2023 Page 5 of 14 F3. The City of Santa Cruz delayed the timeline rather than proceeding as outlined in their 2020 response to the Grand Jury. Instead, the City budgeted for a more comprehensive assessment of system-wide facilities and a capital investment plan to be completed in 2023.
__ AGREE
__ PARTIALLY DISAGREE
_X_ DISAGREE
Response explanation (required for a response other than Agree):
The Parks & Recreation Department has evaluated the condition of the driving range/cart barn and requested capital investment program (CIP) funding in the City’s Fiscal Year 2023 budget. The Department received funding through the City’s budget process, has made initial structural and safety improvements to the facilities, and will lead a more complete, full-scale renovation of the facilities with the appropriated funding in Fiscal Year 2024.
It is accurate that the Parks & Recreation Department’s broader Facility Condition Assessment has been delayed. It will be implemented in Fiscal Year 2024. However, that study will look at all Department-operated facilities to establish an understanding of broader CIP needs and lead to prioritization for funding and investment in facilities with deferred maintenance. The customer-facing facilities at DeLaveaga Golf Course have been assessed, and the Parks & Recreation Department has funding, appropriated through the City’s budget process, to make necessary improvements.
11.7 Required Response from the Santa Cruz City Council Honoring Commitments to the Public Due by September 5, 2023 Page 6 of 14 F5. The adoption of multi-year plans by both the City and County of Santa Cruz offer the public some assurance that locations can be found within the County where homeless services will be provided.
_X_ AGREE
__ PARTIALLY DISAGREE
__ DISAGREE
Response explanation (required for a response other than Agree):
11.8 Required Response from the Santa Cruz City Council Honoring Commitments to the Public Due by September 5, 2023 Page 7 of 14 F7. The master plan for Coral Street being worked by the City of Santa Cruz includes consideration of limiting vehicle access to Coral Street, but the grants received by the City and the plan to build 120 units of supportive housing preempt the original Grand Jury recommendation to consider closing it.
__ AGREE
_X_ PARTIALLY DISAGREE
__ DISAGREE
Response explanation (required for a response other than Agree):
A variety of uses exist on Coral Street. Vehicular access is needed to/from many of those residences and businesses, not just the 120 units of supportive housing. A number of enhancements are considered to the streetscape as part of the Visioning Report. See pages 39-40 and 48-49 at
https://www.cityofsantacruz.com/home/showpublisheddocument/94159/63822268902 6170000. Staff will continue to consider options for how to improve the Coral Street right-of-way as development and uses along Coral Street evolve.
11.9 Required Response from the Santa Cruz City Council Honoring Commitments to the Public Due by September 5, 2023 Page 8 of 14 F8. Staffing shortages made automating the process for updating the website of the City of Santa Cruz and redesigning the website of the City of Scotts Valley more difficult.
__ AGREE
_X_ PARTIALLY DISAGREE
__ DISAGREE
Response explanation (required for a response other than Agree):
For the City of Santa Cruz, significant progress has been made in addressing staffing shortages within the IT Department, and continuous efforts are underway to enhance the City's website update procedures. These initiatives involve integrating third-party tools to bolster auditing and analytics capabilities, facilitating in-depth content analysis for departmental review and action.
Moreover, the IT Department has recently enlisted a dedicated temporary resource to address content deficiencies and resolve numerous issues related to broken links on the website.
Lastly, the City of Santa Cruz has allocated funds for an extensive website redesign project, set to occur in the latter part of Fiscal Year 2024 or the early stages of Fiscal Year 2025.
11.10 Required Response from the Santa Cruz City Council Honoring Commitments to the Public Due by September 5, 2023 Page 9 of 14 Recommendations
R1. All agencies should provide their own independent responses to findings and recommendations instead of referring to the response of another agency. (F2) __ HAS BEEN IMPLEMENTED – summarize what has been done
__
HAS NOT YET BEEN IMPLEMENTED BUT WILL BE IN THE FUTURE – summarize what will be done and the timeframe
__
REQUIRES FURTHER ANALYSIS – explain the scope and timeframe (not to exceed six months)
_X_ WILL NOT BE IMPLEMENTED – explain why
Required response explanation, summary, and timeframe:
When an agency agrees with the response of another agency or coordinates with another agency, the positive interpretation of that could be that there is synchronization and agreement of content – be that approach, subject matter expertise, next steps, etc. This alignment can be viewed as a very good thing. Should the City have a partial disagreement with another agency’s response or need to clarify portions, the City would note that and do so.
11.11 Required Response from the Santa Cruz City Council Honoring Commitments to the Public Due by September 5, 2023 Page 10 of 14 R2. We continue to recommend that all organizations create and regularly update formal records of the actions they take to address Grand Jury recommendations, and to share those records with the public, in accordance with CA Penal Code Section 933(c). (F1, F2)
__ HAS BEEN IMPLEMENTED – summarize what has been done
__
HAS NOT YET BEEN IMPLEMENTED BUT WILL BE IN THE FUTURE – summarize what will be done and the timeframe
__
REQUIRES FURTHER ANALYSIS – explain the scope and timeframe (not to exceed six months)
_X_ WILL NOT BE IMPLEMENTED – explain why
Required response explanation, summary, and timeframe:
The Civil Grand Jury has, over the years, issued annual reports covering a wide variety of topics and issues, with a range of recommendations from the very granular (e.g., R6 “assign one individual responsible to cyber-security"), to very broad and general (e.g., R18 “demonstrate progress in working collaboratively with UCSC...”), some of which the City agrees with and others it does not. It is neither practical nor economically feasible for the City to create a formal record of all actions taken to “address Grand Jury recommendations,” as it would impose a substantial burden on City staff and resources over and above the cost and administrative burden of preparing responses to Grand Jury Reports, in the first instance, as required by Cal.
Penal Code Section 933(c). Moreover, the recommendations the City agrees with would be implemented because the City agrees with them, and not because they “address Grand Jury recommendations.”
11.12 Required Response from the Santa Cruz City Council Honoring Commitments to the Public Due by September 5, 2023 Page 11 of 14 R3. The City of Santa Cruz should report to the Grand Jury on the completion status of the Facilities Assessment and capital investment plan no later than December 31, 2023. (F3)
__ HAS BEEN IMPLEMENTED – summarize what has been done
_X_
HAS NOT YET BEEN IMPLEMENTED BUT WILL BE IN THE FUTURE – summarize what will be done and the timeframe
__
REQUIRES FURTHER ANALYSIS – explain the scope and timeframe (not to exceed six months)
__ WILL NOT BE IMPLEMENTED – explain why
Required response explanation, summary, and timeframe:
The Parks & Recreation system-wide Facilities Condition Assessment will be conducted in early 2024. This is separate from the condition assessments performed at DeLaveaga Golf Course, which have already led to CIP investment to make needed repairs. The broader assessment will look at all Parks & Recreation facilities and characterize the specific needs for investment. Staff could report these findings at a later time (estimated summer 2024), but the assessment will not be complete by December 31, 2023.
11.13 Required Response from the Santa Cruz City Council Honoring Commitments to the Public Due by September 5, 2023 Page 12 of 14 R6. The County of Santa Cruz and the four cities should plan to provide services for homeless persons at the sites identified in their plans, including but not limited to supportive housing, case management, and medical services. The County of Santa Cruz and the four cities should report to the Grand Jury on the status of providing homeless services at the sites identified no later than December 31, 2023. (F5, F6)
_X_ HAS BEEN IMPLEMENTED – summarize what has been done __
HAS NOT YET BEEN IMPLEMENTED BUT WILL BE IN THE FUTURE – summarize what will be done and the timeframe
__
REQUIRES FURTHER ANALYSIS – explain the scope and timeframe (not to exceed six months)
__ WILL NOT BE IMPLEMENTED – explain why
Required response explanation, summary, and timeframe:
The City of Santa Cruz offers two emergency shelter sites, one located at 1220 River Street, and one at the Armory located in DeLaveaga Park. The City avails these locations to the County Staff to provide a location for case workers to provide services and offer limited medical services. The County in its capacity as the arm of the state is responsible for providing medical services. City staff works with shelter participants to connect them to a variety of services including assistance with finding housing.
11.14 Required Response from the Santa Cruz City Council Honoring Commitments to the Public Due by September 5, 2023 Page 13 of 14 R7. The City of Santa Cruz should complete and then implement their Master Plan for Coral Street, including consideration of limiting vehicle access. The City of Santa Cruz should report to the Grand Jury on the status of Coral Street no later than December 31, 2023. (F7)
__ HAS BEEN IMPLEMENTED – summarize what has been done
_X_ HAS NOT YET BEEN IMPLEMENTED BUT WILL BE IN THE FUTURE – summarize what will be done and the timeframe
__
REQUIRES FURTHER ANALYSIS – explain the scope and timeframe (not to exceed six months)
__ WILL NOT BE IMPLEMENTED – explain why
Required response explanation, summary, and timeframe:
The Coral Street visioning community engagement was conducted in late 2022 and early 2023. The Coral Street Visioning Report is complete and was accepted by the City Council on May 9, 2023. The vision will be implemented over time. Work on two of the projects – short- and long-term use and development of 125 Coral Street and the former River Street Shelter site – is in process. The City purchased 125 Coral Street, and the current tenant is expected to vacate the site late this year. The City is currently further assessing needs for environmental remediation in advance of interim uses and future uses contemplated in the vision, and the City is coordinating closely with the County on potential funding and associated building design options. The former River Street Shelter site will be demolished in the coming months to prepare the site for interim uses and future uses contemplated in the vision.
11.15 Required Response from the Santa Cruz City Council Honoring Commitments to the Public Due by September 5, 2023 Page 14 of 14 R8. The City of Santa Cruz should verify that their commitment to automate the process for updating their website has been completed by October 31, 2023. (F8)
_X_ HAS BEEN IMPLEMENTED – summarize what has been done __
HAS NOT YET BEEN IMPLEMENTED BUT WILL BE IN THE FUTURE – summarize what will be done and the timeframe
__
REQUIRES FURTHER ANALYSIS – explain the scope and timeframe (not to exceed six months)
__ WILL NOT BE IMPLEMENTED – explain why
Required response explanation, summary, and timeframe:
Automating updates to the City's website is in progress, highlighting the City's commitment through its investment in and deployment of specialized software tools.
These tools are aimed at overseeing and enhancing various aspects of the City's website, such as accessibility, content quality, branding, data privacy, core web vitals, and more. Additionally, with the upcoming website refresh planned for either the end of Fiscal Year 2024 or beginning of Fiscal Year 2025, the City will leverage modern website automation tools that are readily available.
11.16 City Council
AGENDA REPORT
DATE: 11/01/23
AGENDA OF: 11/28/2023
DEPARTMENT: City Manager
SUBJECT: 2024 Legislative Program (CM)
RECOMMENDATION: Motion to approve the 2024 Legislative Program.
BACKGROUND: The Legislative Program (Program) establishes the principles that will guide the City’s annual policy and legislative advocacy efforts at the regional, state, and federal level.
The program focuses on the key areas that will enable the City of Santa Cruz to deliver projects and programs that meet the needs of our community. Adopted annually, the City’s Program serves as a reference to guide the development of positions on legislative proposals and provides guidance for the City Council and staff throughout the year.
Each year, the Legislative Program is updated in consultation with the Mayor, City Council, and City departments to highlight legislative and funding priorities for consideration and adoption by the City Council. Recognizing the importance of promoting priorities, the City develops a legislative program consistent with the City Council Strategic Plan (https://www.cityofsantacruz.com/government/city-council/city-council-strategic-goals).
DISCUSSION: The Program contains three sections:
1. Legislative Priorities. These three areas are the focus of the City’s legislative advocacy efforts for 2024.
2. Legislative Platform (Platform). The Platform is the City Council’s declared policies on various issues impacting the City. The Platform sets forth the City’s legislative objectives for the 2024 legislative sessions under the legislative priorities, and provides direction for the City’s legislative representatives and advocates as they work to secure strategic initiatives in Sacramento and Washington, D.C. It is intended to articulate the City’s positions on issues that are currently, or anticipated to be, the focus of future legislation by the state or federal governments. The Platform streamlines the City’s advocacy efforts by enabling City staff to take immediate action on pressing legislative items efficiently and without delay under City Council direction.
3. Legislative Action Guide. This outlines the process for Council and staff to use to appropriately advocate for legislation and budget provisions favorable to the City.
The 2024 Legislative Priorities highlight funding and legislative focus areas for the current legislative year. Priorities are developed in conjunction with City Council, various City departments, and the City Councils 2023-2028 Strategic Plan. The priorities may shift from year
12.1 to year based on the social, political, and economic environment. The three highest priorities of the City for 2024 are:
The Platform contains City Council-adopted objectives and directives regarding a wide array of issue areas impacting the City. The Platform was developed through meetings with City staff, the Mayor, our lobbyists, and the California League of Cities’ legislative platforms. There are six key Platform issue areas outlined in the Platform, each with detailed policy positions.
The accompanying Legislative Action Guide outlines in greater detail the advocacy strategies, and process by which the City will engage with the state and federal legislative sessions, including the roles of City staff, elected officials, and contracted lobbying firms.
FISCAL IMPACT: None.
Prepared by:
Lisa Murphy
Deputy City Manager
Submitted by:
Laura Schmidt
Assistant City Manager
Approved by:
Matt Huffaker
City Manager
ATTACHMENTS:
1. 2024 Legislative Program
12.2 2024 ANNUAL LEGISLATIVE
PROGRAM
Fred Keeley, Mayor
Renee Golder, Vice Mayor
Martine Watkins, Councilmember
Sandy Brown, Councilmember
Sonja Brunner, Councilmember
Shebreh Kalantari-Johnson, Councilmember
Scott Newsome, Councilmember
12.3 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 2 | Page
Contents
Purpose 3
City Strategic Plan Focus Areas 4
SECTION 1:
Legislative Priorities 5
SECTION 2:
Legislative Platform 6
SECTION 3:
Legislative Action Program Manual 13
Engagement Strategies 13
Internal Coordination of the Legislative Program 14
The Role of the City Council 14
The Role of the City Manager’s Office 15
The Role of the Departments 15
Guidelines for Evaluating Legislation 16
Legislative Advocacy 16
Guidelines for Letter Writing 18
Procedure for City Council Meetings with Other Elected Representatives 19 California State Legislative Timeline 2024 20
12.4 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 3 | Page
The Legislative Program establishes the principles that will guide the City’s policy and legislative advocacy efforts at the regional, state, and federal level. The program focuses on the key areas that will enable the City of Santa Cruz to deliver projects and programs that meet the needs of our community. The purpose of the program is to create a plan that positions the City to capitalize on funding opportunities and provide input into legislation in both Washington, D.C. and Sacramento.
Each year, the Legislative Program is updated in consultation with the Mayor, City Council, and City departments to highlight legislative and funding priorities for consideration and adoption by the City Council. Recognizing the importance of promoting priorities, the City develops a legislative program consistent with the City Council Strategic Plan. The City’s Legislative Program serves as a reference to guide the development of positions on legislative proposals and provides guidance for the City Council and staff throughout the year.
The Legislative Program is presented in three sections. The first section is the 2024 Legislative Priority Section. Each of these areas will be the focus of the City’s legislative advocacy efforts. The second section contains the City’s Legislative Platform. The Platform is the City Council’s declared policies on various issues impacting the City. The Platform sets forth the City’s legislative objectives for the 2024 legislative sessions, and provides direction for the City’s legislative representatives and advocates as they work to secure strategic initiatives in Sacramento and Washington, D.C. It is intended to articulate the City’s positions on issues that are currently, or anticipated to be, the focus of future legislation by the state or federal governments. The Platform streamlines the City’s advocacy efforts by enabling City staff to take immediate action on pressing legislative items efficiently and without delay under City Council direction. The last section is a Legislative Action Guide for Council and staff on how to appropriately advocate for legislation and budget provisions favorable to the City.
2024 LEGISLATIVE PROGRAM
12.5 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 4 | Page
CITY OF SANTA CRUZ STRATEGIC PLAN 2023-2028
12.6 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 5 | Page
While the Legislative Platform contains City Council-adopted objectives and directives regarding a wide array of issue areas impacting the City, the 2024 Legislative Priorities highlight funding and legislative priorities for the current legislative year. Priorities are developed in conjunction with various City departments and the strategic plan and may shift from year to year based on the social, political, and economic environment.
The City has identified three legislative priorities for 2024. Each of these areas will be the focus of the City’s legislative advocacy efforts.
Homelessness
Response
• Actively pursue state
funding for the
CityEmergency
Shelter Operations at
the Overlook
Emergency Shelter at
the Armory, 1220
Riverstreet
Community Camp.
• Funding for the Coral
Street Navigation
Project
Affordable
Housing
• Fund the creation &
preservation of
affordable &
supportive housing
in the City,
emphasizing low &
very low-income
households &
workforce housing
Infrastructure
• Provide funding for
projects that build
resiliency, restore or
replace the city's
ageing infrastructure,
especially transit,
transportation &
climate resiliency
2024 LEGISLATIVE PRIORITIES
12.7 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 6 | Page
The Legislative Platform was developed to support the successful implementation of the City’s adopted 2023-2028 Citywide Strategic Plan. The Legislative Platform provides additional information to the City Council, City staff, and the City’s state and federal legislative advocates on policy issues.
The Legislative Platform reflects the City’s priorities coupled with current public policy issues affecting local governments. As this document is updated annually, its priorities will change to most accurately reflect the relevant policy issues facing the City. The platform will enable City staff to accurately and efficiently impact legislation. Six areas were identified as important to the City to serve the community. The issues in red represent the Priority Areas for 2024. 2024 LEGISLATIVE PLATFORM
2024 Legislative
Platform
Homelessness
Response
Housing
Public Safety &
Community
Well Being
Economic
Vitality
Sustainability &
Resiliency
Infrastructure
&
Transportation
12.8 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 7 | Page
PRIORITY: Provide sustainable funding for the City’s Emergency shelter programs located at the Overlook at the Armory and 1220 River Street.
PRIORITY: Provide funding for the Coral Street Navigation project.
Advocate for, sponsor, or support legislation or budget provisions that would:
• Support unrestricted, on-going State funding to cities that support homeless prevention programs, outreach teams, shelter programs and encampment clean-up programs.
• Provide homelessness prevention and services funding directly to cities proportionate to the rate of homelessness and the accompanying local impacts in that City.
• Expand the availability of mental health and substance use disorder treatment services and facilities.
• Sustainable funding for transitional housing units and permanent supportive housing units to house homeless individuals and families.
• Expand and maintain support for basic food, hygiene, and safety needs, especially for highly vulnerable populations, including persons living with a mental health diagnosis, persons with a substance use disorder, veterans, older adults, and persons with disabilities.
• Take a balanced approach that addresses the need for services for people experiencing homelessness while upholding the health, safety, and welfare of all people in Santa Cruz.
• Advance regional initiatives involving county, state, and federal governments to reduce chronic homelessness.
HOMELESSNESS RESPONSE -
Priority
12.9 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 8 | Page
PRIORITY: Fund the creation & preservation of affordable & supportive housing in the City, emphasizing low & very low-income households & workforce housing Advocate for, sponsor, or support legislation or budget provisions that would:
• Support housing production with an emphasis on production and protection of affordable, permanent supportive, and workforce housing. • Fund the creation and preservation of affordable and supportive housing in the City, emphasizing low- and very-low-income households and workforce housing.
• Support the construction of affordable housing and permanent supportive housing programs.
• Increase the range of CEQA exemptions. Discourage, limit, and streamline legal challenges to housing projects, including but not limited to CEQA lawsuits.
• Increase Section 8 or other rental subsidies to accommodate areas with the highest market-rate rents or lowest ratio of incomes to housing costs in the state.
• Amend both Federal and State Low-Income Housing Tax Credit Programs to support and deem competitive a mix of units in an affordable housing project.
• Limit or eliminate ballot initiative options that serve as barriers to housing.
HOUSING - Priority
12.10 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 9 | Page
PRIORITY: Provide funding for projects that build resiliency, restore or replace the city's ageing infrastructure, especially transit, transportation & climate resiliency • Allocate funding for the upgrading, replacement, and construction of needed infrastructure at the local level.
• Create transportation policies that fund long-term maintenance and development of infrastructure projects.
• Fund park development, infrastructure, and maintenance. • Fund cost-effective water ecosystem projects and ensure direct beneficiaries and cost causers fund their fair share of projects that provide long-term benefits to the state and its inhabitants.
• Fund projects and programs to increase water system resiliency to drought by supporting increased storage of available surface water through aquifer storage and recovery and further development of alternative supplies, such as advanced purified recycled water.
• Maintain and strengthen local control of water use and encourage water recycling and the many benefits of sustainability to Santa Cruz’s water supply. • Seek Funding for San Lorenzo River Pump Station Upgrades. The upgrade and addition are necessary as existing infrastructure is undersized and reaching end of life. The pump stations are critical as is protects the downtown and river basin area.
• Seek funding for the Wastewater Treatment Facility (WWTF) electrical upgrades.
The WWTF is a regional facility serving over 100,000 residents and is in of an electrical overhaul.
TRANSPORTATION & INFRASTRUCTURE -
Priority
12.11 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 10 | Page Rapidly enact equitable climate solutions that support and enhance sustainability and resiliency and ensure effective performance of essential services, such as water and wastewater utilities, in the face of climate change effects already in motion.
Grow the green economy through workforce development.
Sustainability
Advocate for, sponsor, or support state and federal legislation or budget provisions that would:
• Increase the adoption of electric vehicles and charging infrastructure. • Reduce emissions from transportation by increasing walking, biking, and access to public transportation, including future rail transit.
• Support telework policy and infrastructure.
• Eliminate natural gas use.
• Equitably electrify buildings and bolster building stock resiliency through energy efficiency, local solar installations, and microgrids.
• Provide stable and fair electricity rates, fees, and solar generation credit. • Increase the efficiency of water and wastewater transportation and treatment. • Reduce the amount of organic and inorganic waste entering the City’s landfill through producer responsibility initiatives, recyclable pre-processed material incentives, and the reduction of single-use products.
• Advance local government’s ability to set local policies relating to environmental “sustainability,” including but not limited to building standards and land use planning. • Encourage innovation in carbon sequestration and carbon capture technology. • Provide capacity and resources to scale up municipal efforts and regional coordination to rapidly draw down carbon.
Resiliency
Advocate for, sponsor, or support state and federal legislation or budget provisions that would:
• Fund and implement projects and programs for upgrading existing water, wastewater, and stormwater facilities and services to ensure effective functioning in the face of changing climate conditions, including increasing incidents of extreme weather. • Promote prevention and mitigation of wildfires by mandating responsible power management, funding fuel reduction activities, and community engagement. • Fund coastal resilience and citywide climate adaptation studies, planning, monitoring and implementation.
• Promote training and development initiatives that support the collaboration between community partners and fund training and development for youth, veterans, and underemployed individuals in green jobs supporting the City’s sustainability and resiliency priorities.
• Fund capacity and resources for equitable engagement of frontline communities on resilience issues.
Sustainability & Resiliency
12.12 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 11 | Page Advocate for, sponsor, or support legislation or budget provisions that would • Support measures that encourage community safety and wellbeing. • Support funding and programs for non-law enforcement response to those experiencing a mental health crisis.
• Support funding for local law enforcement equipment, services, or personnel. • Support funding for local emergency operations including equipment, services, and personnel.
• Support bills that restrict access to firearms and ammunition. • Support increased funding for law enforcement training costs related to homelessness and mental health.
• Funding and programs addressing police officer wellness and mental health. • Oppose legislation that makes recruitment into law enforcement more difficult. • Support bills increasing the penalties for those supplying Fentanyl. • Support funding toward technological advancements.
• Support funding for a new County jail facility in South County • Support legislation that develops and expands programs to encourage and support the City’s emergency preparedness initiatives.
• Support legislation that provides funding to enhance wildfire mitigation and emergency response efforts.
• Legislation supporting funding for public safety infrastructure. • Legislation that supports fire department medical transport efforts.
Public Safety & Community Well-Being
12.13 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 12 | Page Diversify revenue generation through actively pursuing new and varied sources.
Support local economic recovery and regeneration of tourism dollars by seeking supports for local businesses and workers.
Advocate for, sponsor, or support state and federal legislation or budget provisions that would:
• Fund recovery specifically for cities and businesses in majority tourismbased economies, such as Santa Cruz. • Preserve and enhance federal assistance to local governments and oppose federal preemption of local authority.
• Prevent the state from borrowing, raiding, or otherwise redirecting local government funds (e.g., local taxes, sales tax, property taxes, etc.). • Ensure increased flexibility for the use of municipally generated revenues, such as the Public Education and Government fee, Utility Users Tax, and Development Impact Fees.
• Retain and promote the success of local businesses.
• Replace redevelopment funding mechanisms within the City and state. • Preserve funding mechanisms to promote continued economic development, including initiatives to provide financing for infrastructure and affordable housing.
• Fund opportunities for small business assistance, loan programs for business improvements, and tax credits for businesses.
• Provide tangible and productive tools and incentives to support job creation and retention.
• Creation of a funding mechanism to accelerate innovation and entrepreneurship in the region.
• Fund programs and projects that maintain the affordability of essential services provided by the City’s water and wastewater systems and other critical infrastructure, which serve as the foundation for economic vitality.
• Maintain cities’ abilities to require only commercial and industrial uses on potential development sites.
Economic Vitality
12.14 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 13 | Page Engagement Strategies
Staff and the City’s government relations consultants will employ a variety of public engagement strategies to support the 2024 Legislative Program, including:
Direct Engagement
Engage policymakers directly and guide sponsored legislation, submit correspondence, and provide public testimony that communicates and advances the City’s legislative and budget priorities and positions.
Building Coalitions
Engage local, regional, and statewide stakeholders to advocate on specific issues and participate in local, regional, statewide, and national coalitions organized to advance positions that are consistent with the 2024 Legislative Program. Lead a statewide coalition of coastal cities to advocate for policy and funding reform around the issue of homelessness.
Agency Connections
Foster and build state and federal agency relationships to advance state and federal funding competitiveness for the priorities identified in the 2024 Legislative program.
Legislative Action Manual
12.15 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 14 | Page Internal Coordination of the Legislative Program
1. Track
Legislation is tracked by the City Manager’s Office or brought to the City’s attention by residents, agencies, departments, organizations, public servants, and others. In addition, departments are urged to take the initiative to identify legislation of importance to the City.
2. Review
The City Manager’s Office reviews the proposed legislation and, if warranted, requests assistance from one or more departments. The City Manager or the appropriate departments evaluate the bill for its impact on the City of Santa Cruz, recommend a position and potential action, and, as appropriate, draft a statement or letter for use by the City Manager’s Office.
3. Determine Course of Action
One of two actions can be taken:
a. If the City Council has adopted a policy directly relevant to the legislation of concern, the City Manager’s Office may proceed to prepare a letter for the Mayor’s signature;
b. If City Council policy does not exist, if the issue is politically controversial, or if there is significant local interest in the issue(s) posed by the legislation, the proposed legislation is referred to the City Council.
4. Referral to Council
The City Council will consider the information provided in a staff report, determine its position on the legislation and provide appropriate direction to staff.
5. Advocacy
The City Council, staff delegate, or government relations consultant will connect with appropriate legislative bodies throughout the legislative year.
The Role of the City Council
The City Council has ultimate responsibility for determining the position the City will take on legislative issues. City Council positions applicable to legislation accumulate over the years and require periodic reevaluation to assure they are still relevant to the City’s needs and interests. The Council generally takes positions only on those issues that are of relevance to the City of Santa Cruz.
Some of the City Council’s responsibilities include:
• Conducting an annual review and updating legislative priorities at both the State and Federal levels, taking the Council’s own strategic priorities into account.
12.16 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 15 | Page • Considering legislative issues brought to the Council’s attention by staff, residents, organizations, and others and determine what, if any, position the City should take.
• Determining Council positions on resolutions proposed for adoption by Cal Cities (formerly the League of California Cities) and the National League of Cities.
• Suggesting areas for staff action concerning legislation. • Assuming an active advocacy role with legislators on behalf of the City. This may include travel, which will be consistent with current City policies/procedures on travel.
The Role of the City Manager’s Office
The City Manager’s Office is the central coordinator of the City’s legislative program.
Some of the City Manager’s Office responsibilities include:
• Ensuring the consistency of legislative policy throughout the City. • Serving as a clearinghouse and record keeper for all legislative activity occurring within the City.
• Coordinating contacts and communications with legislators and staff. • Coordinating the evaluation of proposed legislation that may affect the City. • Disseminating information on legislation of interest to departments and divisions within the City.
• Encouraging suggestions from other departments concerning subjects for legislative action.
• Providing feedback to departments on the progress of legislation of interest. • Keeping the Council informed of the status of the City’s legislative program. • Recommending priorities for legislative action to ensure the effectiveness of the City’s lobbying activities.
• Planning, coordinating, and facilitating lobbying activities by Councilmembers and staff.
• Maintaining legislative files (bill texts, correspondence, records of lobbying activity, background information, Council policies).
• Serving as liaison to Cal Cities, the National League of Cities, and other organizations and jurisdictions concerning legislative activities. • Coordinating the annual review of legislative positions and preparing the City’s legislative platform.
The Role of Departments
The participation of the City’s various departments is essential to the success of the Legislative Program. The program requires departments to take responsibility for identifying, evaluating, and monitoring legislation related to their functional areas. • Inform the City Manager’s Office of legislative issues of importance to the City. • Designate a key contact within the department or division who will be responsible for coordinating the evaluation of legislation and monitoring those legislative issues of direct significance to the department. Continue to monitor bills as they progress through the Legislature or Congress. • Establish a system within the department for assuring that requests for the
12.17 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 16 | Page evaluation of legislation are addressed promptly.
• Draft letters and provide analysis of legislation as requested by City Manager’s Office.
• Maintain a legislative file with the department to ensure consistency of policy recommendations.
• Establish mechanisms within the department for accessing direct information on legislation.
• Network with other cities, agencies, professional organizations, etc., to gain background information and a broader perspective on legislative issues. • Suggest organizations, individuals, publications, and legislators who may be allies in lobbying the City’s position on legislation.
• Understand and adhere to the City’s Legislative Advocacy Policy. Consult the City Manager’s Office if there are questions.
• Annually, provide to the City Manager’s Office the department’s recommendations for the ensuing year’s legislative platform including a review of existing positions, statements of underlying policies and principles, and priorities related to specific legislative issues.
Guidelines for Evaluating Legislation
Bills are frequently amended during their introduction and approval processes. Due to this, analyses and letters expressing the City’s position should be based on the most up-to-date version of the bill.
1.Citywide Perspective
a. Bills often impact multiple departments in different ways. Therefore, it is essential that these different impacts are taken into consideration to form a balanced citywide position. It is the responsibility of the City Manager’s office to work with departments to reconcile differences.
2.Stating the City’s Position
a. If the department recommendation is to support, oppose, or amend a bill, it is important to draft the body of a letter that the City Manager’s Office can use in writing to the legislators. The City Manager’s Office will put the letter in final form and send it to the appropriate committees, legislators, etc. A copy of the finalized letter will be routed to the evaluating department for its records.
Legislative Advocacy
The City Council holds the final authority for determining the position that will be taken by the City on legislation. The process outlined below would likely be followed only for key and controversial topics. In many instances, due to timing or the nature of the issue, the Mayor may sign a letter supporting or opposing legislation on behalf of the City. This position would need to be consistent with the City’s overall guiding legislative principles or the annually adopted priorities.
Process
12.18 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 17 | Page Signatures
• Letters and other communications expressing the City’s position on legislation will customarily bear the signature of the Mayor, particularly when the legislation relates to areas of General Plan policies and programs, other Council adopted policies, issues of Council interest, and fiscal matters. • Letters and other communications expressing the City’s position on legislation not related to areas of General Plan policies and programs, other Council adopted policies, issues of Council interest, and fiscal matters require Council direction for the Mayor’s signature.
• If the legislation’s principal impact is on the City’s operating procedures, the City Manager may sign the communication.
• Copies of the letters will be distributed in the Council agenda packet to keep the Council and others informed of all City communications on legislation.
Independent Lobbying by City Personnel
City employees are not to lobby in the name of the City of Santa Cruz unless the department head has approved the activity and the City Manager has been informed in advance of the activity.
City Advisory Commissions and Committees
City employees who are staff or liaisons to Council-appointed advisory commissions and committees should encourage the bodies to alert he Council to legislation on which they recommend taking a position. Should legislative analysis and advocacy be a required function of the advisory commission or committee, those bodies shall ensure that function is carried out according to its bylaws.
Lobbying Methods
Listed here are a number of ways to inform and persuade legislators and others of the City’s position on proposed legislation. Departmental participation in the planning and implementation of these activities is critical to the City’s success.
Departments should let the City Manager’s Office know of its interest and suggestions for lobbying bills they have evaluated.
Letters to
• The authors of proposed legislation
• The City’s elected representatives in the State Legislature and Congress • The Chair and members of legislative committees
• The Governor or President
To submit a position letter to a committee you must first register on the California Legislature Position Letter Portal. After you complete your registration, you can submit your position letter to communicate your views to the bill author’s staff as well as the committee that will be hearing the bill. Most committees require letters a week in advance of a hearing. All records of mail, and e-mail, will be maintained
12.19 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 18 | Page by the City Manager’s Office.
Telephone calls
• Phone calls are useful for discussing with legislative staff the content and implications of a bill and for suggesting amendments or language clarification. However, many committees’ rules prevent them from counting phone calls as a legitimate expression of a City’s position on a bill. Pro and con positions are recorded if they are received in writing.
Meeting with elected representatives either in the district or in Sacramento and Washington
• It is Council’s practice to invite legislators representing Santa Cruz to an annual meeting to discuss all issues of importance to the City during that legislative session.
• Councilmembers are encouraged to attend legislative days set by the National League of Cities or Cal Cities.
Resolutions
• The Council is sometimes asked to adopt a resolution expressing its position on a bill. Resolutions are frequently sought by organizations as an indication of widespread support for a position, but they are less effective than letters when communicating directly with a legislator.
Testimony
• Testifying in person at a legislative committee hearing provides an opportunity to present the City’s position and respond to questions. The City Manager, the Mayor, a Councilmember, or the staff person with particular expertise in the subject assumes the responsibility.
Editorial support from newspapers serving the Santa Cruz community • Staff members must seek approval from the City Manager’s Office before submitting editorials in newspapers.
Press Conferences
• Press conferences are called by the Mayor and Councilmembers and are staged in a location relevant to the issues being lobbied. Any press conference should be coordinated with the City Manager’s Office.
Coalitions with other jurisdictions
• These alliances are not limited to governmental bodies, but extend to all segments of the broader community that can similarly be affected by the legislation, e.g. business, nonprofit organization, environmental group, etc.
Guidelines for Letter Writing • Concentrate on the letter content, rather than format. The City Manager’s Office will produce the final letter, addressing it to the proper legislators or
12.20 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 19 | Page committees and securing the appropriate signature. At the very start of the letter, indicate the bill number or title that is the subject of the letter. • A short concise letter is generally more effective than a lengthy treatise. • Provide specific examples of the impact of the legislation on the City of Santa Cruz.
• When it is appropriate, discuss the effects of the proposed legislation on the legislator’s constituents.
Procedure for City Council Meetings with Other Elected
Representatives
Typically, the City Council meets annually with its County, State, and Federal representatives. These meetings are an important component of building legislative relationships and to share issues of importance to the City of Santa Cruz. These meetings should be scheduled at the appropriate times during the respective legislative calendars.
• At direction of City Council, the other Elected Representative, or the City Manager, staff will schedule a meeting with the representative. • The City Manager will seek agenda items from the Mayor and Council. • Staff from the City Manager’s Office will obtain agenda items from Departments and staff in the representative’s office.
Useful Links
Know your legislator
Overview of the legislative process
How to look up a bill
12.21 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 20 | Page 2024 California State Legislative Timeline
Jan. 1 Statutes take effect.
Jan. 3 Legislature reconvenes.
Jan. 10 Budget must be submitted by Governor.
Jan. 12 Last day for policy committees to hear and report to fiscal committees fiscal bills introduced in their house in the oddnumber year.
Jan. 12 Last day to submit bill requests to the Office of Legislative Counsel.
Jan. 19 Last day for any committee to hear and report to the Floor bills introduced in that house in the odd-number year.
Last day to submit bill request to the Office of Legislative Counsel.
Jan. 31 Last day for each house to pass bills introduced in that house in the odd-numbered year
Feb. 16 Last day for bills to be introduced.
Mar. 21 Spring Recess begins upon adjournment.
April 1 Legislature reconvenes from Spring Recess.
April 26 Last day for policy committees to hear and report to fiscal committees’ fiscal bills introduced in their house.
May 3 Last day for policy committees to hear and report to the floor non-fiscal bills introduced in their house.
May 10 Last day for policy committees to meet prior to May 28.
May 17 Last day for fiscal committees to hear and report to the floor bills introduced in their house.
Last day for fiscal committees to meet prior to May 28.
May 20-24 Floor session only. No committee may meet for any purpose.
May 24 Last day for each house to pass bills introduced in that house May 28 Committee meetings may resume.
June 15 Budget Bill must be passed by midnight.
June 27 Last day for a legislative measure to qualify for the Nov. 5 General Election ballot.
July 3 Last day for policy committees to meet and report bills.
July 3 Summer Recess begins on adjournment, provided Budget Bill has been passed.
Aug. 5 Legislature reconvenes from Summer Recess.
Aug. 16 Last day for fiscal committees to meet and report bills to the Floor.
Aug. 19-31 Floor session only. No committee may meet for any purpose.
Aug. 23 Last day to amend on the Floor.
12.22 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 21 | Page Aug. 31 Last day for each house to pass bills. Final Recess begins upon adjournment.
Sept. 30 Last day for Governor to sign or veto bills passed by the Legislature on or before Sept. 1 and in the Governor’s possession after Sept. 1.
Oct. 2 Bills enacted on or before this date take effect January 1, 2025 Nov. 5 General Election
12.23 City of Santa Cruz Legislative Platform 22 | Page
12.24 City Council
AGENDA REPORT
DATE: 11/06/2023
AGENDA OF: 11/28/2023
DEPARTMENT: Finance
SUBJECT: Liability Claim Filed Against the City of Santa Cruz (FN) RECOMMENDATION: Motion to reject the liability claim of 1) Lorraine H. Coppolino, based on staff recommendation.
BACKGROUND: N/A.
DISCUSSION: I. Claim to be rejected:
1. Claimant: Lorraine H. Coppolino
Date of occurrence: 10/01/2023
Date of claim: 10/19/2023
Amount of claim: Unspecified
Claimant seeks general damages and reimbursement for medical expenses allegedly caused by a trip and fall.
Represented by legal counsel.
FISCAL IMPACT: No fiscal impact.
Prepared By:
Ross Brandon
Risk & Safety Manager
Submitted By:
Elizabeth Cabell
Finance Director
Approved By:
Matt Huffaker
City Manager
ATTACHMENTS:
None.
13.1 City Council
AGENDA REPORT
DATE: 11/08/2023
AGENDA OF: 11/28/2023
DEPARTMENT: Human Resources
SUBJECT: Resolution Amending the City of Santa Cruz Classification and Compensation Plans: Implementation of Statutory and Regulatory Requirements for Publicly Available Pay Schedules – All Departments (HR)
RECOMMENDATION: Resolution amending the City of Santa Cruz Classification and Compensations Plans by implementing the CalPERS requirements for publicly available pay schedules per California Code of Regulations 570.5.
BACKGROUND: The California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) notified contracted agencies (Public Agencies, Schools, and State) of the new requirements for providing CalPERS with a publicly available pay schedule in compliance with the Public Employees’ Retirement Law (PERL), Public Employees’ Pension Reform Act of 2013 (PEPRA), and Title 2 of the California Code of Regulations (CCR).
Publicly available pay schedules are required by CalPERS and are a critical component to verify all members’ pay rates when calculating members’ retirement benefits. Maintaining a compliant publicly available pay schedule supports transparency and expedites CalPERS’ review process.
Failure to provide CalPERS with a compliant publicly available pay schedule may result in a retirement benefit being delayed.
Subdivision (a) of CCR Section 570.5 defines the requirements for a publicly available pay schedule used to determine pay rates.
Pay rates shall be limited to the amount listed on a pay schedule that must meet all the following eight (8) requirements:
1. Be duly approved and adopted by the employer's governing body in accordance with requirements of applicable public meetings laws.
2. Identify the position title for every employee position.
3. Show the pay rate as a single amount or multiple amounts within a range for each identified position.
4. Indicate the time base, including, but not limited to, whether the time base is hourly, daily, biweekly, monthly, bi-monthly, or annually.
5. Be posted at the office of the employer or immediately accessible and available for public review from the employer during normal business hours or posted on the employer's website.
6. Indicate an effective date and date of any revisions.
14.1 7. Is retained by the employer and available for public inspection for not less than five years.
8. Does not reference another document in lieu of disclosing the pay rate.
DISCUSSION: The City of Santa Cruz Classification and Compensation Plans do not indicate the time base, including, but not limited to, whether the time base is hourly, daily, bi-weekly, monthly, bi-monthly, or annually, as identified in requirement four (4). To comply with all terms and conditions set forth in the City’s contract with CalPERS and to ensure all reportable information is compliant with the PERL, PEPRA, and the CCR, staff has revised the publicly available pay schedules as required by CalPERS. The newly revised schedules require City Council approval.
FISCAL IMPACT: None.
Prepared By:
Debbie Levy
HR Analyst II
Submitted By:
Sara De Leon
Chief People Officer
Approved By:
Matt Huffaker
City Manager
ATTACHMENTS:
1. RESOLUTION.DOCX
2. ALL SALARY COMPENSATION PLANS.PDF
14.2 RESOLUTION NO. NSRESOLUTION OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF SANTA CRUZ AMENDING THE CLASSIFICATION AND COMPENSATION PLANS –
ALL DEPARTMENTS
WHEREAS, staff has recommended certain modifications to the Classification and Compensation Plans.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the City Council of the City of Santa Cruz as follows:
That effective November 28, 2023, the City of Santa Cruz Classification and Compensation Plans be modified to include time base of monthly and hourly.
PASSED AND ADOPTED this 28th day of November 2023 by the following vote:
AYES:
NOES:
ABSENT:
DISQUALIFIED:
APPROVED: ______________________________
Fred Keeley, Mayor
ATTEST: _________________________________
Bonnie Bush, City Clerk Administrator
14.3 City of Santa Cruz Page 1 of 24
California 10/26/2023
Human Resources
Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
761
37.9632 48.9346
ACCOUNTANT I 6,580 8,482
701
41.7587 53.8269
ACCOUNTANT II 7,238 9,330
101 22.1077 23.2154 24.3750 25.5923 26.8731 28.2173
3,832 4,024 4,225 4,436 4,658 4,891
ACCOUNTING ASSISTANT I
5,136
29.6308
5,393
31.1135
102 23.6538 24.8365 26.0769 27.3808 28.7481 30.1846
4,100 4,305 4,520 4,746 4,983 5,232
ACCOUNTING ASSISTANT II
5,494
31.6962
5,769
33.2827
344 34.7885 36.5250 38.3538 40.2692 42.2827
6,030 6,331 6,648 6,980 7,329
ACCOUNTING SERVICES SUPERVISOR
7,695
44.3942
8,080
46.6154
291 28.1308 29.5385 31.0154 32.5673 34.1942 35.9019
4,876 5,120 5,376 5,645 5,927 6,223
ACCOUNTING TECHNICIAN
6,534
37.6962
6,861
39.5827
105 21.0577 22.1077 23.2154 24.3750 25.5923 26.8731
3,650 3,832 4,024 4,225 4,436 4,658
ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT I
4,891
28.2173
5,136
29.6308
106 22.1077 23.2154 24.3750 25.5923 26.8731 28.2173
3,832 4,024 4,225 4,436 4,658 4,891
ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT II
5,136
29.6308
5,393
31.1135
107 26.0942 27.3981 28.7654 30.2019 31.7135 33.3000
4,523 4,749 4,986 5,235 5,497 5,772
ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT III
6,061
34.9673
6,364
36.7154
316 35.7577 37.5462 39.4212 41.3942 43.4654
6,198 6,508 6,833 7,175 7,534
ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES SUPERV
7,911
45.6404
8,307
47.9250
901 AQUATIC INSTRUCTOR/COACH 16.1200 16.9260 17.7724 18.6609 19.5939 780
39.0285 50.3077
ARTS PROGRAMS MANAGER 6,765 8,720
898 ASSISTANT CITY ATTORNEY 10,420
801
93.9717 119.9277
ASSISTANT CITY MANAGER 16,288 20,787
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Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
704
67.8343 87.4385
ASSISTANT DIRECTOR OF FINANCE 11,758 15,156
833
67.5568 87.0808
ASSISTANT DIRECTOR OF IT 11,710 15,094
108 35.4231 37.1942 39.0519 41.0019 43.0500 45.2019
6,140 6,447 6,769 7,107 7,462 7,835
ASSISTANT ENGINEER I
8,227
47.4635
8,638
49.8346
109 38.0423 39.9462 41.9423 44.0365 46.2404 48.5538
6,594 6,924 7,270 7,633 8,015 8,416
ASSISTANT ENGINEER II
8,837
50.9827
9,279
53.5327
301 32.6712 34.3038 36.0173 37.8173 39.7096
5,663 5,946 6,243 6,555 6,883
ASSISTANT GOLF COURSE SUPT
7,227
41.6942
7,588
43.7769
297 37.4712 39.3462 41.3135 43.3788 45.5481 47.8269
6,495 6,820 7,161 7,519 7,895 8,290
ASSISTANT PLANS EXAMINER
8,705
50.2212
9,140
52.7308
777
42.3897 54.6404
ASSOCIATE PLANNER I 7,348 9,471
778
46.6372 60.1154
ASSOCIATE PLANNER II 8,084 10,420
707
54.3847 70.1019
ASSOCIATE PROF ENGINEER 9,427 12,151
773
70.9226 91.4192
ASST DIR PLAN AND COMM DEVELOP 12,293 15,846
830
67.5568 87.0808
ASST DIRECTOR OF LIBRARIES 11,710 15,094
710
73.6483 94.9327
ASST DIRECTOR OF PW/CITY ENG 12,766 16,455
787
60.2524 77.6654
ASST TO THE CM 10,444 13,462
902 BEACH CAPTAIN 25.0496 26.3021 27.6172 28.9981 30.4480 \\Edenrpt\Eden_5.5Reports\CustomReports\Py\SalaryCompPlans.rpt Page 2 of 24 14.5 City of Santa Cruz Page 3 of 24
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Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
903 BEACH LIEUTENANT 24.6452 25.8775 27.1714 28.5299 29.9564 904 BEACH LIFEGUARD I 20.4734 21.4971 22.5720 23.7006 24.8856 905 BEACH LIFEGUARD II 22.5274 23.6539 24.8364 26.0783 27.3823 115 32.5615 34.1885 35.8962 37.6904 39.5769 41.5558
5,644 5,926 6,222 6,533 6,860 7,203
BICYCLE/PEDESTRIAN COORDINATOR
7,563
43.6327
7,941
45.8135
284 23.7692 24.9577 26.2038 27.5135 28.8865 30.3288
4,120 4,326 4,542 4,769 5,007 5,257
BOOKMOBILE LIB ASST
5,520
31.8462
5,796
33.4385
231 22.1077 23.2154 24.3750 25.5923 26.8731 28.2173
3,832 4,024 4,225 4,436 4,658 4,891
BOX OFFICE REPRESENTATIVE
5,136
29.6308
5,393
31.1135
116 35.0308 36.7846 38.6250 40.5577 42.5827 44.7115
6,072 6,376 6,695 7,030 7,381 7,750
BUILDING INSPECTOR
8,137
46.9442
8,544
49.2923
117 24.1500 25.3558 26.6250 27.9577 29.3538 30.8192
4,186 4,395 4,615 4,846 5,088 5,342
BUILDING MAINTENANCE WORKER I
5,609
32.3596
5,889
33.9750
118 27.8077 29.1981 30.6577 32.1923 33.8019 35.4923
4,820 5,061 5,314 5,580 5,859 6,152
BUILDING MAINTENANCE WORKER II
6,460
37.2692
6,783
39.1327
834
50.4282 65.0019
BUSINESS LIAISON 8,741 11,267
826
32.3999 41.7635
BUYER I 5,616 7,239
827
34.0067 43.8346
BUYER II 5,894 7,598
120 34.7885 36.5308 38.3596 40.2750 42.2885 44.4058
6,030 6,332 6,649 6,981 7,330 7,697
CHEMIST I
8,082
46.6269
8,486
48.9577
121 36.5365 38.3654 40.2808 42.2942 44.4115 46.6327
6,333 6,650 6,982 7,331 7,698 8,083
CHEMIST II
8,487
48.9635
8,911
51.4096
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Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
711
70.9226 91.4192
CHIEF BUILDING OFFICIAL 12,293 15,846
802
93.9717 119.9277
CHIEF OF FIRE DEPARTMENT 16,288 20,787
803
93.9717 119.9277
CHIEF OF POLICE 16,288 20,787
305 35.8788 37.6731 39.5538 41.5327 43.6096
6,219 6,530 6,856 7,199 7,559
CHIEF RANGER
7,937
45.7904
8,334
48.0808
899 CITY ATTORNEY 20,787
786
52.5094 67.6846
CITY CLERK ADMINISTRATOR 9,102 11,732
805
132.7571 146.0263
CITY MANAGER 23,011 25,311
717
51.7217 66.6692
CODE COMPLIANCE MANAGER 8,965 11,556
127 35.0308 36.7846 38.6250 40.5577 42.5827 44.7115
6,072 6,376 6,695 7,030 7,381 7,750
CODE COMPLIANCE SPECIALIST
8,137
46.9442
8,544
49.2923
372 40.6558 42.6865 44.8212 47.0596 49.4135
7,047 7,399 7,769 8,157 8,565
CODE COMPLIANCE SUPERVISOR
8,993
51.8827
9,443
54.4788
758
67.5568 87.0808
COMMUNICATIONS MANAGER 11,710 15,094
757
50.4282 65.0019
COMMUNITY RELATIONS SPECIALIST 8,741 11,267
907 COMMUNITY SERVICE AIDE I 16.9851 17.8349 18.7266 19.6629 908 COMMUNITY SERVICE AIDE II 18.9514 19.9022 20.8959 21.9410 23.0381 \\Edenrpt\Eden_5.5Reports\CustomReports\Py\SalaryCompPlans.rpt Page 4 of 24 14.7 City of Santa Cruz Page 5 of 24
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Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
501
26.5904 27.9173 29.3135 30.7788 32.3192 33.9346 35.6308 37.4135 COMMUNITY SERVICE OFFICER 4,609 4,839 5,081 5,335 5,602 5,882 6,176 6,485 6,809
39.2827
7,149
41.2442
131 27.0058 28.3558 29.7750 31.2635 32.8269 34.4712
4,681 4,915 5,161 5,419 5,690 5,975
CONSTRUCTION SPECIALIST
6,274
36.1962
6,588
38.0077
909 COUNCIL ASSISTANT 12.0000 25.0038 25.0038
806 COUNCILMEMBER 1,710.35
132 20.4346 21.4558 22.5288 23.6538 24.8365 26.0769
3,542 3,719 3,905 4,100 4,305 4,520
COURIER/DRIVER
4,746
27.3808
4,983
28.7481
835
40.4786 52.1769
CRIME ANALYST 7,016 9,044
133 20.4346 21.4558 22.5288 23.6538 24.8365 26.0769
3,542 3,719 3,905 4,100 4,305 4,520
CUSTODIAN
4,746
27.3808
4,983
28.7481
712
55.3963 71.4058
CUSTOMER SERVICE MGR 9,602 12,377
764
56.8151 73.2346
DEPUTY BUILDING OFFICIAL 9,848 12,694
713
39.0285 50.3077
DEPUTY CITY CLERK ADMIN 6,765 8,720
818
85.6762 109.3028
DEPUTY CITY MANAGER I 14,851 18,946
819
90.0141 114.8470
DEPUTY CITY MANAGER II 15,602 19,907
601
50.0077 53.0077 56.1865 59.5558 63.1269 66.9173 70.9327 75.1904 DEPUTY FIRE MARSHAL 8,668 9,188 9,739 10,323 10,942 11,599 12,295 13,033 550
83.9135 88.0212 92.3365 96.8654 101.6250
DEPUTY POLICE CHIEF 14,545 15,257 16,005 16,790 17,615
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Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
714
70.9226 91.4192
DEPUTY WATER DIR/ENGINEER MGR 12,293 15,846
715
70.9226 91.4192
DEPUTY WATER DIR/OPER MGR 12,293 15,846
776
56.5376 72.8769
DESALINATION PROGRAM COORD 9,800 12,632
735
55.0069 70.9038
DEVELOPMENT MANAGER 9,535 12,290
811
85.6762 109.3028
DIR OF PLNNG/COMM DEVELOPMENT 14,851 18,946
807
85.6762 109.3028
DIRECTOR OF FINANCE 14,851 18,946
810
85.6762 109.3028
DIRECTOR OF HR 14,851 18,946
816
85.6762 109.3028
DIRECTOR OF IT 14,851 18,946
808
85.6762 109.3028
DIRECTOR OF LIBRARIES 14,851 18,946
809
85.6762 109.3028
DIRECTOR OF PARKS & RECREATION 14,851 18,946
812
90.0141 114.8470
DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC WORKS 15,602 19,907
813
90.0141 114.8470
DIRECTOR OF WATER DEPARTMENT 15,602 19,907
782
41.0291 52.8865
ECONOMIC DEVEL CORD I 7,112 9,167
783
43.0745 55.5231
ECONOMIC DEVEL CORD II 7,466 9,624
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Human Resources
Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
765
55.0069 70.9038
ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT MANAGER 9,535 12,290
716
46.6372 60.1154
ENGINEERING ASSOCIATE 8,084 10,420
135 31.7019 33.2885 34.9558 36.7038 38.5385 40.4654
5,495 5,770 6,059 6,362 6,680 7,014
ENGINEERING TECHNICIAN
7,365
42.4904
7,733
44.6135
141 32.2038 33.8135 35.5038 37.2808 39.1442 41.1000
5,582 5,861 6,154 6,462 6,785 7,124
ENVIRON PROGRAMS ANALYST I
7,480
43.1538
7,854
45.3115
136 34.4827 36.2077 38.0192 39.9231 41.9192 44.0135
5,977 6,276 6,590 6,920 7,266 7,629
ENVIRON PROGRAMS ANALYST II
8,010
46.2115
8,411
48.5250
143 33.1500 34.8058 36.5481 38.3769 40.2981 42.3115
5,746 6,033 6,335 6,652 6,985 7,334
ENVIRONMENTAL COMPLIANCE INSP
7,701
44.4288
8,086
46.6500
255 34.7885 36.5308 38.3596 40.2750 42.2885 44.4058
6,030 6,332 6,649 6,981 7,330 7,697
ENVIRONMENTAL MICROBIO I
8,082
46.6269
8,486
48.9577
256 36.5365 38.3654 40.2808 42.2942 44.4115 46.6327
6,333 6,650 6,982 7,331 7,698 8,083
ENVIRONMENTAL MICROBIO II
8,487
48.9635
8,911
51.4096
257 40.1769 42.1846 44.2962 46.5115 48.8365 51.2769
6,964 7,312 7,678 8,062 8,465 8,888
ENVIRONMENTAL MICROBIO III
9,332
53.8385
9,799
56.5327
137 26.3077 27.6231 29.0019 30.4500 31.9731 33.5712
4,560 4,788 5,027 5,278 5,542 5,819
EQUIPMENT MECHANIC I
6,110
35.2500
6,415
37.0096
138 30.0519 31.5519 33.1269 34.7827 36.5192 38.3481
5,209 5,469 5,742 6,029 6,330 6,647
EQUIPMENT MECHANIC II
6,979
40.2635
7,328
42.2769
139 23.8788 25.0731 26.3250 27.6404 29.0250 30.4788
4,139 4,346 4,563 4,791 5,031 5,283
EQUIPMENT SERVICE WORKER
5,547
32.0019
5,824
33.6000
286 31.5115 33.0865 34.7423 36.4788 38.3019 40.2173
5,462 5,735 6,022 6,323 6,639 6,971
EXECUTIVE ASSIST TO CM
7,320
42.2308
7,686
44.3423
280 33.5885 35.2673 37.0327 38.8846 40.8288 42.8712
5,822 6,113 6,419 6,740 7,077 7,431
FAC MAINT/ENERGY PROJ COORD
7,803
45.0173
8,193
47.2673
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Human Resources
Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
350 38.9885 40.9385 42.9865 45.1385 47.3942
6,758 7,096 7,451 7,824 8,215
FACILITIES MAINT SUPERVISOR
8,626
49.7654
9,057
52.2519
140 19.7712 20.7577 21.7962 22.8865 24.0288 25.2288
3,427 3,598 3,778 3,967 4,165 4,373
FACILITY ATTENDANT
4,592
26.4923
4,822
27.8192
308 41.1519 43.2115 45.3750 47.6423 50.0250
7,133 7,490 7,865 8,258 8,671
FIELD SUPERVISOR
9,105
52.5288
9,560
55.1538
775
54.1386 69.7846
FINANCE MANAGER 9,384 12,096
652
75.7038 80.2442 85.0615 90.1673 95.5788 101.3135
FIRE BATT CHIEF-40 HR 13,122 13,909 14,744 15,629 16,567 17,561 651
54.0742 57.3173 60.7582 64.4052 68.2706 72.3668
FIRE BATTALION CHIEF 13,122 13,909 14,744 15,629 16,567 17,561 602
35.7198 37.8626 40.1332 42.5398 45.0907 47.7981 50.6662 53.7074 FIRE CAPTAIN 8,668 9,188 9,739 10,323 10,942 11,599 12,295 13,033 603
50.0077 53.0077 56.1865 59.5558 63.1269 66.9173 70.9327 75.1904 FIRE CAPTAIN-40 HR 8,668 9,188 9,739 10,323 10,942 11,599 12,295 13,033 654
82.1135 87.0404 92.2615 97.7942 103.6615 109.8808
FIRE DIVISION CHIEF 14,233 15,087 15,992 16,951 17,968 19,046 604
31.2115 33.0824 35.0687 37.1745 39.4038 41.7692 44.2747 46.9327 FIRE ENGINEER 7,574 8,028 8,510 9,021 9,562 10,136 10,744 11,389 609
43.6962 46.3154 49.0962 52.0442 55.1654 58.4769 61.9846 65.7058 FIRE ENGINEER-40/HR 7,574 8,028 8,510 9,021 9,562 10,136 10,744 11,389 605
37.6327 39.8885 42.2827 44.8212 47.5096 50.3596 53.3827 56.5846 FIRE PREVENTION INSPECTOR I 6,523 6,914 7,329 7,769 8,235 8,729 9,253 9,808 606
40.7192 43.1654 45.7558 48.5019 51.4096 54.4962 57.7673 61.2346 FIRE PREVENTION INSPECTOR II 7,058 7,482 7,931 8,407 8,911 9,446 10,013 10,614 296 28.1308 29.5385 31.0154 32.5673 34.1942 35.9019
4,876 5,120 5,376 5,645 5,927 6,223
FIRE PREVENTION TECHNICIAN
6,534
37.6962
6,861
39.5827
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California 10/26/2023
Human Resources
Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
607
29.0852 30.8324 32.6827 34.6442 36.7212 38.9258 41.2624 43.7390 FIREFIGHTER 7,058 7,482 7,931 8,407 8,911 9,446 10,013 10,614 608
40.7192 43.1654 45.7558 48.5019 51.4096 54.4962 57.7673 61.2346 FIREFIGHTER - 40/HR 7,058 7,482 7,931 8,407 8,911 9,446 10,013 10,614 309 39.6981 41.6827 43.7654 45.9519 48.2481
6,881 7,225 7,586 7,965 8,363
GARAGE SERVICE SUPERVISOR
8,781
50.6596
9,220
53.1923
719
49.8598 64.2692
GOLF COURSE SUPERINTENDENT 8,642 11,140
237 32.5788 34.2058 35.9135 37.7077 39.5942 41.5731
5,647 5,929 6,225 6,536 6,863 7,206
GREEN BLDG ENVIRO SPECIALIST
7,566
43.6500
7,944
45.8308
122 24.1500 25.3558 26.6250 27.9577 29.3538 30.8192
4,186 4,395 4,615 4,846 5,088 5,342
HOMELESSNESS RESPONSE FIELD WK
5,609
32.3596
5,889
33.9750
838
60.2524 77.6654
HOMELESSNESS RESPONSE MANAGER 10,444 13,462
840
35.0585 45.1904
HOMELESSNESS RESPONSE SPEC I 6,077 7,833
841
37.6947 48.5885
HOMELESSNESS RESPONSE SPEC II 6,534 8,422
709
45.5496 58.7135
HOMELESSNESS SERVICES COORD 7,895 10,177
836
58.4577 75.3519
HOUSING & COMM DEVELP MANAGER 10,133 13,061
142 34.4827 36.2077 38.0192 39.9231 41.9192 44.0135
5,977 6,276 6,590 6,920 7,266 7,629
HOUSING PROGRAMS SPECIALIST
8,010
46.2115
8,411
48.5250
720
39.0285 50.3077
HUMAN RESOURCES ANALYST I 6,765 8,720
721
41.7587 53.8269
HUMAN RESOURCES ANALYST II 7,238 9,330
\\Edenrpt\Eden_5.5Reports\CustomReports\Py\SalaryCompPlans.rpt Page 9 of 24 14.12 City of Santa Cruz Page 10 of 24
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Human Resources
Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
169 28.1308 29.5385 31.0154 32.5673 34.1942 35.9019
4,876 5,120 5,376 5,645 5,927 6,223
HUMAN RESOURCES TECHNICIAN
6,534
37.6962
6,861
39.5827
232 36.6808 38.5154 40.4423 42.4615 44.5846 46.8115
6,358 6,676 7,010 7,360 7,728 8,114
INFORMATION TEC SPECIALIST III
8,520
49.1538
8,946
51.6115
144 30.2423 31.7538 33.3404 35.0077 36.7558 38.5962
5,242 5,504 5,779 6,068 6,371 6,690
INFORMATION TECH SPECIALIST I
7,024
40.5231
7,375
42.5481
145 33.3346 35.0019 36.7500 38.5904 40.5173 42.5423
5,778 6,067 6,370 6,689 7,023 7,374
INFORMATION TECH SPECIALIST II
7,743
44.6712
8,130
46.9038
837
47.7383 61.5346
IT BUS. SYSTEMS ANALYST III 8,275 10,666
828
38.4063 49.5058
IT BUSINESS SYSTEMS ANALYST I 6,657 8,581
829
42.9045 55.3038
IT BUSINESS SYSTEMS ANALYST II 7,437 9,586
832
60.4673 77.9423
IT MANAGER 10,481 13,510
766
54.3847 70.1019
IT PROJECT MGR/TRAIN COORD 9,427 12,151
215 27.0577 28.4077 29.8269 31.3212 32.8846 34.5288
4,690 4,924 5,170 5,429 5,700 5,985
LABORATORY TECHNICIAN
6,284
36.2538
6,598
38.0654
146 19.7712 20.7577 21.7962 22.8865 24.0288 25.2288
3,427 3,598 3,778 3,967 4,165 4,373
LANDFILL GATE ATTENDANT
4,592
26.4923
4,822
27.8192
312 34.5635 36.2942 38.1115 40.0154 42.0173
5,991 6,291 6,606 6,936 7,283
LEAD EQUIPMENT MECHANIC
7,647
44.1173
8,029
46.3212
742
31.9031 41.1231
LIBRARIAN I 5,530 7,128
750
34.1320 43.9962
LIBRARIAN II 5,916 7,626
\\Edenrpt\Eden_5.5Reports\CustomReports\Py\SalaryCompPlans.rpt Page 10 of 24 14.13 City of Santa Cruz Page 11 of 24
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Human Resources
Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
831
46.6372 60.1154
LIBRARIAN III 8,084 10,420
925 LIBRARY AIDE 16.1200 16.9260 17.7724 18.6609 19.5939 282 21.0115 22.0615 23.1635 24.3231 25.5404 26.8154
3,642 3,824 4,015 4,216 4,427 4,648
LIBRARY ASSISTANT I
4,880
28.1538
5,124
29.5615
283 23.7692 24.9577 26.2038 27.5135 28.8865 30.3288
4,120 4,326 4,542 4,769 5,007 5,257
LIBRARY ASSISTANT II
5,520
31.8462
5,796
33.4385
363 26.6712 28.0038 29.4058 30.8769 32.4231
4,623 4,854 5,097 5,352 5,620
LIBRARY ASSISTANT III
5,901
34.0442
6,196
35.7462
364 27.9635 29.3596 30.8250 32.3654 33.9808
4,847 5,089 5,343 5,610 5,890
LIBRARY ASSISTANT IV
6,185
35.6827
6,494
37.4654
285 26.2615 27.5769 28.9558 30.4038 31.9212 33.5192
4,552 4,780 5,019 5,270 5,533 5,810
LIBRARY INFORMATION SPECIALIST
6,101
35.1981
6,406
36.9577
740
30.3769 39.1558
LIBRARY SPECIALIST 5,265 6,787
153 26.9135 28.2577 29.6712 31.1538 32.7115 34.3442
4,665 4,898 5,143 5,400 5,670 5,953
LIGHT EQUIPMENT MECHANIC
6,251
36.0635
6,564
37.8692
911 MAINTENANCE WORKER AIDE I 16.1200 16.9260 17.7724 18.6609 19.5939 913 MAINTENANCE WORKER AIDE II 18.5380 19.4650 20.4382 21.4601 22.5331 702
40.4786 52.1769
MANAGEMENT ANALYST 7,016 9,044
912 MANAGEMENT ASSISTANT 12.0000 25.0385
977 MANAGEMENT PROF & TECH ASST 20.0000
\\Edenrpt\Eden_5.5Reports\CustomReports\Py\SalaryCompPlans.rpt Page 11 of 24 14.14 City of Santa Cruz Page 12 of 24
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Human Resources
Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
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J
Monthly
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Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
610
28.7019 30.4212 32.2442 34.1769 36.2250 38.4000 40.7019 43.1423 MARINE SAFETY OFFICER 40/HR 4,975 5,273 5,589 5,924 6,279 6,656 7,055 7,478 814 MAYOR 3,420.68
726
54.3847 70.1019
NETWORK & SYSTEMS ADMIN 9,427 12,151
914 OFFICE ASSISTANT 16.1200 16.9260 17.7724 18.6609 19.5939 162 19.7712 20.7577 21.7962 22.8865 24.0288 25.2288
3,427 3,598 3,778 3,967 4,165 4,373
PARKING ATTENDANT
4,592
26.4923
4,822
27.8192
164 25.6904 26.9769 28.3269 29.7404 31.2288 32.7923
4,453 4,676 4,910 5,155 5,413 5,684
PARKING CONTROL MAINT WKR
5,968
34.4308
6,266
36.1500
163 25.6904 26.9769 28.3269 29.7404 31.2288 32.7923
4,453 4,676 4,910 5,155 5,413 5,684
PARKING ENFORCEMENT OFFICER
5,968
34.4308
6,266
36.1500
227 22.2808 23.3942 24.5654 25.7942 27.0865 28.4423
3,862 4,055 4,258 4,471 4,695 4,930
PARKING FACILITY MAINT ASST
5,177
29.8673
5,436
31.3615
165 25.6904 26.9769 28.3269 29.7404 31.2288 32.7923
4,453 4,676 4,910 5,155 5,413 5,684
PARKING OFFICE REPRESENTATIVE
5,968
34.4308
6,266
36.1500
320 32.8385 34.4827 36.2077 38.0192 39.9173
5,692 5,977 6,276 6,590 6,919
PARKING OFFICE SUPERVISOR
7,265
41.9135
7,628
44.0077
727
54.8592 70.7135
PARKING PROGRAM MANAGER 9,509 12,257
348 33.9923 35.6942 37.4769 39.3519 41.3192
5,892 6,187 6,496 6,821 7,162
PARKING SERVICES SUPERVISOR
7,520
43.3846
7,896
45.5538
321 30.8365 32.3769 33.9981 35.7000 37.4827
5,345 5,612 5,893 6,188 6,497
PARKS FIELD CREW LEADER
6,822
39.3577
7,163
41.3250
167 24.1500 25.3558 26.6250 27.9577 29.3538 30.8192
4,186 4,395 4,615 4,846 5,088 5,342
PARKS MAINTENANCE WORKER
5,609
32.3596
5,889
33.9750
\\Edenrpt\Eden_5.5Reports\CustomReports\Py\SalaryCompPlans.rpt Page 12 of 24 14.15 City of Santa Cruz Page 13 of 24
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Human Resources
Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
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F
Step
G
Step
I
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H
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J
Monthly
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Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
126 28.1308 29.5385 31.0154 32.5673 34.1942 35.9019
4,876 5,120 5,376 5,645 5,927 6,223
PAYROLL TECHNICIAN
6,534
37.6962
6,861
39.5827
288 28.1308 29.5385 31.0154 32.5673 34.1942 35.9019
4,876 5,120 5,376 5,645 5,927 6,223
PLANNING & COMM DEVEL TECH
6,534
37.6962
6,861
39.5827
170 28.6269 30.0577 31.5577 33.1327 34.7885 36.5250
4,962 5,210 5,470 5,743 6,030 6,331
PLANT MAINTENANCE MECHANIC I
6,648
38.3538
6,980
40.2692
171 32.6885 34.3212 36.0346 37.8346 39.7269 41.7115
5,666 5,949 6,246 6,558 6,886 7,230
PLANT MAINTENANCE MECHANIC II
7,592
43.8000
7,972
45.9923
175 25.1365 26.3942 27.7154 29.1000 30.5538 32.0827
4,357 4,575 4,804 5,044 5,296 5,561
PO PROPERTY & EVIDENCE SPECIAL
5,839
33.6865
6,131
35.3712
552
81.9058 86.0019 90.3000
POLICE LIEUTENANT 14,197 14,907 15,652
504
40.8692 42.9115 45.0577 47.3077 49.6731 52.1596 54.7673 POLICE OFFICER 7,084 7,438 7,810 8,200 8,610 9,041 9,493 9,968
57.5077
10,466
60.3808
503
37.0731
POLICE OFFICER TRAINEE 6,426
728
49.8598 64.2692
POLICE RECORDS MANAGER 8,642 11,140
176 23.8788 25.0731 26.3250 27.6404 29.0250 30.4788
4,139 4,346 4,563 4,791 5,031 5,283
POLICE RECORDS TECHNICIAN
5,547
32.0019
5,824
33.6000
505
47.4346 49.8058 52.2981 54.9115 57.6577 60.5423 63.5712 66.7500 POLICE SERGEANT 8,222 8,633 9,065 9,518 9,994 10,494 11,019 11,570 12,149
70.0904
12,756
73.5923
915 POOL LIFEGUARD 16.1200 16.9260 17.7724 18.6609 19.5939 916 POOL MANAGER 16.1200 16.9260 17.7724 18.6609 19.5939 730
50.4282 65.0019
PRINCIPAL HR ANALYST 8,741 11,267
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Human Resources
Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
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D
Step
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Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
729
50.4282 65.0019
PRINCIPAL MGMT ANALYST 8,741 11,267
731
59.6303 76.8635
PRINCIPAL PLANNER 10,336 13,323
917 PROFESSIONAL & TECH ASSIST 16.1200 43.3998
705
38.4063 49.5058
PROGRAMMER ANALYST I 6,657 8,581
706
42.9045 55.3038
PROGRAMMER ANALYST II 7,437 9,586
770
43.0701 55.5173
PROPERTY MANAGER 7,465 9,623
759
48.1366 62.0481
PUBLIC WORKS OPER SUPT 8,344 10,755
732
56.0587 72.2596
PUBLIC WORKS OPERATIONS MGR 9,717 12,525
281 23.6538 24.8365 26.0769 27.3808 28.7481 30.1846
4,100 4,305 4,520 4,746 4,983 5,232
PURCHASING ASSISTANT
5,494
31.6962
5,769
33.2827
733
54.1386 69.7846
PURCHASING MANAGER 9,384 12,096
359 40.7250 42.7615 44.9019 47.1462 49.5058
7,059 7,412 7,783 8,172 8,581
QA/QC LABORATORY CHEMIST
9,010
51.9808
9,461
54.5827
238 20.4692 21.4904 22.5635 23.6942 24.8769 26.1231
3,548 3,725 3,911 4,107 4,312 4,528
RANGER ASSISTANT
4,754
27.4269
4,992
28.8000
294 24.9288 26.1750 27.4846 28.8577 30.3000 31.8173
4,321 4,537 4,764 5,002 5,252 5,515
RANGER I
5,791
33.4096
6,081
35.0827
179 26.8962 28.2404 29.6538 31.1365 32.6942 34.3269
4,662 4,895 5,140 5,397 5,667 5,950
RANGER II
6,248
36.0462
6,560
37.8462
\\Edenrpt\Eden_5.5Reports\CustomReports\Py\SalaryCompPlans.rpt Page 14 of 24 14.17 City of Santa Cruz Page 15 of 24
California 10/26/2023
Human Resources
Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
918 RANGER TRAINEE 17.9790 18.8795 19.8231 20.8141 21.8548 223 26.5269 27.8538 29.2442 30.7038 32.2385 33.8481
4,598 4,828 5,069 5,322 5,588 5,867
RECORDS COORDINATOR
6,160
35.5385
6,468
37.3154
919 RECREATION AREA AIDE 16.1200 16.9260 17.7724 18.6609 19.5939 180 27.2885 28.6558 30.0865 31.5923 33.1731 34.8288
4,730 4,967 5,215 5,476 5,750 6,037
RECREATION COORDINATOR
6,339
36.5712
6,656
38.4000
920 RECREATION I 16.1200 16.9260 17.7724 18.6609
921 RECREATION II 17.7320 18.6186 19.5495 20.5270 21.5534 922 RECREATION III 19.5052 20.4805 21.5045 22.5796 23.7087 923 RECREATION IV 21.4557 22.5285 23.6549 24.8377 26.0796 734
56.0587 72.2596
RECREATION SUPERINTENDENT 9,717 12,525
323 35.5962 37.3731 39.2423 41.2038 43.2635
6,170 6,478 6,802 7,142 7,499
RECREATION SUPERVISOR
7,874
45.4269
8,268
47.7000
924 RECREATION V 23.6012 24.7813 26.0204 27.3214 28.6875 181 30.0519 31.5519 33.1269 34.7827 36.5192 38.3481
5,209 5,469 5,742 6,029 6,330 6,647
RECYCLE CENTER MAINT MECHANIC
6,979
40.2635
7,328
42.2769
815
85.6762 109.3028
REDEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR 14,851 18,946
182 27.4154 28.7885 30.2250 31.7365 33.3231 34.9904
4,752 4,990 5,239 5,501 5,776 6,065
RESOURCE RECOVERY EQUIP OPERAT
6,368
36.7385
6,686
38.5731
\\Edenrpt\Eden_5.5Reports\CustomReports\Py\SalaryCompPlans.rpt Page 15 of 24 14.18 City of Santa Cruz Page 16 of 24
California 10/26/2023
Human Resources
Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
349 34.2635 35.9769 37.7769 39.6635 41.6481
5,939 6,236 6,548 6,875 7,219
RESOURCE RECOVERY SUPERVISOR
7,580
43.7308
7,959
45.9173
218 22.6788 23.8154 25.0038 26.2558 27.5712 28.9500
3,931 4,128 4,334 4,551 4,779 5,018
RESOURCE RECOVERY WORKER I
5,269
30.3981
5,532
31.9154
219 23.7981 24.9865 26.2385 27.5481 28.9269 30.3750
4,125 4,331 4,548 4,775 5,014 5,265
RESOURCE RECOVERY WORKER II
5,528
31.8923
5,804
33.4846
279 30.2423 31.7538 33.3404 35.0077 36.7558 38.5962
5,242 5,504 5,779 6,068 6,371 6,690
REVENUE COLLECTIONS SPECIALIST
7,024
40.5231
7,375
42.5481
703
54.1386 69.7846
RISK AND SAFETY MANAGER 9,384 12,096
843
50.4282 65.0019
SAFETY OFFICER 8,741 11,267
797
54.3847 70.1019
SCADA SYSTEM NETWORK ADMINISTR 9,427 12,151
762
48.1366 62.0481
SENIOR ACCOUNTANT 8,344 10,755
184 38.7865 40.7250 42.7615 44.9019 47.1462 49.5058
6,723 7,059 7,412 7,783 8,172 8,581
SENIOR BUILDING INSPECTOR
9,010
51.9808
9,460
54.5769
345 42.4096 44.5327 46.7596 49.0962 51.5481
7,351 7,719 8,105 8,510 8,935
SENIOR ELECTRICIAN
9,382
54.1269
9,851
56.8327
264 26.9135 28.2577 29.6712 31.1538 32.7115 34.3442
4,665 4,898 5,143 5,400 5,670 5,953
SENIOR PARKING SERVICES WORKER
6,251
36.0635
6,564
37.8692
234 30.2423 31.7538 33.3404 35.0077 36.7558 38.5962
5,242 5,504 5,779 6,068 6,371 6,690
SENIOR PAYMENTS TECHNICIAN
7,024
40.5231
7,375
42.5481
741
54.1386 69.7846
SENIOR PLANNER 9,384 12,096
277 41.2269 43.2865 45.4500 47.7231 50.1115 52.6154
7,146 7,503 7,878 8,272 8,686 9,120
SENIOR PLANS EXAMINER
9,576
55.2462
10,055
58.0096
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California 10/26/2023
Human Resources
Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
292 25.7308 27.0173 28.3673 29.7865 31.2750 32.8385
4,460 4,683 4,917 5,163 5,421 5,692
SENIOR POLICE RECORDS TECH
5,977
34.4827
6,276
36.2077
708
60.2345 77.6423
SENIOR PROFESSIONAL ENGINEER 10,441 13,458
293 29.3481 30.8135 32.3538 33.9692 35.6654 37.4481
5,087 5,341 5,608 5,888 6,182 6,491
SENIOR RANGER
6,816
39.3231
7,157
41.2904
366 45.3115 47.5788 49.9558 52.4538 55.0788
7,854 8,247 8,659 9,092 9,547
SENIOR WW PLANT OPER IV
10,024
57.8308
10,525
60.7212
330 30.8365 32.3769 33.9981 35.7000 37.4827
5,345 5,612 5,893 6,188 6,497
SERVICE FIELD CREW LEADER
6,822
39.3577
7,163
41.3250
189 22.2808 23.3942 24.5654 25.7942 27.0865 28.4423
3,862 4,055 4,258 4,471 4,695 4,930
SERVICE MAINTENANCE TRAINEE
5,177
29.8673
5,436
31.3615
190 24.1558 25.3615 26.6308 27.9635 29.3596 30.8250
4,187 4,396 4,616 4,847 5,089 5,343
SERVICE MAINTENANCE WORKER
5,610
32.3654
5,890
33.9808
191 27.6231 29.0019 30.4500 31.9731 33.5712 35.2500
4,788 5,027 5,278 5,542 5,819 6,110
SOLID WASTE WORKER
6,416
37.0154
6,737
38.8673
287 32.2038 33.8135 35.5038 37.2808 39.1442 41.1000
5,582 5,861 6,154 6,462 6,785 7,124
SPECIAL EVENTS COORDINATOR
7,480
43.1538
7,854
45.3115
360 36.8712 38.7173 40.6558 42.6865 44.8212
6,391 6,711 7,047 7,399 7,769
SR ENVIR COMPLIANCE INSPECTOR
8,157
47.0596
8,565
49.4135
123 26.2788 27.5942 28.9731 30.4212 31.9442 33.5423
4,555 4,783 5,022 5,273 5,537 5,814
SR HOMELESSNESS RESPONSE FLDWK
6,105
35.2212
6,410
36.9808
186 26.2788 27.5942 28.9731 30.4212 31.9442 33.5423
4,555 4,783 5,022 5,273 5,537 5,814
SR PARKS MAINTENANCE WKR
6,105
35.2212
6,410
36.9808
299 27.0981 28.4538 29.8788 31.3731 32.9423 34.5865
4,697 4,932 5,179 5,438 5,710 5,995
SR POLICE PROPERTY & EVID. SP
6,295
36.3173
6,610
38.1346
220 25.9038 27.2019 28.5635 29.9942 31.4942 33.0692
4,490 4,715 4,951 5,199 5,459 5,732
SR RESOURCE RECOVERY WKR
6,019
34.7250
6,320
36.4615
\\Edenrpt\Eden_5.5Reports\CustomReports\Py\SalaryCompPlans.rpt Page 17 of 24 14.20 City of Santa Cruz Page 18 of 24
California 10/26/2023
Human Resources
Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
187 26.2788 27.5942 28.9731 30.4212 31.9442 33.5423
4,555 4,783 5,022 5,273 5,537 5,814
SR SERVICE MAINTENANCE WKR
6,105
35.2212
6,410
36.9808
243 32.8038 34.4423 36.1673 37.9731 39.8712 41.8673
5,686 5,970 6,269 6,582 6,911 7,257
SR WATER DISTRIBUTION OPERATOR
7,620
43.9615
8,001
46.1596
205 32.8038 34.4423 36.1673 37.9731 39.8712 41.8673
5,686 5,970 6,269 6,582 6,911 7,257
SR WW COLLECTION MAINT TECH
7,620
43.9615
8,001
46.1596
329 44.2038 46.4135 48.7327 51.1673 53.7231
7,662 8,045 8,447 8,869 9,312
SR WW PLANT OPER III
9,778
56.4115
10,267
59.2327
743
56.0587 72.2596
SUPERINTENDENT OF PARKS 9,717 12,525
367 44.6250 46.8577 49.2000 51.6577 54.2423
7,735 8,122 8,528 8,954 9,402
SUPERVISING BUILDING INSPECTOR
9,872
56.9538
10,366
59.8038
362 45.9346 48.2308 50.6423 53.1750 55.8346
7,962 8,360 8,778 9,217 9,678
SUPERVISING PLANS EXAMINER
10,162
58.6269
10,670
61.5577
771
41.8527 53.9481
SUPT OF PARKING SERVICES 7,254 9,351
744
49.9493 64.3846
SUPT OF R R COLLECT-SWEEPING 8,658 11,160
745
49.9493 64.3846
SUPT OF R R PROCESS - DISPOSAL 8,658 11,160
754
62.2799 80.2788
SUPT OF WATER DISTRIBUTION 10,795 13,915
747
63.8554 82.3096
SUPT OF WATER TREATMENT & PROD 11,068 14,267
738
54.1386 69.7846
SUSTAIN - CLIMATE ACTION MGR 9,384 12,096
793
54.3847 70.1019
SYSTEMS COORDINATOR 9,427 12,151
\\Edenrpt\Eden_5.5Reports\CustomReports\Py\SalaryCompPlans.rpt Page 18 of 24 14.21 City of Santa Cruz Page 19 of 24
California 10/26/2023
Human Resources
Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
196 25.5231 26.7981 28.1365 29.5442 31.0212 32.5731
4,424 4,645 4,877 5,121 5,377 5,646
TRAFFIC SIGNAL WORKER
5,928
34.2000
6,224
35.9077
749
70.9226 91.4192
TRANSPORTATION MANAGER 12,293 15,846
198 32.5615 34.1885 35.8962 37.6904 39.5769 41.5558
5,644 5,926 6,222 6,533 6,860 7,203
TRANSPORTATION COORDINATOR
7,563
43.6327
7,941
45.8135
722
46.6372 60.1154
TRANSPORTATION PLANNER I 8,084 10,420
723
54.1386 69.7846
TRANSPORTATION PLANNER II 9,384 12,096
751
45.5049 58.6558
URBAN FORESTER 7,888 10,167
271 27.1212 28.4769 29.9019 31.3962 32.9654 34.6154
4,701 4,936 5,183 5,442 5,714 6,000
UTILITY ACCOUNT SPECIALIST
6,300
36.3462
6,615
38.1635
295 27.3058 28.6731 30.1038 31.6096 33.1904 34.8519
4,733 4,970 5,218 5,479 5,753 6,041
UTILITY MAINT TECH TRAINEE
6,343
36.5942
6,660
38.4231
260 29.0596 30.5135 32.0365 33.6404 35.3250 37.0904
5,037 5,289 5,553 5,831 6,123 6,429
UTILITY MAINT TECHNICIAN
6,750
38.9423
7,088
40.8923
274 23.4692 24.6404 25.8750 27.1673 28.5231 29.9481
4,068 4,271 4,485 4,709 4,944 5,191
UTILITY SER FIELD TECH I
5,451
31.4481
5,724
33.0231
275 24.6577 25.8923 27.1846 28.5462 29.9712 31.4712
4,274 4,488 4,712 4,948 5,195 5,455
UTILITY SER FIELD TECH II
5,728
33.0462
6,014
34.6962
272 23.4692 24.6404 25.8750 27.1673 28.5231 29.9481
4,068 4,271 4,485 4,709 4,944 5,191
UTILITY SERVICE REP I
5,451
31.4481
5,724
33.0231
273 24.6577 25.8923 27.1846 28.5462 29.9712 31.4712
4,274 4,488 4,712 4,948 5,195 5,455
UTILITY SERVICE REP II
5,728
33.0462
6,014
34.6962
333 34.5981 36.3288 38.1462 40.0558 42.0577
5,997 6,297 6,612 6,943 7,290
UTILITY SUPERVISOR
7,655
44.1635
8,038
46.3731
\\Edenrpt\Eden_5.5Reports\CustomReports\Py\SalaryCompPlans.rpt Page 19 of 24 14.22 City of Santa Cruz Page 20 of 24
California 10/26/2023
Human Resources
Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
506
26.2615 27.5769 28.9558 30.4038 31.9269 33.5250 35.2038 36.9635 VICTIM ADVOCATE 4,552 4,780 5,019 5,270 5,534 5,811 6,102 6,407 6,727
38.8096
7,063
40.7481
289 21.3750 22.4423 23.5673 24.7442 25.9788 27.2769
3,705 3,890 4,085 4,289 4,503 4,728
VOLUNTEER COORDINATOR ASSIST
4,964
28.6385
5,212
30.0692
225 24.9288 26.1750 27.4846 28.8577 30.3000 31.8173
4,321 4,537 4,764 5,002 5,252 5,515
WASTE REDUCTION ASSITANT
5,791
33.4096
6,081
35.0827
746
69.6067 89.7231
WASTEWATER SYSTEMS MANAGER 12,065 15,552
839
67.8343 87.4385
WATER CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER 11,758 15,156
753
57.4506 74.0538
WATER CONSERVATION MANAGER 9,958 12,836
208 27.6346 29.0192 30.4731 31.9962 33.5942 35.2731
4,790 5,030 5,282 5,546 5,823 6,114
WATER CONSERVATION REPRES.
6,420
37.0385
6,741
38.8904
355 36.9808 38.8327 40.7769 42.8135 44.9538
6,410 6,731 7,068 7,421 7,792
WATER DIST CREW LEADER III
8,182
47.2038
8,591
49.5635
356 37.1192 38.9769 40.9269 42.9750 45.1212
6,434 6,756 7,094 7,449 7,821
WATER DIST CREW LEADER IV
8,212
47.3769
8,623
49.7481
244 22.9096 24.0577 25.2577 26.5212 27.8481 29.2385
3,971 4,170 4,378 4,597 4,827 5,068
WATER DISTRIBUTION OIT
5,321
30.6981
5,587
32.2327
246 29.3481 30.8135 32.3538 33.9692 35.6654 37.4481
5,087 5,341 5,608 5,888 6,182 6,491
WATER DISTRIBUTION OPER III
6,816
39.3231
7,157
41.2904
245 26.8904 28.2346 29.6481 31.1308 32.6885 34.3212
4,661 4,894 5,139 5,396 5,666 5,949
WATER DISTRIBUTION OPERATOR II
6,246
36.0346
6,558
37.8346
352 47.7115 50.0942 52.5981 55.2288 57.9923
8,270 8,683 9,117 9,573 10,052
WATER DISTRIBUTION SUP V
10,555
60.8942
11,083
63.9404
351 44.5269 46.7538 49.0904 51.5423 54.1212
7,718 8,104 8,509 8,934 9,381
WATER DISTRIBUTION SUPERV IV
9,850
56.8269
10,342
59.6654
\\Edenrpt\Eden_5.5Reports\CustomReports\Py\SalaryCompPlans.rpt Page 20 of 24 14.23 City of Santa Cruz Page 21 of 24
California 10/26/2023
Human Resources
Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
370 45.0462 47.2962 49.6615 52.1423 54.7500
7,808 8,198 8,608 9,038 9,490
WATER FAC MECH SUPERVISOR
9,965
57.4904
10,463
60.3635
258 33.4962 35.1692 36.9288 38.7750 40.7135 42.7500
5,806 6,096 6,401 6,721 7,057 7,410
WATER FAC MECHANICAL TECH II
7,780
44.8846
8,169
47.1288
259 36.1558 37.9615 39.8596 41.8500 43.9442 46.1423
6,267 6,580 6,909 7,254 7,617 7,998
WATER FAC MECHANICAL TECH III
8,398
48.4500
8,818
50.8731
340 47.2500 49.6096 52.0904 54.6923 57.4269
8,190 8,599 9,029 9,480 9,954
WATER FACILITIES FIELD SUPV
10,452
60.3000
10,975
63.3173
214 23.4692 24.6404 25.8750 27.1673 28.5231 29.9481
4,068 4,271 4,485 4,709 4,944 5,191
WATER METER SPECIALIST I
5,451
31.4481
5,724
33.0231
276 24.8250 26.0654 27.3692 28.7365 30.1731 31.6788
4,303 4,518 4,744 4,981 5,230 5,491
WATER METER SPECIALIST II
5,766
33.2654
6,054
34.9269
213 26.8904 28.2346 29.6481 31.1308 32.6885 34.3212
4,661 4,894 5,139 5,396 5,666 5,949
WATER METER SPECIALIST LEAD
6,246
36.0346
6,558
37.8346
339 34.6673 36.3981 38.2154 40.1250 42.1327
6,009 6,309 6,624 6,955 7,303
WATER METER SUPERVISOR
7,668
44.2385
8,051
46.4481
212 22.0788 23.1808 24.3404 25.5577 26.8385 28.1827
3,827 4,018 4,219 4,430 4,652 4,885
WATER METER TECHNICIAN
5,129
29.5904
5,385
31.0673
251 34.7885 36.5308 38.3596 40.2750 42.2885 44.4058
6,030 6,332 6,649 6,981 7,330 7,697
WATER QUALITY CHEMIST I
8,082
46.6269
8,486
48.9577
252 36.5365 38.3654 40.2808 42.2942 44.4115 46.6327
6,333 6,650 6,982 7,331 7,698 8,083
WATER QUALITY CHEMIST II
8,487
48.9635
8,911
51.4096
253 40.1769 42.1846 44.2962 46.5115 48.8365 51.2769
6,964 7,312 7,678 8,062 8,465 8,888
WATER QUALITY CHEMIST III
9,332
53.8385
9,799
56.5327
755
57.4506 74.0538
WATER QUALITY MANAGER 9,958 12,836
298 37.8519 39.7442 41.7288 43.8173 46.0096 48.3115
6,561 6,889 7,233 7,595 7,975 8,374
WATER RESOURCES ANALYST
8,793
50.7288
9,233
53.2673
\\Edenrpt\Eden_5.5Reports\CustomReports\Py\SalaryCompPlans.rpt Page 21 of 24 14.24 City of Santa Cruz Page 22 of 24
California 10/26/2023
Human Resources
Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
371 42.4096 44.5327 46.7596 49.0962 51.5481
7,351 7,719 8,105 8,510 8,935
WATER RESOURCES SUPERVISOR
9,382
54.1269
9,851
56.8327
228 41.2269 43.2865 45.4500 47.7231 50.1115 52.6154
7,146 7,503 7,878 8,272 8,686 9,120
WATER SCADA ANALYST
9,576
55.2462
10,055
58.0096
354 47.1000 49.4538 51.9288 54.5250 57.2538
8,164 8,572 9,001 9,451 9,924
WATER TREAT SUP V
10,420
60.1154
10,941
63.1212
239 28.0731 29.4750 30.9462 32.4923 34.1192 35.8269
4,866 5,109 5,364 5,632 5,914 6,210
WATER TREATMENT OIT
6,521
37.6212
6,847
39.5019
240 31.1481 32.7058 34.3385 36.0577 37.8577 39.7500
5,399 5,669 5,952 6,250 6,562 6,890
WATER TREATMENT OPERATOR II
7,235
41.7404
7,597
43.8288
241 36.6462 38.4808 40.4019 42.4212 44.5442 46.7712
6,352 6,670 7,003 7,353 7,721 8,107
WATER TREATMENT OPERATOR III
8,512
49.1077
8,938
51.5654
242 38.4923 40.4192 42.4385 44.5615 46.7885 49.1308
6,672 7,006 7,356 7,724 8,110 8,516
WATER TREATMENT OPERATOR IV
8,942
51.5885
9,389
54.1673
353 44.8500 47.0942 49.4481 51.9231 54.5192
7,774 8,163 8,571 9,000 9,450
WATER TREATMENT SUPV IV
9,923
57.2481
10,419
60.1096
779
57.4506 74.0538
WATERSHED COMPLIANCE MANAGER 9,958 12,836
341 32.5038 34.1308 35.8385 37.6327 39.5135
5,634 5,916 6,212 6,523 6,849
WHARF CONSTRUCTION CREW LDR
7,191
41.4865
7,551
43.5635
216 29.0423 30.4962 32.0192 33.6173 35.2962 37.0615
5,034 5,286 5,550 5,827 6,118 6,424
WHARF CONSTRUCTION WORKER
6,745
38.9135
7,082
40.8577
343 41.1519 43.2115 45.3750 47.6423 50.0250
7,133 7,490 7,865 8,258 8,671
WHARF SUPERVISOR
9,105
52.5288
9,560
55.1538
265 36.1212 37.9269 39.8250 41.8154 43.9038 46.0962
6,261 6,574 6,903 7,248 7,610 7,990
WTR FAC ELEC/INSTR TECH II
8,390
48.4038
8,809
50.8212
266 40.0212 42.0231 44.1231 46.3269 48.6462 51.0808
6,937 7,284 7,648 8,030 8,432 8,854
WTR FAC ELEC/INSTR TECH III
9,297
53.6365
9,762
56.3192
\\Edenrpt\Eden_5.5Reports\CustomReports\Py\SalaryCompPlans.rpt Page 22 of 24 14.25 City of Santa Cruz Page 23 of 24
California 10/26/2023
Human Resources
Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
346 36.9808 38.8327 40.7769 42.8135 44.9538
6,410 6,731 7,068 7,421 7,792
WW COLLECTION FIELD CREW LDR
8,182
47.2038
8,591
49.5635
204 26.8904 28.2346 29.6481 31.1308 32.6885 34.3212
4,661 4,894 5,139 5,396 5,666 5,949
WW COLLECTION MAINT TECH I
6,246
36.0346
6,558
37.8346
202 29.3481 30.8135 32.3538 33.9692 35.6654 37.4481
5,087 5,341 5,608 5,888 6,182 6,491
WW COLLECTION MAINT TECH II
6,816
39.3231
7,157
41.2904
203 22.9096 24.0577 25.2577 26.5212 27.8481 29.2385
3,971 4,170 4,378 4,597 4,827 5,068
WW COLLECTION MAINT TRAINEE
5,321
30.6981
5,587
32.2327
774
60.2614 77.6769
WW COLLECTION MANAGER 10,445 13,464
261 32.2558 33.8712 35.5673 37.3442 39.2135 41.1750
5,591 5,871 6,165 6,473 6,797 7,137
WW COLLECTION MECH TECH II
7,494
43.2346
7,869
45.3981
262 29.0596 30.5135 32.0365 33.6404 35.3250 37.0904
5,037 5,289 5,553 5,831 6,123 6,429
WW FAC ELEC/ INSTR TECH I
6,750
38.9423
7,088
40.8923
358 43.4712 45.6462 47.9308 50.3308 52.8404
7,535 7,912 8,308 8,724 9,159
WW FAC ELEC/INSTR SUPV
9,617
55.4827
10,098
58.2577
263 36.1212 37.9269 39.8250 41.8154 43.9038 46.0962
6,261 6,574 6,903 7,248 7,610 7,990
WW FAC ELEC/INSTR TECH II
8,390
48.4038
8,809
50.8212
268 32.8269 34.4654 36.1904 38.0019 39.9000 41.8962
5,690 5,974 6,273 6,587 6,916 7,262
WW FAC INSTR TECH II
7,625
43.9904
8,006
46.1885
254 38.5615 40.4885 42.5135 44.6365 46.8692 49.2115
6,684 7,018 7,369 7,737 8,124 8,530
WW FAC LEAD ELEC/INST TECH
8,956
51.6692
9,404
54.2538
249 36.1558 37.9615 39.8596 41.8500 43.9442 46.1423
6,267 6,580 6,909 7,254 7,617 7,998
WW FAC LEAD MECH TECH
8,398
48.4500
8,818
50.8731
247 29.0596 30.5135 32.0365 33.6404 35.3250 37.0904
5,037 5,289 5,553 5,831 6,123 6,429
WW FAC MECH TECH I
6,750
38.9423
7,088
40.8923
248 33.4962 35.1692 36.9288 38.7750 40.7135 42.7500
5,806 6,096 6,401 6,721 7,057 7,410
WW FAC MECH TECH II
7,780
44.8846
8,169
47.1288
\\Edenrpt\Eden_5.5Reports\CustomReports\Py\SalaryCompPlans.rpt Page 23 of 24 14.26 City of Santa Cruz Page 24 of 24
California 10/26/2023
Human Resources
Salary Compensation Plans Deliver To: cruser
Effective Date: 09/30/2023
Sorted by: Grade Description
Grade
Code Description
Step
A
Step
B
Step
C
Step
D
Step
E
Step
F
Step
G
Step
I
Step
H
Step
J
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Hourly
Monthly
Step
K
269 27.9923 29.3942 30.8654 32.4058 34.0269 35.7288
4,852 5,095 5,350 5,617 5,898 6,193
WW FACILITIES ELEC TECH I
6,503
37.5173
6,828
39.3923
270 32.8269 34.4654 36.1904 38.0019 39.9000 41.8962
5,690 5,974 6,273 6,587 6,916 7,262
WW FACILITIES ELEC TECH II
7,625
43.9904
8,006
46.1885
267 27.9923 29.3942 30.8654 32.4058 34.0269 35.7288
4,852 5,095 5,350 5,617 5,898 6,193
WW FACILITIES INSTR TECH I
6,503
37.5173
6,828
39.3923
357 45.0462 47.2962 49.6615 52.1423 54.7500
7,808 8,198 8,608 9,038 9,490
WW FACILITIES MECH SUP
9,965
57.4904
10,463
60.3635
752
60.2614 77.6769
WW LAB/ENVIRO COMPLIANCE MGR 10,445 13,464
111 24.6288 25.8577 27.1500 28.5058 29.9308 31.4250
4,269 4,482 4,706 4,941 5,188 5,447
WW PLANT OPER IN TRAIN
5,719
32.9942
6,005
34.6442
206 24.8885 26.1346 27.4442 28.8173 30.2596 31.7712
4,314 4,530 4,757 4,995 5,245 5,507
WW PLANT OPERATOR I
5,782
33.3577
6,071
35.0250
207 34.5115 36.2365 38.0481 39.9519 41.9481 44.0481
5,982 6,281 6,595 6,925 7,271 7,635
WW PLANT OPERATOR II
8,017
46.2519
8,418
48.5654
236 37.9385 39.8365 41.8269 43.9154 46.1135 48.4212
6,576 6,905 7,250 7,612 7,993 8,393
WW PLANT OPERATOR III
8,813
50.8442
9,254
53.3885
760
63.2646 81.5481
WW TREATMENT FACIL OPER MGR 10,966 14,135
368 49.8462 52.3385 54.9577 57.7038 60.5885
8,640 9,072 9,526 10,002 10,502
WW TREATMENT OPER SUPERVISOR
11,027
63.6173
11,578
66.7962
\\Edenrpt\Eden_5.5Reports\CustomReports\Py\SalaryCompPlans.rpt Page 24 of 24 14.27 City Council
AGENDA REPORT
DATE: 11/08/2023
AGENDA OF: 11/28/2023
DEPARTMENT: Police
SUBJECT: Fiscal Year (FY) 2024 State Homeland Security Program Grant Proposal – Automated License Plate Readers (PD)
RECOMMENDATION: Motion to:
1) Approve the attached FY 2024 State Homeland Security Program Grant proposal letter and direct staff to send the letter to the Santa Cruz County Office of Response, Recovery, and Resilience, Authorized Body of Five no later than December 31, 2023, and 2) Approve the installation of automated license plate readers within Santa Cruz city limits, purchased with funds received through the FY 2024 State Homeland Security Program Grant.
BACKGROUND: The FY 2024 Homeland Security Grant Program (HSGP) is one of three grant programs that support the Department of Homeland Security (DHS)/Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA) focus on enhancing the ability of state, local, tribal, and territorial governments, as well as nonprofit organizations, to prevent, prepare for, protect against, and respond to potential terrorist attacks. These grant programs are part of a comprehensive set of measures authorized by Congress and implemented by the DHS to help strengthen the nation’s communities against potential terrorist attacks and other hazards. HSGP is composed of three grant programs:
• State Homeland Security Program
• Urban Area Security Initiative
• Operation Stonegarden
The County of Santa Cruz is eligible to be awarded an estimated $329,000 through the FY 2024 State Homeland Security Program Grant (SHSPG), which will be distributed among multiple agencies, including Santa Cruz County Health Services Agency, Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office, City of Santa Cruz Police and Fire Departments, and Scotts Valley Police Department.
FY 2024 SHSPG project proposals will be submitted to the Santa Cruz County Office of Response, Recovery & Resilience (OR3) and reviewed by the Program’s Authorized Body of Five for the final SHSPG application submission. All proposals must address at least one of the grant’s eleven priority areas:
15.1 1. Enhance Information and Intelligence Sharing and Cooperation with Federal Agencies, including DHS (National Priority)
2. Enhance the Protection of Soft Targets/Crowded Places (National Priority)
3. Enhance Cybersecurity (National Priority)
4. Enhancing Community Preparedness and Resilience (National Priority)
5. Combatting Domestic Violence Extremism
6. Strengthen Emergency Communications Capabilities through Planning, Governance, Technology, and Equipment
7. Enhance Medical and Public Health Preparedness
8. Strengthen Information Sharing and Collaboration
9. Enhance Multi-Jurisdictional/Inter-Jurisdictional All-Hazards/Whole Community Incident Planning, Response & Recovery Capabilities
10. Protect Critical Infrastructure and Key Resources (including Food & Agriculture)
11. Enhance Election Security (National Priority)
The City of Santa Cruz Police Department has received funds through the SHSPG in prior years (FY 2019, 2020 & 2023) to cover the cost of body armor, a Throwbot, specialized visual equipment, and personal ballistic shields.
DISCUSSION: The Santa Cruz Police Department is seeking approval of an FY 2024 State Homeland Security Program Grant Proposal Letter addressed to the OR3 Body of Five members to request funds to support the purchase of automated license plate readers (ALPRs). The ALPRs would be installed within the city limits of Santa Cruz and accessed by the Santa Cruz Police Department.
If approved, the proposal letter will be submitted to the OR3 Body of Five for review no later than December 31, 2023. OR3 will finalize and submit their application to the California Office of Emergency Services no later than January 31, 2024. Final approval of applications is expected to occur between September and October of 2024. The performance period, when funds can be spent, is expected to occur between October 2024 and June 2026.
Within the proposal letter to OR3, the Santa Cruz Police Department has requested $84,000 to lease fourteen (14) Flock Safety fixed ALPRs for two years to enhance the department’s crime prevention and investigative capabilities throughout the City of Santa Cruz.
The requested equipment is pre-approved by FEMA’s authorized equipment list and meets several of the eleven grant priority areas.
Vehicle data obtained by the fixed APLRs would provide information to police officers to identify stolen vehicles, locate missing children or adults, and investigate individuals wanted for serious crimes. In addition, the city’s numerous tourist attractions and public schools create soft target opportunities for criminal and terrorist activities. The use of ALPRs would build on the Santa Cruz Police Department’s capabilities to use real-time information and historical analysis to identify and investigate potential threats and enhance its support towards regional public safety efforts.
Please see the Santa Cruz Police Department’s existing ALPR use policy and frequently asked questions about ALPRs in the provided attachments.
15.2 HEALTH IN ALL POLICIES (HiAP): The proposed FY 2024 State Homeland Security Program Grant project proposal is consistent with the Health in All Policies pillars of equity and public health in that it will assist the city in dedicating funding towards infrastructure that reduces bias and supports neighborhood safety and communities free of crime, violence, and social disorder.
FISCAL IMPACT: Approval of the FY 2024 State Homeland Security Program Grant proposal letter would have no fiscal impact on the General Fund. If funds are awarded to the Santa Cruz Police Department through the State Homeland Security Program Grant, approval of the FY 2024 State Homeland Security Program Grant proposal letter will allow the City to accept $84,000 in grant funds with no cash match requirement.
Prepared By:
Catherine Brothers
Principal Management
Analyst
Submitted By:
Bernie Escalante
Chief of Police
Approved By:
Matt Huffaker
City Manager
ATTACHMENTS:
1. SANTA CRUZ POLICE DEPARTMENT POLICY- AUTOMATED LICENSE PLATE READERS (ALPRS).PDF
2. FAQ – AUTOMATED LICENSE PLATE READERS & SANTA CRUZ POLICE DEPARTMENT USE POLICY.PDF
3. FY 2024 STATE HOMELAND SECURITY PROGRAM GRANT PROPOSAL LETTER.PDF
15.3 Policy
415
Santa Cruz Police Department
Santa Cruz PD-CA, Policy Manual
Copyright Lexipol, LLC 2023/11/08, All Rights Reserved.
Published with permission by Santa Cruz Police Department Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRs) - 1
Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRs)
415.1 PURPOSE AND SCOPE
The purpose of this policy is to provide guidance for the capture, storage and use of digital data obtained through the use of Automated License Plate Reader (ALPR) technology. 415.1.1 DEFINITIONS
Automated License Plate Reader (ALPR): A device that uses cameras and computer technology to compare digital images to lists of known information of interest.
ALPR Operator: Trained department members who may utilize ALPR system/equipment. ALPR operators may be assigned to any position within the department, and the ALPR Administrator may order the deployment of the ALPR systems for use in various efforts.
ALPR Administrator: The Investigations Bureau Lieutenant or the Administration Deputy Chief's designee, serves as the ALPR Administrator for the department.
Hot List: A list of license plates associated with vehicles of interest compiled from one or more databases including, but not limited to, National Crime Information Center (NCIC), California Department of Motor Vehicles, local be on the lookout (BOLO's) lists, etc.
Vehicles of Interest: Including, but not limited to vehicles, which are reported as stolen; display stolen license plates or tags; vehicles linked to missing and/or wanted persons, and vehicles flagged by the Department of Motor Vehicle Administration or law enforcement agencies.
Detection: Data obtained by an ALPR of an image (such as a license plate) within public view that was read by the device, including potential images (such as the plate and description of vehicle on which it was displayed), and information regarding the location of the ALPR system at the time of the ALPR's read.
Hit: Alert from the ALPR system that a scanned license plate number may be in the NCIC or other law enforcement databases for a specific reason including, but not limited to, being related to a stolen car, wanted person, missing person, domestic violation protective order or terroristrelated activity. 415.2 POLICY
The policy of the Santa Cruz Police Department is to utilize ALPR technology to capture and store digital license plate data and images while recognizing the established privacy rights of the public.
All data and images gathered by the ALPR are for the official use of this department. Because such data may contain confidential information, it is not open to public review.
The Santa Cruz Police Department does not permit the sharing of ALPR data gathered by the City of Santa Cruz or its contractors/subcontractors for purpose of federal immigration enforcement, pursuant to the California Values Act (Government Code § 7282.5; Government Code § 7284.2 et seq.) – these federal immigration agencies include Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Patrol (CPB).
15.4 Santa Cruz Police Department
Santa Cruz PD-CA, Policy Manual
Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRs)
Copyright Lexipol, LLC 2023/11/08, All Rights Reserved.
Published with permission by Santa Cruz Police Department Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRs) - 2
415.3 ADMINISTRATION
The ALPR technology, also known as License Plate Recognition (LPR), allows for the automated detection of license plates. It is used by the Santa Cruz Police Department to convert data associated with vehicle license plates for official law enforcement purposes, including identifying stolen or wanted vehicles, stolen license plates and missing persons. It may also be used to gather information related to active warrants, homeland security, electronic surveillance, suspect interdiction and stolen property recovery.
All installation and maintenance of ALPR equipment, as well as ALPR data retention and access, shall be managed by the Administration Deputy Chief. The Administration Deputy Chief will assign members under his/her command to administer the day-to-day operation of the ALPR equipment and data.
415.3.1 ALPR ADMINISTRATOR
The Administration Deputy Chief shall be responsible for developing guidelines and procedures to comply with the requirements of Civil Code § 1798.90.5 et seq. This includes, but is not limited to (Civil Code § 1798.90.51; Civil Code § 1798.90.53):
(a) A description of the job title or other designation of the members and independent contractors who are authorized to use or access the ALPR system or to collect ALPR information.
(b) Training requirements for authorized users.
(c) A description of how the ALPR system will be monitored to ensure the security of the information and compliance with applicable privacy laws. (d) Procedures for system operators to maintain records of access in compliance with Civil Code § 1798.90.52.
(e) The title and name of the current designee in overseeing the ALPR operation. (f) Working with the Custodian of Records on the retention and destruction of ALPR data. (g) Ensuring this policy and related procedures are conspicuously posted on the department’s website.
415.4 OPERATIONS
Use of an ALPR is restricted to the purposes outlined below. Department members shall not use, or allow others to use the equipment or database records for any unauthorized purpose (Civil Code § 1798.90.51; Civil Code § 1798.90.53).
(a) An ALPR shall only be used for official law enforcement business. (b) An ALPR may be used in conjunction with any routine patrol operation or criminal investigation. Reasonable suspicion or probable cause is not required before using an ALPR.
(c) Partial license plates and unique vehicle descriptions reported during major crimes should be entered into the ALPR system in an attempt to identify suspect vehicles.
15.5 Santa Cruz Police Department
Santa Cruz PD-CA, Policy Manual
Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRs)
Copyright Lexipol, LLC 2023/11/08, All Rights Reserved.
Published with permission by Santa Cruz Police Department Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRs) - 3
(d) If practicable, the officer shall verify an ALPR response through the California Law Enforcement Telecommunications System (CLETS) before taking enforcement action that is based solely on an ALPR alert. Once an alert is received, the operator shall confirm that the observed license plate from the system matches the license plate of the observed vehicle. Before any law enforcement action is taken because of an ALPR alert, the alert will be verified through a CLETS inquiry via a mobile digital communicator or through dispatch. Members will not take any police action that restricts the freedom of any individual based solely on an ALPR alert unless it has been validated. Because the ALPR alert may relate to a vehicle and may not relate to the person operating the vehicle, officers are reminded that they need to have reasonable suspicion and/or probable cause to make an enforcement stop of any vehicle. For example, if a vehicle is entered into the system because of its association with a wanted individual, officers shall attempt to visually match the driver to the description of the wanted subject prior to making the stop or should have another legal basis for making the stop.
(e) Hot Lists. Designation of hot lists to be utilized by the ALPR system shall be made by the ALPR Administrator or their designee. Hot lists shall be obtained or compiled from sources as may be consistent with the purposes of the ALPR system set forth in this policy. Hot lists utilized by the department's ALPR system may be updated by agency sources more frequently than the department may be uploading them and thus the department's ALPR system will not have access to real time data. Occasionally, there may be errors in the ALPR system's read of a license plate. Therefore, an alert alone shall not be a basis for police action (other than following the vehicle of interest). Prior to initiation of a stop of a vehicle or other intervention based on an alert, department members shall undertake the following:
1. Verification of status on a hot list. An officer must receive confirmation, from a Santa Cruz Police Department Communications Dispatcher or other department computer device, that the license plate is still stolen, wanted, or otherwise of interest before proceeding (absent exigent circumstances).
2. Visual verification of license plate number. Officers shall visually verify that the license plate of interest matches identically with the image of the license plate number captured (read) by the ALPR, including both the alphanumeric characters of the license plate, state of issue, and vehicle descriptors before proceeding. Department members alerted to the fact that an observed motor vehicle's license plate is entered as a hot plate (hit) in a specific BOLO list are required to make a reasonable effort to confirm that a wanted person is actually in the vehicle and/or that a reasonable basis exists before a department member would have a lawful basis to stop the vehicle.
3. Department members will clear all stops from hot list alerts by indicating the positive ALPR hit, i.e., with an arrest or other enforcement action. If it is not obvious in the text of the call as to the correlation of the ALPR hit and the arrest, then the department member shall update with the Communications Dispatcher and original person and/or a crime analyst inputting the vehicle in the hot list (hit).
15.6 Santa Cruz Police Department
Santa Cruz PD-CA, Policy Manual
Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRs)
Copyright Lexipol, LLC 2023/11/08, All Rights Reserved.
Published with permission by Santa Cruz Police Department Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRs) - 4
4. General hot lists (i.e. Stolen Vehicle System) will be automatically downloaded into the ALPR system a minimum of once a day with the most current data overwriting the old data.
5. All entries and updates of specific hot lists within the ALPR system will be documented by the requesting department member within the appropriate general offense report. As such, specific hot lists shall be approved by the ALPR Administrator (or their designee) before initial entry within the ALPR system. The updating of such a list within the ALPR system shall thereafter be accomplished pursuant to the approval of the department member's immediate supervisor. The hits from these data sources should be viewed as informational; created solely to bring the officer's attention to specific vehicles that have been associated with criminal activity.
All hot plates and suspect information entered into the ALPR system will contain the following information as a minimum:
(a) Entering department member's name
(b) Related case number
(c) Short synopsis describing the nature of the originating call (f) Training. No member of this Department shall operate ALPR equipment or access ALPR data without proper training or authorization to do so. (g) Login/Log-Out Procedure. To ensure proper operation and facilitate oversight of the ALPR system, all users will be required to have individual credentials for access and use of the systems and/or data, which has the ability to be fully audited. (h) Permitted/Impermissible Uses. The ALPR system, and all data collected, is the property of the Santa Cruz Police Department. Department personnel may only access and use the ALPR system for official and legitimate law enforcement purposes consistent with this policy. The following uses of the ALPR system are specifically prohibited:
1. Invasion of Privacy: Except when done pursuant to a court order such as a search warrant, it is a violation of this policy to utilize the ALPR to record license plates except those of vehicles that are exposed to public view (e.g., vehicles on a public road or street, or that are on private property but whose license plate(s) are visible from a public road, street, or a place to which members of the public have access, such as the parking lot of a shop or other business establishment.)
2. Harassment or Intimidation: It is a violation of this policy to use the ALPR system to harass and/or intimidate any individual or group.
3. Use Based on a Protected Characteristic. It is a violation of this policy to use the ALPR system or associated scan files or hot lists solely because of a person's or group's race, gender, religion, political affiliation, nationality, ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability, or other classification protected by law.
4. Personal Use: It is a violation of this policy to use the ALPR system or associated scan files or hot lists for any personal purpose.
15.7 Santa Cruz Police Department
Santa Cruz PD-CA, Policy Manual
Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRs)
Copyright Lexipol, LLC 2023/11/08, All Rights Reserved.
Published with permission by Santa Cruz Police Department Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRs) - 5
5. First Amendment Rights. It is a violation of this policy to use the ALPR system or associated scan files or hot lists for the purpose or known effect of infringing upon First Amendment rights.
6. Anyone who engages in an impermissible use of the ALPR system or associated scan files or hot lists may be subject to administrative sanctions, up to and including termination, pursuant to and consistent with the relevant collective bargaining agreements and Department policies.
415.5 DATA COLLECTION AND RETENTION
The Administration Deputy Chief is responsible for ensuring systems and processes are in place for the proper collection and retention of ALPR data.
All ALPR data downloaded to the server should be stored for a minimum of one year (Government Code § 34090.6) and in accordance with the established records retention schedule. Thereafter, ALPR data should be purged unless it has become, or it is reasonable to believe it will become, evidence in a criminal or civil action or is subject to a discovery request or other lawful action to produce records. In those circumstances the applicable data should be downloaded from the server onto portable media and booked into evidence.
ALPR vendor will store the data (data hosting) and ensure proper maintenance and security of data stored in their data towers. ALPR vendor will purge their data at the end of the 30 days of storage. However, this will not preclude SCPD from maintaining any relevant vehicle data obtained from the system after that period pursuant to the established City of Santa Cruz retention schedule mentioned above or outlined elsewhere. Relevant vehicle data are scans corresponding to the vehicle of interest on a hot list.
Restrictions on use of ALPR Data: Information gathered or collected, and records retained by ALPR cameras or any other Santa Cruz Police Department (SCPD) ALPR system will not be sold, accessed, or used for any purpose other than legitimate law enforcement or public safety purposes. SCPD ALPR data shall not be shared with Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) unless under the authority of a valid court order. 415.6 ACCOUNTABILITY AND SAFEGUARDS
All data will be closely safeguarded and protected by both procedural and technological means.
The Santa Cruz Police Department will observe the following safeguards regarding access to and use of stored data (Civil Code § 1798.90.51; Civil Code § 1798.90.53):
(a) All non-law enforcement requests for access to stored ALPR data shall be processed in accordance with applicable law.
(b) All ALPR data downloaded to the mobile workstation shall be accessible only through a login/password-protected system capable of documenting all access of information by name, date, and time.
15.8 Santa Cruz Police Department
Santa Cruz PD-CA, Policy Manual
Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRs)
Copyright Lexipol, LLC 2023/11/08, All Rights Reserved.
Published with permission by Santa Cruz Police Department Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRs) - 6
(c) Members approved to access ALPR data under these guidelines are permitted to access the data for legitimate law enforcement purposes only, such as when the data relates to a specific criminal investigation or department-related civil or administrative action.
(d) Such ALPR data may not be released to other authorized and verified law enforcement officials and agencies, unless the Administration Deputy Chief provides written approval, and only for a valid crime.
(e) Every ALPR Detection Browsing Inquiry must be documented by either the associated Santa Cruz Police case number or incident number, and/or a reason for the inquiry.
For security or data breaches, see the Records Release and Maintenance Policy. 415.7 ALPR DATA DETECTION BROWSING AUDITS
It is the responsibility of the Professional Standards Unit (PSU) Sergeant or the Chief's designee to ensure that an audit is conducted of ALPR detection browsing inquiries at least once during each calendar year. The Department will audit a sampling of the ALPR system utilization from the prior 12-month period to verify proper use in accordance with the above authorized uses. The audit shall randomly select at least 10 detection browsing inquiries conducted by department employees.
The audit shall be documented in the form of an internal department memorandum to the Administration Deputy Chief. The memorandum shall include any data errors found so that such errors can be corrected. After review by the Administration Deputy Chief, the memorandum and any associated documentation shall be filed and retained by PSU. 415.8 RELEASING ALPR DATA
The ALPR data may be shared only with other law enforcement or prosecutorial agencies for official law enforcement purposes or as otherwise permitted by law, using the following procedures:
(a) The agency makes a written request for the ALPR data that includes:
1. The name of the agency.
2. The name of the person requesting.
3. The intended purpose of obtaining the information.
(b) The request is reviewed by the Administration Deputy Chief or the authorized designee and approved before the request is fulfilled.
(c) The approved request is retained on file.
Requests for ALPR data by non-law enforcement or non-prosecutorial agencies will be processed as provided in the Records Maintenance and Release Policy (Civil Code § 1798.90.55).
15.9 Santa Cruz Police Department
Santa Cruz PD-CA, Policy Manual
Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRs)
Copyright Lexipol, LLC 2023/11/08, All Rights Reserved.
Published with permission by Santa Cruz Police Department Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRs) - 7
415.9 TRAINING
The Training Manager should ensure that members receive department-approved training for those authorized to use or access the ALPR system (Civil Code § 1798.90.51; Civil Code § 1798.90.53).
15.10 FAQs – AutomaƟc License Plate Readers & Santa Cruz Police Department Policy on ALPRs 1 | P a g e
1. What is an AutomaƟc License Plate Reader (ALPR)?
Automated License Plate Recognition (ALPR) systems function to automatically capture an image of a vehicle and the vehicle’s license plate, transform the plate image into alphanumeric characters using optical character recognition, compare the plate number acquired to one or more databases (also known as “hotlists”) of vehicles of interest to law enforcement, and then alert law enforcement officers when a vehicle of interest has been observed. Databases can include the National Crime Information Center, California Department of Motor Vehicles, and local Be on the Lookout lists. The stored license plate data also provides law enforcement investigators with a pointer system that may help them identify vehicles associated with suspects, witnesses, or victims, and develop exculpatory information that assists them with focusing their investigative resources.
The data also allows law enforcement to connect serial criminal activities that may have occurred in disconnected law enforcement jurisdictions.
ALPR cameras can be installed on vehicles ("mobile ALPR") or attached to fixed objects like traffic lights or dedicated poles ("fixed ALPR").
2. Who has access to ALPR data?
ALPR systems are restricted to law enforcement personnel with 1. An official and legiƟmate law enforcement purpose for accessing the system. 2. A criminal case or incident number/name. 3. A lawful purpose with a need to know and right to know the informaƟon.
3. What is a lawful purpose, Need to Know, and Right to Know? The lawful purposes required for users to access the system are:
1. Locate Stolen, Wanted, or Suspect Vehicles.
2. Locate Suspect(s) of Criminal InvesƟgaƟon (Violent, Retail, CatalyƟc Convertor, etc.) or Arrest Warrant.
3. Locate Witnesses or VicƟms of Violent Crime.
4. Locate Missing Children and Elderly individuals (Amber / Silver Alerts).
5. Protect the Public during Special Events / SituaƟonal Awareness.
6. Protect CriƟcal Infrastructure.
Need to know is a standard that establishes when the requested informaƟon is perƟnent and necessary to the requesƟng agency in iniƟaƟng, furthering, or compleƟng the performance of a law enforcement acƟvity.
Right to know is a standard that establishes when the requester is acƟng in an official capacity and has statutory authority to obtain the informaƟon being sought.
15.11 FAQs – AutomaƟc License Plate Readers & Santa Cruz Police Department Policy on ALPRs 2 | P a g e
4. Is ALPR data shared for the purpose of immigraƟon enforcement? Santa Cruz Police Department Policy 414.2 Policy states Santa Cruz Police Department does not permit the sharing of ALPR data gathered by the City of Santa Cruz or its contractors/subcontractors for the purpose of federal immigraƟon enforcement, pursuant to the California Values Act (Government Code § 7282.5; Government Code § 7284.2 et seq.) – these federal immigraƟon agencies include ImmigraƟons and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Patrol.
5. Where are ALPRs located?
ALPR units are aƩached to law enforcement vehicles or deployed at fixed locaƟons, where they collect license plate informaƟon from vehicles on public roadways, public property and vehicles that are within public view. Santa Cruz Police Department Policy 414.4(h)(1) OperaƟons, Invasion of Privacy states except when done pursuant to a court order such as a search warrant, it is a violaƟon of this policy to uƟlize the ALPR to record license plates except those of vehicles that are exposed to public view (e.g., vehicles on a public road or street, or that are on private property but whose license plate(s) are visible from a public road, street, or a place to which members of the public have access, such as the parking lot of a shop or other business establishment.)
6. Can ALPR devices see into a vehicle or capture occupant images? ALPR devices do not have illuminaƟon to aid in idenƟfying the driver of the vehicle. The purpose of the ALPR is to idenƟfy the vehicle, not the occupants. If ambient lighƟng is sufficient or a subject is outside, and near the vehicle, their image may be captured.
7. DO ALPR devices provide video surveillance?
No, ALPR systems only provide authorized law enforcement personnel with a single photo “pointer” for one moment in Ɵme and locaƟon where a vehicle was located to provide potenƟal leads to support criminal invesƟgaƟons.
15.12 FAQs – AutomaƟc License Plate Readers & Santa Cruz Police Department Policy on ALPRs 3 | P a g e
8. What company provides ALPRs?
Flock Safety is a company that provides, installs, and maintains ALPR devices. Flock Safety products are made and manufactured in the United States.
9. What are Flock’s security measures and privacy protecƟon policies? Flock Safety “Flock” products are NaƟonal Defense AuthorizaƟon Act (“NDAA”) compliant and Trade Agreements Act ("TAA") compliant.
The InformaƟon Security program at Flock aligns with industry-recognized security frameworks, including SOC 2 Type II, SOC 3 Type II, NIST Cybersecurity Framework, Cloud Security Alliance's Cloud Control Matrix, AWS FoundaƟonal Security Best PracƟces, and CIS AWS FoundaƟons Benchmarks.
Flock provided mulƟfactor authenƟcaƟon and single sign-on idenƟty management tools. A search reason is required for all searches conducted on Flock’s database. Flock devices are equipped with endpoint encrypƟon and asset management protecƟons.
The Agency/City owns photos generated by Flock Safety ALPR devices and are never sold or shared by Flock.
Flock does not support facial recogniƟon soŌware, and Flock’s database does not contain personally idenƟfiable informaƟon (i.e., data that can trace or idenƟfy a person).
10. How long are ALPR data maintained?
Santa Cruz Police Department policy 414.5 Data CollecƟon and RetenƟon states the AdministraƟon Deputy Chief is responsible for ensuring systems and processes are in place for the proper collecƟon and retenƟon of ALPR data. Data will be transferred from vehicles to the designated storage in accordance with department procedures.
All ALPR data downloaded to the server should be stored for a minimum of one year (Government Code § 34090.6) and in accordance with the established records retenƟon schedule. ThereaŌer, ALPR data should be purged unless it has become, or it is reasonable to believe it will become, evidence in a criminal or civil acƟon or is subject to a discovery request or other lawful acƟon to produce records. In those circumstances, the applicable data should be downloaded from the server onto portable media and booked into evidence.
ALPR vendor will store the data (data hosƟng) and ensure proper maintenance and security of data stored in their data towers. ALPR vendor will purge their data at the end of the 30 days of storage.
However, this will not preclude SCPD from maintaining any relevant vehicle data obtained from the system aŌer that period pursuant to the established City of Santa Cruz retenƟon schedule menƟoned above or outlined elsewhere. Relevant vehicle data are scans corresponding to the vehicle of interest on a hot list.
RestricƟons on use of ALPR Data: InformaƟon gathered or collected, and records retained by ALPR cameras or any other Santa Cruz Police Department (SCPD) ALPR system will not be sold, accessed,
15.13 FAQs – AutomaƟc License Plate Readers & Santa Cruz Police Department Policy on ALPRs 4 | P a g e
or used for any purpose other than legiƟmate law enforcement or public safety purposes. SCPD ALPR data shall not be shared with ImmigraƟons and Customs Enforcement unless under the authority of a valid court order.
11. How much do ALPRs cost?
Cost per ALPR device can vary depending on the model (fixed vs mobile and capabiliƟes). Flock’s Safety Falcon, a fixed infrastructure-free ALPR for standard two-lane roadways with moderate traffic, costs $3000 annually. An addiƟonal one-Ɵme installaƟon fee ranges between $150-$650. The annual fee covers the device lease, maintenance, and data management.
12. What other ciƟes or towns use ALPRs?
Within Santa Cruz County: ScoƩs Valley,
Capitol (Pending), Watsonville
Within the Bay Area: Morgan Hill, Los
Gatos, Monte Sereno, Milpitas, Santa Clara,
Foster City, Hillsborough, Millbrae,
Atherton, San Mateo, San Mateo County,
San Bruno, Novato, Fairfield, Dixon, Vallejo,
Vacaville, Rio Vista, Benicia, Piedmont,
Livermore, San Ramon, Danville, Hercules,
Orinda, Oakley, Mountain House,
Woodland, Roseville, Elk Grove, Grass
Valley, Salinas
Within California: Alhambra, El Monte,
Glendale, La Canada Flintridge, Monterey
Park, San Dimas, Arcadia, Azusa, Glendora,
Covina, West Covina, Pomona, Calabasas, La
Puente, Rosemead, Whiƫer, Santa Fe
Springs, Walnut, Pico Rivera, Cathedral City,
Riverside County Sheriff, Temecula, Moreno
Valley, Lake Elsinore, Canyon Lake,
Beaumont, Indio, Norco, Atherton,
Roseville, Vallejo, Fullerton, PlacenƟa,
Stanton, Laguna Hills, Lake Forest, Seal
Beach, Oceanside, Bakersfield, Elk Grove,
Woodland, Grass Valley, San Ramon,
Danville, Livermore, Hercules, Vacaville,
Lake County Sheriff, Clear Lake, Fairfield,
Benicia, Rio Vista, Dixon,
Napa County Sheriff, San Mateo County
Sheriff, Novato, San Mateo PD, San Bruno,
Foster City, Colma, Hillsborough Alhambra,
El Monte, Glendale, Monterey Park, Arcadia,
Azusa, Glendora, Covina, West Covina,
Pomona, Calabasas, La Puente, Whiƫer,
Beverly Hills, San Marino, South Pasadena,
La Canada Flintridge, Santa Fe Springs,
Walnut, Rosemead, San Dimas, Pico Rivera,
Industry, Lancaster, Paramount, Bakersfield,
Santa Maria, Ventura, Port Hueneme,
Cathedral City, Temecula, Menifee, Moreno
Valley, Lake Elsinore, Canyon Lake, San
Jacinto, Perris, Desert Hot Springs,
Beaumont, Barstow, Indio, Norco, Murrieta,
Bakersfield, Corona, Riverside, Redlands,
Seal Beach, Los Alamitos, Lake Forest,
HunƟngton Beach, Fullerton, PlacenƟa,
Stanton, Laguna Hills, Costa Mesa, Dana
Point, San Juan Capistrano, Oceanside, El
Centro, Brawley, Westmoreland
13. Where can I learn more about the Santa Cruz Police Department’s policy on ALPRs? The Santa Cruz Police Department posts a complete policy manual in the Policies and Training folder of the Department’s Transparency Portal at www.SantaCruzPolice.com
15.14 155 Center Street, Santa Cruz, CA 95060 • (831) 420-5810 • Fax (831) 420-5811 Bernie Escalante, Chief of Police
December 31, 2023
Authorized Body of Five
Office of Response, Recovery & Resilience
County of Santa Cruz
Dear Authorized Body of Five,
The Santa Cruz Police Department is submiƫng the following request for the upcoming FY 2024 State Homeland Security Program Grant:
Equipment:
03OE-01-ALPR – System, Automated License Plate RecogniƟon (ALPR) Fixed, portable, or vehicle-mounted mobile system consisƟng of imaging technology and opƟcal character recogniƟon soŌware capable of determining the informaƟon on license plates.
QuanƟty:
A multiyear service agreement to lease fourteen fixed ALPRs to enhance the Santa Cruz Police Department’s crime prevention and investigative capabilities throughout the City of Santa Cruz.
Justification:
ALPRs are a widely adopted tool that utilizes technology to capture and record vehicle license plates and associate a temporal and spatial reference with each image. Vehicle information is temporarily stored, and pertinent data is readily available to help officers efficiently identify stolen vehicles, missing children or adults, and locate individuals wanted for investigation of serious crimes. Numerous tourist attractions, the University of California Santa Cruz, and fifteen city and charter K-12 schools, which draw hundreds of thousands of people into the city every year, create soft target opportunities for criminal and terrorist activity. The use of ALPRs, purposefully placed around the city, would build on the Santa Cruz Police Department’s capabilities to use real-time information and historical analysis to identify and investigate potential threats before criminal actions occur. In addition, building upon the existing network of ALPRs within the county and surrounding Bay Area, the Santa Cruz Police Department will enhance its support towards regional public safety efforts.
Cost: $84,000
Respecƞully,
Bernie Escalante, Chief of Police
15.15 From: Karen Kaplan
To: City Council
Subject: Tues. Nov. 28: SC City Council Mtg. - Oppose ALPR Date: Wednesday, November 22, 2023 2:25:56 AM
Dear Mayor Fred Keeley and Santa Cruz City Council Members:
RE: Tuesday, November 28, 2023: Santa Cruz City Council Meeting at 809 Center Street, Santa Cruz, CA 95060
Please Oppose the Purchase and Permanent Installation of Automatic License Plate Readers. (ALPR)
It is an invasion of privacy to track the whereabouts of every person 24/7.
The information can potentially be misused for stalking purposes, racial and religious profiling, monitoring relationships, invading medical privacy, etc.
Since the data collected would be held by a private company, there is potential for data hacking without accountability and possible ransom demands to return the data to the government. Employees who collect and monitor the data may have access to information that could potentially be used for inappropriate purposes other than law enforcement. Victims who rely on government protection may lose their safety if unlisted addresses become available to criminals, especially in domestic violence cases and child custody disputes. The misuse of information could be potentially harmful to innocent victims and children.
The Bill of Rights Fourth Amendment protects individuals from "unreasonable searches and seizures" by the government. The First Amendment protects freedom of religion, speech, press, and assembly.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) opposes the installation of permanent Automatic License Plate Readers. (ALPR)
Thank you for your consideration.
Sincerely,
Karen Kaplan
Resident of Santa Cruz County Since 1974
15.16 From: Roland Saher
To: City Council
Subject: ALPR
Date: Wednesday, November 22, 2023 11:21:00 AM
Dear Mayor Keeley and council members,
I urge you not to purchase ALPR! It's an invasion of privacy. We have more important things to spend our tax dollars on and have lived without this kind of undermining our basic freedom ever since we decided to have a city here at all! Best wishes, Roland Saher
15.17 From: Chris
To: City Council
Subject: SCPD’s purchase of License Plate Readers
Date: Wednesday, November 22, 2023 12:05:48 PM
Dear Council,
I’m writing to express my strong opposition to our police department’s desired purchase and deployment of automatic license plate readers.
This would amount to indefinite, indiscriminate, and constant surveillance of citizens by the city. Even if it did improve the department’s clearance rate for crimes, the cost and risks to everyone are far too high. The data are highly sensitive, and cannot be kept out of the wrong hands, where they could be used to intimidate, harass, or dox law abiding people.
There are numerous examples of this from elsewhere. To take just one, Texas is using such technology to track women traveling to other states for abortions.
This is a terrible idea. Please tell the police chief, flatly, No.
Chris Ryan
Santa Cruz
15.18 1
Rosemary Balsley
From: Esther Frances <[email protected]>
Sent: Friday, November 24, 2023 10:09 AM
To: City Council
Subject: Automatic License plate readers
Dear Mayor Fred Keeley and Santa Cruz City Council Members:
RE: Tuesday, November 28, 2023: Santa Cruz City Council Meeting at 809 Center Street, Santa Cruz, CA 95060
Please Oppose the Purchase and Permanent Installation of Automatic License Plate Readers. (ALPR)
It is an invasion of privacy to track the whereabouts of every person 24/7.
The information can potentially be misused for stalking purposes, racial and religious profiling, monitoring relationships, invading medical privacy, etc.
Since the data collected would be held by a private company, there is potential for data hacking without accountability and possible ransom demands to return the data to the government. Employees who collect and monitor the data may have access to information that could potentially be used for inappropriate purposes other than law enforcement. Victims who rely on government protection may lose their safety if unlisted addresses become available to criminals, especially in domestic violence cases and child custody disputes. The misuse of information could be potentially harmful to innocent victims and children.
The Bill of Rights Fourth Amendment protects individuals from "unreasonable searches and seizures" by the government. The First Amendment protects freedom of religion, speech, press, and assembly.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) opposes the installation of permanent Automatic License Plate Readers. (ALPR)
Thank you for your consideration.
Sincerely,
15.19 2
Esther Frances
15.20 1
Rosemary Balsley
From: Sheryl McCartney <[email protected]>
Sent: Friday, November 24, 2023 11:18 AM
To: City Council
Subject: License Plate Readers
Santa Cruz City Council,
I am opposed to the cities plan to install license plate readers in Santa Cruz.
We don't need them and it's just another form of Police State actions! Sincerely,
Sheryl
15.21 1
Rosemary Balsley
From: Cole Turner <[email protected]>
Sent: Friday, November 24, 2023 11:20 AM
To: Fred Keeley; City Council; Matt Huffaker; Bernie Escalante Subject: Oppose Automatic License Plate Readers
Hello Mayor Keeley, City Manager Huffaker, Chief of Police Escalante, and Santa Cruz City Council:
I'm a property owner in Santa Cruz County and grew up spending a lot of time in the county since early childhood. My family goes back in Santa Cruz many generations. My grandfather graduated from Santa Cruz HS and my great‐great‐uncle was the first foreman of Coastways Ranch.
I'm writing to voice my very strong objection to automatic license plate readers in Santa Cruz County.
This is a terrible waste of money and an infringement on privacy. American citizens do not want to live in a surveillance state and a police state. We do not wish to sacrifice our freedom and privacy for the sake of some kind of "safety" which is "given" to us by the government.
Safety comes in the form of protecting our democratic rights; part of this practice of democracy is you listening to and operating by the expressed opinions of residents. Please keep in mind that we are all active voters.
Thank you.
15.22 1
Rosemary Balsley
From: Gary Patton <[email protected]>
Sent: Friday, November 24, 2023 1:06 PM
To: City Council
Subject: Agenda Item #15 - Automated License Plate Readers Attachments: ACLU Report on License Plate Readers.pdf; Letter To City Council Opposing Automagted License Plate Readers.pdf
Dear Council,
I am attaching a PDF version of my letter opposing the acquisition and use of Automated License Plate Readers in the City of Santa Cruz, along with another PDF file of a report from the ACLU that should be taken seriously.
Thanks for your consideration of my strongly‐felt comments.
Gary A. Patton, Attorney at Law
P.O. Box 1038
Santa Cruz, CA 95061
Telephone: 831‐332‐8546
Email: [email protected]
Website / Blog: www.gapatton.net
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/gapatton
15.23 Gary A. Patton
131 Dake Avenue, Santa Cruz, CA 95062
Telephone: 831-423-2984 Email: [email protected] November 24, 2023
Mayor Fred Keeley and Council Members
Santa Cruz City Council
809 Center Street
Santa Cruz, CA 95060
RE: Opposition To Purchase And Deployment Of Automated License Plate Readers Dear Mayor Keeley and Council Members:
I am writing to urge the Council, in the strongest terms possible, not to authorize the purchase and use of Automated License Plate Readers in the City of Santa Cruz. I understand that this is being proposed to you by the City Police Chief, and that you will consider this proposal on Tuesday, November 28, 2023, in connection with your Agenda Item #15, which is currently placed on the Consent Agenda.
I have extensively studied the use of Automated License Plate Readers in connection with teaching a Senior Capstone Course in the Legal Studies Program at UCSC. The theme of the course, as I teach it, is “Privacy, Technology, And Freedom.” Automated License Plate Readers are exactly the kind of “Technology” that virtually eliminates “Privacy,” and thus undermines “Freedom.” The ACLU has published an extensive report on Automated License Plate Readers, dating from 2013. A copy is being sent along with this letter, both as PDF files. In 2014, I believe, the Santa Cruz City Council explicitly rejected the purchase and use of ALPRs in our city. PLEASE RECONFIRM THAT DECISION. While I appreciate that the Police Department policy, part of the agenda packet, seeks to provide limits on the use of ALPRs, in response to concerns like the ones I express, the generation of a database that inventories every place a vehicle has been is inherently subject to abuse, and the best protection against such abuse is simply not to allow the accumulation of such an invasive database in the first place.
I understand that the local ACLU will be protesting the acquisition and use of ALPRs in the City of Santa Cruz. Again, I join it its opposition in the strongest terms possible.
Yours truly,
Gary A. Patton
cc: ACLU (Santa Cruz)
15.24 July 2013
YOU ARE BEING TRACKED
How License Plate Readers Are Being Used
To Record Americans’ Movements
15.25 You Are Being Tracked:
How License Plate Readers Are Being Used
To Record Americans’ Movements
July 2013
American Civil Liberties Union
125 Broad Street
New York, NY 10004
www.aclu.org
Cover Photo: Newsbound/AP
15.26 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 1 Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION .............................................................. 2 THE TECHNOLOGY ............................................................ 4 LICENSE PLATE READERS POSE PRIVACY RISKS ................................ 7 Chilling effects............................................................ 7 Abusive tracking .......................................................... 8 Institutional abuse ........................................................ 9 Discriminatory targeting ................................................... 9 Sidebar: Pervasive, Permanent Monitoring ................................. 10
LICENSE PLATE READERS ARE WIDELY USED BY STATE AND LOCAL LAW ENFORCEMENT AGENCIES ................................................... 12 License plate readers collect vast quantities of data on innocent people........ 13 Many agencies retain data on innocent Americans for long periods of time ..... 16 All the pieces are lining up for widespread sharing of license plate reader data .. 18 Sidebar: Pushing Back on Invasive License Plate Reader Use: A Success Story.. 23
THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT IS FUELING STATE AND LOCAL USE OF LICENSE PLATE READERS ............................................................ 25 TOO LITTLE IS KNOWN ABOUT THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT’S OWN USE OF LICENSE PLATE READERS.................................................... 27 PRIVATE COMPANIES COLLECT LICENSE PLATE DATA WITH NO OVERSIGHT........ 28 Sidebar: Data Mining License Plate Records................................. 30 THERE ARE TOO FEW RULES IN PLACE TO PROTECT PRIVACY .................... 31 RECOMMENDATIONS ........................................................ 32 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS........................................................ 34
15.27 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 2
INTRODUCTION
If you’ve never seen an automatic license plate reader, it’s probably because you didn’t know what to look for. The devices have been proliferating around the country at worrying speed. Mounted on patrol cars or placed on bridges or overpasses, license plate readers combine high-speed cameras that capture photographs of every passing license plate with software that analyzes those photographs to identify the plate number.
License plate reader systems typically check each plate number against “hot lists” of plates that have been uploaded to the system and provide an instant alert to a law enforcement agent when a match or “hit” appears.
License plate readers would pose few
civil liberties risks if they only checked
plates against hot lists and these
hot lists were implemented soundly.
But these systems are configured
to store the photograph, the license
plate number, and the date, time, and
location where all vehicles are seen
— not just the data of vehicles that
generate hits. All of this information
is being placed into databases, and
is sometimes pooled into regional
sharing systems. As a result, enormous databases of motorists’ location information are being created. All too frequently, these data are retained permanently and shared widely with few or no restrictions on how they can be used.
The implementation of automatic license plate readers poses serious privacy and other civil liberties threats. More and more cameras, longer retention periods, and widespread sharing allow law enforcement agents to assemble the individual puzzle pieces of where we have been over time into a single, high-resolution image of our lives. The knowledge that one is subject to constant monitoring can chill the exercise of our cherished rights to free speech and association. Databases of license plate reader information create opportunities for institutional abuse, such as using them to identify protest attendees merely because these individuals have exercised their First Amendment-protected right to free speech. If not properly secured, license plate reader databases open the door to abusive tracking, enabling anyone with access to pry into the lives of his boss, his exwife, or his romantic, political, or workplace rivals. PHOTO: SPARKY AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 2
INTRODUCTION
If you’ve never seen an automatic license plate reader, it’s probably because you didn’t know what to look for. The devices have been proliferating around the country at worrying speed. Mounted on patrol cars or placed on bridges or overpasses, license plate readers combine high-speed cameras that capture photographs of every passing license plate with software that analyzes those photographs to identify the plate number.
License plate reader systems typically check each plate number against “hot lists” of plates that have been uploaded to the system and provide an instant alert to a law enforcement agent when a match or “hit” appears.
License plate readers would pose few
civil liberties risks if they only checked
plates against hot lists and these
hot lists were implemented soundly.
But these systems are configured
to store the photograph, the license
plate number, and the date, time, and
location where all vehicles are seen
— not just the data of vehicles that
generate hits. All of this information
is being placed into databases, and
is sometimes pooled into regional
sharing systems. As a result, enormous databases of motorists’ location information are being created. All too frequently, these data are retained permanently and shared widely with few or no restrictions on how they can be used.
The implementation of automatic license plate readers poses serious privacy and other civil liberties threats. More and more cameras, longer retention periods, and widespread sharing allow law enforcement agents to assemble the individual puzzle pieces of where we have been over time into a single, high-resolution image of our lives. The knowledge that one is subject to constant monitoring can chill the exercise of our cherished rights to free speech and association. Databases of license plate reader information create opportunities for institutional abuse, such as using them to identify protest attendees merely because these individuals have exercised their First Amendment-protected right to free speech. If not properly secured, license plate reader databases open the door to abusive tracking, enabling anyone with access to pry into the lives of his boss, his exwife, or his romantic, political, or workplace rivals. PHOTO: SPARKY
15.28 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 3 In July 2012, American Civil Liberties Union affiliates in 38 states and Washington, D.C., sent 587 public records act requests to local police departments and state agencies to obtain information on how these agencies use license plate readers. We also filed requests with the U.S. Departments of Justice, Homeland Security, and Transportation to learn how the federal government has used grants to encourage the widespread adoption of license plate readers, as well as how it is using the technology itself.
NUMBER OF POLICE DEPARTMENTS AND
STATE AGENCIES WE ASKED FOR RECORDS
NUMBER THAT HAVE
RESPONDED SO FAR
NUMBER THAT HAVE
NOT RESPONDED
587 293 294
We received over 26,000 pages of documents from the law enforcement agencies that responded to our requests, about their policies, procedures, and practices for using license plate readers.
This report provides an overview of what we have learned about license plate readers:
what their capabilities are, how they are being used, and why they raise privacy issues of critical importance. We close by offering specific recommendations designed to allow law enforcement agencies to use license plate readers for legitimate purposes without subjecting Americans to the permanent recording of their every movement.
The potential privacy harms discussed in this report are not merely theoretical. In August 2012, the Minneapolis Star Tribune published a map displaying the location, obtained via a public records request, of the 41 times that Mayor R.T. Rybak’s car had been recorded by a license plate reader in the preceding year.1
The Star Tribune also reported that of the
805,000 plate scans made in June, less than one percent were hits.2 Yet for as long as the
information was retained, the other 99 percent of scans were also vulnerable to the risk that they might be released, used by the police to track innocent people, or otherwise abused. The alarming fact that a law-abiding citizen’s sensitive location history could be revealed so easily was not lost on this exposed mayor. In response to the Star Tribune’s reporting, he directed the city’s chief of police to recommend a new policy on data retention.3
We hope the findings of our report spur similar policy changes. 1 Eric Roper, City Cameras Track Anyone, Even Minneapolis Mayor Rybak, Minneapolis Star Tribune (Aug. 17, 2012), http://www.startribune.com/local/minneapolis/166494646.html. 2 Eric Roper, Police Cameras Quietly Capture License Plates, Collect Data, Minneapolis Star Tribune (Aug. 10, 2012), http://www.startribune.com/local/minneapolis/165680946.html. 3 Id. Minnesota now has a temporary data classification that makes the plate data collected by readers exempt from disclosure under the state public records laws. That temporary classification applies statewide and is set to expire August 1, 2015 absent legislative action on the issue. Minnesota Department of Administration, Information and Analysis Division, Current Temporary Classifications, http://www.ipad.state.mn.us/docs/tccurrent.html.
AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 3
In July 2012, American Civil Liberties Union affiliates in 38 states and Washington, D.C., sent 587 public records act requests to local police departments and state agencies to obtain information on how these agencies use license plate readers. We also filed requests with the U.S. Departments of Justice, Homeland Security, and Transportation to learn how the federal government has used grants to encourage the widespread adoption of license plate readers, as well as how it is using the technology itself.
NUMBER OF POLICE DEPARTMENTS AND
STATE AGENCIES WE ASKED FOR RECORDS
NUMBER THAT HAVE
RESPONDED SO FAR
NUMBER THAT HAVE
NOT RESPONDED
293 294
We received over 26,000 pages of documents from the law enforcement agencies that responded to our requests, about their policies, procedures, and practices for using license plate readers.
This report provides an overview of what we have learned about license plate readers:
what their capabilities are, how they are being used, and why they raise privacy issues of critical importance. We close by offering specific recommendations designed to allow law enforcement agencies to use license plate readers for legitimate purposes without subjecting Americans to the permanent recording of their every movement.
The potential privacy harms discussed in this report are not merely theoretical. In August 2012, the Minneapolis Star Tribune published a map displaying the location, obtained via a public records request, of the 41 times that Mayor R.T. Rybak’s car had been recorded by a license plate reader in the preceding year.1 The Star Tribune also reported that of the 805,000 plate scans made in June, less than one percent were hits.2 Yet for as long as the information was retained, the other 99 percent of scans were also vulnerable to the risk that they might be released, used by the police to track innocent people, or otherwise abused. The alarming fact that a law-abiding citizen’s sensitive location history could be revealed so easily was not lost on this exposed mayor. In response to the Star Tribune’s reporting, he directed the city’s chief of police to recommend a new policy on data retention.3 We hope the findings of our report spur similar policy changes. 1 Eric Roper, City Cameras Track Anyone, Even Minneapolis Mayor Rybak, Minneapolis Star Tribune (Aug. 17, 2012), http://www.startribune.com/local/minneapolis/166494646.html. 2 Eric Roper, Police Cameras Quietly Capture License Plates, Collect Data, Minneapolis Star Tribune (Aug. 10, 2012), http://www.startribune.com/local/minneapolis/165680946.html. 3 Id. Minnesota now has a temporary data classification that makes the plate data collected by readers exempt from disclosure under the state public records laws. That temporary classification applies statewide and is set to expire August 1, 2015 absent legislative action on the issue. Minnesota Department of Administration, Information and Analysis Division, Current Temporary Classifications, http://www.ipad.state.mn.us/docs/tccurrent.html. 587
15.29 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 4
THE TECHNOLOGY
Automatic license plate readers are made up of high-speed cameras designed to capture a photograph of each and every passing license plate, combined with software that analyzes those photographs to identify the license plate number.4 These systems
store extensive location information about each automobile.5 License plate reader cameras
can be placed almost anywhere,
from mobile vehicles like patrol
cars6
to fixed objects like bridges
and overpasses.7
There are even
apps that allow law enforcement
agents on foot to scan license
plates with their smartphones.8
On taking a photograph, license
plate reader systems quickly:
• Identify any license plates
within the photograph
• Convert each license plate
number into machinereadable text
4 ELSAG North America, Mobile Plate Hunter-900 Car Systems User Guide (June 2011), Documents Received in Response to ACLU Public Records Requests, all of which are available at aclu.org [hereinafter “Public Records Responses”], p. 6422, http://www.aclu. org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/vermont/alprpra_departmentofpublicsafety_VT%20(2).pdf; Motorola, Automatic License Plate Recognition Solutions Brief (2011), Public Records Responses p.10717, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/illinois/alprpra_burbankpd_ burbankil.PDF.
5 L-3 Mobile-Vision, AlertVU Mobile User Manual, Public Records Responses, p. 18733, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/ new-jersey/18731-18763%20Woodbridge%20ALPR%20User%20Manual.pdf; Federal Signal, PAGIS ALPR Software Data Sheet (2010), Public Records Responses, p. 18538, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-jersey/18537-18538%20Vineland%20OPRA%20 Response%2024.pdf; Vigilant Video, Mobile License Plate Recognition Systems, Public Records Responses, p. 15935, http://www.aclu. org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-york/alprpra_yonkerspolicedepartment_yonkersny_1.pdf. 6 Federal Signal, Slate ALPR Camera Data Sheet (2009), Public Records Responses, pp. 1866-87, http://www.aclu.org/files/ FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_AustinPD_AustinTX%20(56).pdf; ELSAG North America, How the MPH-900 Works, (Sept. 16, 2011), Public Records Responses, p. 4334, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/north-carolina/alprpra_wrightsvillebeachpd_ wrightsvillebeachnc%20(3).pdf.
7 Federal Signal, Spike+ Model P372 Data Sheet (2008), Public Records Responses, pp. 2425-26, http://www.aclu.org/files/ FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_grapevinePD_grapevineTX%20(5).pdf; ELSAG North America, Fixed Plate Hunter-900 (Sept. 16, 2011), Public Records Responses, p. 4330, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/north-carolina/alprpra_wrightsvillebeachpd_ wrightsvillebeachnc%20(3).pdf%20; Prime Communications, Corporate Overview, Public Records Responses, p. 3555, http://www.aclu. org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_texastechuniversity_lubbocktx%20(4).pdf. 8 Vigilant Video, CarDetector Mobile Companion, p. 1 (2012), http://vigilantsolutions.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/VigilantMobile-Companion-Datasheet-092012.pdf.
AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 4
THE TECHNOLOGY
Automatic license plate readers are made up of high-speed cameras designed to capture a photograph of each and every passing license plate, combined with software that analyzes those photographs to identify the license plate number.4 These systems store extensive location information about each automobile.5 License plate reader cameras
can be placed almost anywhere,
from mobile vehicles like patrol
cars6 to fixed objects like bridges
and overpasses.7 There are even
apps that allow law enforcement
agents on foot to scan license
plates with their smartphones.8
On taking a photograph, license
plate reader systems quickly:
• Identify any license plates
within the photograph
• Convert each license plate
number into machinereadable text
4 ELSAG North America, Mobile Plate Hunter-900 Car Systems User Guide (June 2011), Documents Received in Response to ACLU Public Records Requests, all of which are available at aclu.org [hereinafter “Public Records Responses”], p. 6422, http://www.aclu. org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/vermont/alprpra_departmentofpublicsafety_VT%20(2).pdf; Motorola, Automatic License Plate Recognition Solutions Brief (2011), Public Records Responses p.10717, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/illinois/alprpra_burbankpd_ burbankil.PDF.
5 L-3 Mobile-Vision, AlertVU Mobile User Manual, Public Records Responses, p. 18733, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/ new-jersey/18731-18763%20Woodbridge%20ALPR%20User%20Manual.pdf; Federal Signal, PAGIS ALPR Software Data Sheet (2010), Public Records Responses, p. 18538, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-jersey/18537-18538%20Vineland%20OPRA%20 Response%2024.pdf; Vigilant Video, Mobile License Plate Recognition Systems, Public Records Responses, p. 15935, http://www.aclu. org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-york/alprpra_yonkerspolicedepartment_yonkersny_1.pdf. 6 Federal Signal, Slate ALPR Camera Data Sheet (2009), Public Records Responses, pp. 1866-87, http://www.aclu.org/files/ FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_AustinPD_AustinTX%20(56).pdf; ELSAG North America, How the MPH-900 Works, (Sept. 16, 2011), Public Records Responses, p. 4334, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/north-carolina/alprpra_wrightsvillebeachpd_ wrightsvillebeachnc%20(3).pdf.
7 Federal Signal, Spike+ Model P372 Data Sheet (2008), Public Records Responses, pp. 2425-26, http://www.aclu.org/files/ FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_grapevinePD_grapevineTX%20(5).pdf; ELSAG North America, Fixed Plate Hunter-900 (Sept. 16, 2011), Public Records Responses, p. 4330, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/north-carolina/alprpra_wrightsvillebeachpd_ wrightsvillebeachnc%20(3).pdf%20; Prime Communications, Corporate Overview, Public Records Responses, p. 3555, http://www.aclu. org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_texastechuniversity_lubbocktx%20(4).pdf. 8 Vigilant Video, CarDetector Mobile Companion, p. 1 (2012), http://vigilantsolutions.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/VigilantMobile-Companion-Datasheet-092012.pdf.
15.30 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 5 • Check each license plate number against manually entered plate numbers and “hot lists” of plates that have been uploaded to the system • Provide an instant alert to a law enforcement agent when a match or hit appears • Store the photograph, the license plate number, and the date, time, and location where the automobile was seen9
Prices for license plate reader systems have decreased markedly in recent years and are continuing to fall.10 State and federal grants can further lower the cost law enforcement agencies must pay out of pocket to purchase license plate reading equipment.11 The cost of storing data collected from license plate readers is also dropping.Between 2000 and 2010, the inflation-adjusted cost to purchase one gigabyte of hard drive storage fell from about $10 to less than ten cents.12
As license plate readers become increasingly widespread, they are being put to a variety of uses. Perhaps the most common law enforcement use of license plate readers is, as described above, to check plates against “hot lists,” including the National Crime Information Center vehicle file (which includes stolen vehicles and vehicles used in the commission of a crime). Other common hot lists include the plate numbers of those who are the subject of an AMBER Alert or felony arrest warrant, and people who have been required to register as sex offenders or are on supervised release.13 Data collected from license plate readers can also be pooled in centralized databases.14 Software can then be used to plot all of the plate reads associated with a particular vehicle to trace a person’s past movements.15 The systems can also plot all vehicles at 9 Federal Signal, PAGIS ALPR Software Data Sheet (2010), Public Records Responses, pp. 18537-38, http://www.aclu.org/ files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-jersey/18537-18538%20Vineland%20OPRA%20Response%2024.pdf; Vigilant Video, National Vehicle Location Service, Public Records Responses, pp. 15939-41, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-york/alprpra_ yonkerspolicedepartment_yonkersny_1.pdf.
10 According to the Wall Street Journal, the price of a standard two-camera license plate recognition system has dropped from $25,000 to $15,000 in just a few years. Julia Angwin & Jennifer Valentino-Devries, New Tracking Frontier: Your License Plates, Wall St.
J. (Sept. 29. 2012), http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390443995604578004723603576296.html. See also Homeland Security News Wire, Reduced Prices for License Plates [sic] Readers Attracts More Buyers, (Jan. 24, 2012), http://www.homelandsecuritynewswire. com/srlet20120124-reduced-prices-for-license-plates-readers-attracts-more-buyers (stating that the price of an ALPR system has fallen from an initial cost of $24,000 to $17,000 as of January 2012). 11 ELSAG North America, Grant Guide, http://elsag.com/grant_guide.htm. 12 John Villasenor, Recording Everything: Digital Storage as an Enabler of Authoritarian Governments, Center For Technology Innovation at Brookings, p. 4 (Dec. 14, 2011), http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/research/files/papers/2011/12/14%20digital%20 storage%20villasenor/1214_digital_storage_villasenor.pdf. 13 Federal Signal, PAGIS ALPR Software Data Sheet (2010), Public Records Responses, p. 18537, http://www.aclu.org/files/ FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-jersey/18537-18538%20Vineland%20OPRA%20Response%2024.pdf; High Point Police Department General Order on Automated License Plate Readers (June 1, 2011), Public Records Responses, pp. 812-13, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/ north-carolina/alprpra_HighPointPD_HighPointNC%20(3).pdf. 14 Motorola, Automatic License Plate Recognition Solutions Brief, p. 3 (2011), http://www.motorola.com/web/Business/_ Documents/Application%20Briefs/Motorola_ALPR_RO-14-2005B.pdf. 15 Id.; Prime Communications, Corporate Overview, Public Records Responses, p. 3557, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/ texas/alprpra_texastechuniversity_lubbocktx%20(4).pdf.
AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 5
• Check each license plate number against manually entered plate numbers and “hot lists” of plates that have been uploaded to the system • Provide an instant alert to a law enforcement agent when a match or hit appears • Store the photograph, the license plate number, and the date, time, and location where the automobile was seen9
Prices for license plate reader systems have decreased markedly in recent years and are continuing to fall.10 State and federal grants can further lower the cost law enforcement agencies must pay out of pocket to purchase license plate reading equipment.11 The cost of storing data collected from license plate readers is also dropping.Between 2000 and 2010, the inflation-adjusted cost to purchase one gigabyte of hard drive storage fell from about $10 to less than ten cents.12
As license plate readers become increasingly widespread, they are being put to a variety of uses. Perhaps the most common law enforcement use of license plate readers is, as described above, to check plates against “hot lists,” including the National Crime Information Center vehicle file (which includes stolen vehicles and vehicles used in the commission of a crime). Other common hot lists include the plate numbers of those who are the subject of an AMBER Alert or felony arrest warrant, and people who have been required to register as sex offenders or are on supervised release.13 Data collected from license plate readers can also be pooled in centralized databases.14 Software can then be used to plot all of the plate reads associated with a particular vehicle to trace a person’s past movements.15 The systems can also plot all vehicles at 9 Federal Signal, PAGIS ALPR Software Data Sheet (2010), Public Records Responses, pp. 18537-38, http://www.aclu.org/ files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-jersey/18537-18538%20Vineland%20OPRA%20Response%2024.pdf; Vigilant Video, National Vehicle Location Service, Public Records Responses, pp. 15939-41, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-york/alprpra_ yonkerspolicedepartment_yonkersny_1.pdf.
10 According to the Wall Street Journal, the price of a standard two-camera license plate recognition system has dropped from $25,000 to $15,000 in just a few years. Julia Angwin & Jennifer Valentino-Devries, New Tracking Frontier: Your License Plates, Wall St.
J. (Sept. 29. 2012), http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390443995604578004723603576296.html. See also Homeland Security News Wire, Reduced Prices for License Plates [sic] Readers Attracts More Buyers, (Jan. 24, 2012), http://www.homelandsecuritynewswire. com/srlet20120124-reduced-prices-for-license-plates-readers-attracts-more-buyers (stating that the price of an ALPR system has fallen from an initial cost of $24,000 to $17,000 as of January 2012). 11 ELSAG North America, Grant Guide, http://elsag.com/grant_guide.htm. 12 John Villasenor, Recording Everything: Digital Storage as an Enabler of Authoritarian Governments, Center For Technology Innovation at Brookings, p. 4 (Dec. 14, 2011), http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/research/files/papers/2011/12/14%20digital%20 storage%20villasenor/1214_digital_storage_villasenor.pdf. 13 Federal Signal, PAGIS ALPR Software Data Sheet (2010), Public Records Responses, p. 18537, http://www.aclu.org/files/ FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-jersey/18537-18538%20Vineland%20OPRA%20Response%2024.pdf; High Point Police Department General Order on Automated License Plate Readers (June 1, 2011), Public Records Responses, pp. 812-13, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/ north-carolina/alprpra_HighPointPD_HighPointNC%20(3).pdf. 14 Motorola, Automatic License Plate Recognition Solutions Brief, p. 3 (2011), http://www.motorola.com/web/Business/_ Documents/Application%20Briefs/Motorola_ALPR_RO-14-2005B.pdf. 15 Id.; Prime Communications, Corporate Overview, Public Records Responses, p. 3557, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/ texas/alprpra_texastechuniversity_lubbocktx%20(4).pdf.
15.31 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 6 a particular location, such as the location where a crime — or a political protest — took place.16
Additional uses for license plate readers are arising as the cameras become more affordable and widespread.
VEHICLE VERIFICATION
Photographs captured by license plate readers may contain more than simply the license plate, and sometimes include a substantial part of a vehicle, its occupants, and its immediate vicinity.17 Law enforcement can use captured photographs to verify witness descriptions of vehicles and confirm identifying features.18 Photographs of cars and drivers can also be printed and distributed to the press and public.19
GEOFENCING
Law enforcement or private companies can construct a virtual fence around a designated geographical area, to identify each vehicle entering that space.20
NON-LAW ENFORCEMENT
License plate readers can also be used for non-law enforcement purposes, such as repossession of vehicles and parking enforcement.21
16 Prime Communications, Corporate Overview, Public Records Responses, p. 3557, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/ texas/alprpra_texastechuniversity_lubbocktx%20(4).pdf; Maryland State Police, General Order on Automated License Plate Recognition Program (May 2, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 502, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/maryland/alprpramspmd (2).pdf; Miami-Dade Police, Technical Specifications for Mobile License Plate Readers, Public Records Responses, p. 6252, http://www.aclu.org/ files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/florida/alprpra_miamidadecountypd_miamicountyfl.pdf. 17 Photographs captured by license plate readers may contain more than simply the license plate. A large manufacturer, ELSAG North America, advertises that its cameras “capture nearly twice the physical area — the sweet spot — and that means more information for law enforcement.” The advertised “sweet spot” captures not only the car’s license plate, but “a significant portion of the car and part of the car’s surroundings,” leaving room for the car’s driver, the vehicle’s passengers, or passing pedestrians to also be captured by the camera. Thus, photographs of individuals are also being captured and stored. ELSAG North America, ALPR Products and Solutions — Mobile Plate Hunter-900, http://www.elsag.com/mobile.htm; International Association of Chiefs of Police, Privacy Impact Assessment Report for the Utilization of License Plate Readers, Public Records Responses, pp. 380-81, https://www.aclu.org/ files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/maryland/alprpra_MPIA_md.pdf; Prime Communications, Corporate Overview, Public Records Responses, p. 3556, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_texastechuniversity_lubbocktx%20(4).pdf; see generally Angwin & Valentino-Devries, supra note 10.
18 Prime Communications, Corporate Overview, Public Records Responses, p. 3556, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/ texas/alprpra_texastechuniversity_lubbocktx%20(4).pdf.
19 Id.
20 For example, Tiburon, California has license plate readers monitoring its only two roads that leave the town. Cyrus Favriar, Rich California Town Considers License Plate Readers For Entire City Limits, Ars Technica (Mar. 5, 2013), http://arstechnica.com/ tech-policy/2013/03/rich-california-town-considers-license-plate-readers-for-entire-city-limits/. Prime Communications, Corporate Overview, Public Records Responses, p. 3557, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_texastechuniversity_ lubbocktx%20(4).pdf; ELSAG North America, Geofencing Capabilities of the Mobile Plate Hunter-900, p. 1 (Sept. 14, 2011), http://elsag. com/media/content/ELSAG_geofencing-ss(1).pdf.
21 Texas Tech University Parking Service, Parking in the Buff: Parking in a Post-Permit World (Apr. 24, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 3496-3546, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_texastechuniversity_lubbocktx (2).pdf; Vigilant Video, National Vehicle Location Services Information Sheet, Public Records Responses, p. 15921, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ ALPR/new-york/alprpra_yonkerspolicedepartment_yonkersny_1.pdf; Prime Communications, Corporate Overview, Public Records Responses, p. 3555, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_texastechuniversity_lubbocktx%20(4).pdf; Michael Harlow, License Plate Recognition: It’s Grown Far Beyond Airports, Parking Today (July 2009), http://www.parkingtoday.com/articledetails. php?id=788; Martha Groves, Servant or Snoop in the Parking Garage?, L.A. Times (Jan. 23, 2011), http://articles.latimes.com/2011/jan/23/ local/la-me-santa-monica-parking-20110123; Angwin & Valentino-Devries, supra note 10; Digital Recognition Network, http://www. drndata.com/index.html.
15.32 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 7
LICENSE PLATE READERS POSE
PRIVACY RISKS
Tens of thousands of license plate readers are now deployed throughout the United States. Unfortunately, license plate readers are typically programmed to retain the location information and photograph of every vehicle that crosses their path, not simply those that generate a hit.22 The photographs and all other associated information are then retained in a database, and can be shared with others, such as law enforcement agencies, fusion centers, and private companies.23 Together these databases contain hundreds of millions of data points revealing the travel histories of millions of motorists who have committed no crime.
Longer retention periods and more widespread sharing allow law enforcement agents to assemble the individual puzzle pieces of where we have been over time into a single, high-resolution image of our lives. This constant monitoring and permanent recording violates our privacy in a number of respects.
Chilling effects
In many places in America, license plate readers were initially deployed relatively sparsely, for example, at the entry and exit points of various towns.24 But as license plate readers have proliferated, they no longer capture individuals’ movements at only a few points. Increasingly, they are capturing drivers’ locations outside church, the doctor’s office, and school, giving law enforcement and private companies that run the largest databases the ability to build detailed pictures of our lives.
Location data can reveal extremely sensitive information about who we are and what we 22 ELSAG North America, Car System User’s Guide (June 2011), Public Records Responses, p. 6422-23, http://www.aclu.org/files/ FilesPDFs/ALPR/vermont/alprpra_departmentofpublicsafety_VT(2).pdf; L-3 Mobile-Vision, AlertVU Mobile User Manual, Public Records Responses, p. 18733, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-jersey/18731-18763%20Woodbridge%20ALPR%20User%20 Manual.pdf.
23 Motorola Solutions Brief, supra note 4. See also Commerce City, Grant Application to Colorado Automobile Theft Prevention Authority Grant Program (Feb. 1, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 7881, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/colorado/ alprpra_commercecitypd_commercecityca (5).pdf (police departments sharing license plate data with each other); Memorandum of Understanding between National Capital Region’s License Plate Reader Information Sharing Program and Rockville Police (Mar. 29, 2012), Public Records Responses, pp. 393-99, https://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/maryland/alprpra_MPIA_md.pdf (police department sharing license plate data with a regional fusion center); Vigilant Solutions, Car Detector Mobile ALPR/ANPR (2012), Public Records Responses, p. 15918, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-york/alprpra_yonkerspolicedepartment_yonkersny_1.pdf (police departments sharing data with a private company). 24 Tiburon, California takes this approach, and retains data for 30 days. Cyrus Farivar, Your Car, Tracked: The Rapid Rise of License Plate Readers, Ars Technica (Sept. 27, 2012), http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/09/your-car-tracked-the-rapid-rise-of-licenseplate-readers/.
15.33 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 8 do. As the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit explained in a recent GPS tracking case:
A person who knows all of another’s travels can deduce whether he is a weekly church goer, a heavy drinker, a regular at the gym, an unfaithful husband, an outpatient receiving medical treatment, an associate of particular individuals or political groups — and not just one such fact about a person, but all such facts.25
And license plate readers can be used for tracking people’s movements for months or years on end, chilling the exercise of our cherished rights to free speech and association.
While police departments and government agencies argue that the data they collect will be used only for proper purposes, even the International Association of Chiefs of Police has recognized that pervasive surveillance can have negative chilling effects regardless of its purpose. As it has explained, “The risk is that individuals will become more cautious in the exercise of their protected rights of expression, protest, association, and political participation because they consider themselves under constant surveillance.”26 Psychologists have confirmed through multiple studies that people do in fact alter their behavior when they know they are being watched.27 In one such study, the mere presence of a poster of staring human eyes was enough to significantly change the participants’ behavior.28
Abusive tracking
When police departments lack policies limiting access to license plate data and monitoring its use, abuse of the technology can occur. Other location tracking technologies, such as attachment of GPS devices to vehicles and tracking people 25 United States v. Maynard, 615 F.3d 544, 562 (D.C. Cir. 2010). 26 International Association of Chiefs of Police, Privacy Impact Assessment Report for the Utilization of License Plate Readers, p. 13 (2009), http://www.theiacp.org/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=N%2BE2wvY%2F1QU%3D&tabid=87. 27 See Jay Stanley, Does Surveillance Affect Us Even When We Can’t Confirm We’re Being Watched? Lessons From Behind the Iron Curtain, Free Future (Oct. 15, 2012), http://www.aclu.org/blog/national-security/does-surveillance-affect-us-even-when-we-cantconfirm-were-being-watched. 28 Sander van der Linden, How the Illusion of Being Observed Can Make You a Better Person, Sci. Am. (May 3, 2011), http://www. scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=how-the-illusion-of-being-observed-can-make-you-better-person; M. Ryan Calo, People Can Be So Fake: A New Dimension to Privacy and Technology Scholarship, 114 Penn St. L. Rev. p. 809 (2010), http://www.pennstatelawreview.org/ articles/114/114%20Penn%20St.%20L.%20Rev.%20809.pdf.
15.34 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 9 through their cell phones, are now regularly utilized to facilitate stalking.29 There is no reason to believe that license plate readers will prove an exception.
License plate reader systems allow law enforcement agents to enter license plate numbers manually and then receive automated alerts on those plates in the same way they would any plate listed in an approved hot list. This method enables misuse: Anyone with access to these systems could track his boss, his ex-wife, his romantic or workplace rivals, friends, enemies, neighbors, family, and so forth. An agent could target the owners of vehicles parked at political meetings, gay bars, gun stores, or abortion clinics.
Institutional abuse
In addition to abuse by individual law enforcement agents, license plate readers can be subject to larger-scale institutional abuse as a matter of policy. For decades of the 20th century, the FBI and other federal agencies illegally targeted activists in the civil rights, anti-war, and labor movements. Today, law enforcement agencies are again carrying out systematic surveillance of peaceful political protesters.30 And in other countries, political protesters have already been subjected to surveillance through license plate reader systems. In the United Kingdom, John Catt, a retiree and anti-war protester, was pulled over by an anti-terror unit based on a license plate reader hit.31 The BBC reports that his license plate was put on a hot list after an anti-war protest.32 Discriminatory targeting
License plate reader systems can also facilitate discriminatory targeting. An agent who manually enters plates into a license plate reader system based on discriminatory rationales could check far more plates than he could without the technology. Also, discrimination can exist in deciding where to place the cameras. Whole communities may be targeted based on their religious, ethnic, or associational makeup. In the U.K., law enforcement agents installed over 200 cameras and license plate readers 29 Katrina Baum et al., Bureau of Justice Statistics: Stalking Victimization in the United States, at 5 (Jan. 2009) (“Global positioning system (GPS) technology comprised about a tenth of the electronic monitoring of stalking victims.”), http://www.ovw.usdoj.gov/docs/ stalking-victimization.pdf; Justin Scheck, Stalkers Exploit Cellphone GPS, Wall St. J., Aug. 4, 2010, http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001 424052748703467304575383522318244234.html.
30 See ACLU, Spyfiles, www.aclu.org/spyfiles.
31 Richard Bilton, Camera Grid to Log License Plates, BBC (May 22, 2009), http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/whos_watching_ you/8064333.stm.
32 Id.
15.35 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 10 A citizen group organizes a protest calling for an end to the “war on terror.” Many people show up. The police department uses a license plate reader-equipped police cruiser to scan the license plates of all who park in a nearby parking lot to attend the protest. They then investigate these individuals, showing up at their places of employment to ask questions about their backgrounds.
The mayor of a medium-sized Midwest city is attempting to fight off the first major challenge to his position in over 20 years, and hears a rumor that his challenger has a mistress. He asks his police commissioner to analyze historical license plate reader data for his challenger’s license plate, and is able to confirm that he regularly visits the home of a young, single woman after 10 p.m. The mayor anonymously tips off a local journalist, who confirms the affair and publishes a front-page story exposing it.
A journalist at a small newspaper publishes a series
of explosive stories charging local police officers with planting drugs on suspects in order to meet arrest
quotas. The stories are clearly based on insider
information, so police officials park a license plate reader outside the newspaper’s office and check each car that
drives by against a list of police officers’ license plate numbers. When they see an officer paying visits to the
newspaper, they fire him on a technicality.
PERVASIVE, PERMANENT MONITORING
If regulations are not put in place to limit the use of license plate readers, there is a risk that they will be abused through scenarios such as these:
15.36 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 11 in predominantly Muslim suburbs of Birmingham.33 Public outrage was such that the agents dismantled the cameras, stating that cultivating the trust of the community was the more effective approach.34 In New York City, police officers have reportedly driven unmarked vehicles equipped with license plate readers around local mosques in order to record each attendee.35 Police departments in other parts of the country could easily do the same thing to Tea Party groups, anti-abortion protesters, or the political opposition of a sheriff running for re-election.
33 Paul Lewis, CCTV Aimed at Muslim Areas in Birmingham to be Dismantled, The Guardian (Oct. 25, 2010), http://www.guardian.co.uk/ uk/2010/oct/25/birmingham-cctv-muslim-areas-surveillance. 34 Id.
35 Adam Goldman & Matt Apuzzo, With Cameras, Informants, NYPD Eyed Mosques, Associated Press (Feb. 23, 2012), http://www. ap.org/Content/AP-In-The-News/2012/Newark-mayor-seeks-probe-of-NYPD-Muslim-spying.
15.37 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 12
LICENSE PLATE READERS ARE
WIDELY USED BY STATE AND LOCAL
LAW ENFORCEMENT AGENCIES
License plate readers are already a common tool in the arsenals of many local police departments. In a 2011 survey, almost three-quarters of police agencies included in the survey reported using license plate readers — and a full 85 percent of agencies planned on increasing their use of license plate readers over the next five years.36 Even more strikingly, the same report found that although police departments today typically only have license plate readers installed on a few vehicles, in five years these departments anticipate that, on average, plate readers will be installed on 25 percent of all patrol cars.37 One major license plate reader manufacturer, ELSAG, states that its machines are operating in close to 1,200 agencies in all 50 states38 and more than 5,000 agencies worldwide.39 Another manufacturer, PIPS Technology, claims that it has deployed 20,000 machines to agencies worldwide.40
Not only are license plate readers widely deployed, but few police departments place any substantial restrictions on how automatic license plate readers can be used. The approach of the Pittsburg Police Department in California is typical: It states that license plate readers can be used for “any routine patrol operation or criminal investigation.”41 It makes clear that “[r]easonable suspicion or probable cause is not required.”42 While many police departments do prohibit police officers from using license plate readers for 36 Police Executive Research Forum, How Are Innovations in Technologies Transforming Policing?, p. 31 (Jan. 2012), http:// policeforum.org/library/critical-issues-in-policing-series/Technology_web2.pdf. 37 Id. at p. iii.
38 Press Release, ELSAG North America, IACP 2011: ELSAG Unveils the Latest License Plate Recognition Tech. (Oct. 21, 2011), http://www.policeone.com/police-products/traffic-enforcement/license-plate-readers/press-releases/4538797-IACP-2011-ELSAGUnveils-the-Latest-License-Plate-Recognition-Technology/; ELSAG North America, MPH-900 Deployments, http://www.elsag.com/ deployment.htm.
39 ELSAG North America, References, http://www.elsag.com/references.htm. 40 Press Release, PIPS Technology, PIPS Technology, Inc. Announces Handheld OCR (Oct. 21, 2011), http://www.federalsignal.com/ pdf/pressrelease/2011_10-21_PIPS_Handheld_final.pdf.
41 Pittsburg Police Department, Policy on Automated License Plate Readers (Mar. 22, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 94, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/california/alprpra_pittsburgpd_pittsburgca.pdf. 42 Id. The Milpitas, California Police Department states that the use of the department’s ALPR technology is for “law enforcement investigations only.” Letter from Milpitas Police Department to ACLU of Northern California (Aug. 8, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 128, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/california/alprpra_milpitaspd_milpitasca.pdf. Rockville, Maryland’s license plate reader policy states the technology may be used for “Homeland Security applications, electronic surveillance, suspect interdiction, stolen property recovery and a number of other policing objectives.” Rockville Police Department, General Order on License Plate Reader Systems (Apr. 30, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 363, https://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/maryland/alprpra_ MPIA_md.pdf. The Maryland Coordination and Analysis Center, which runs a state-based regional license plate sharing center, allows participating agencies to access plate data whenever it is “related to a criminal investigation or relevant to the safety of officers and citizens.” Maryland Coordination and Analysis Center, License Plate Recognition Intelligence Bulletin (Jan. 31, 2011), Public Records Responses, p.432, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/maryland/alprpra_dnr_md%20(1).pdf.
15.38 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 13 their own personal uses (tracking friends
and loved ones, for example), these are
the only restrictions. As the Scarsdale
Police Department in New York puts it,
the use of license plate readers “is only
limited by the officer’s imagination.”43
License plate readers collect vast quantities of data on innocent people
While it is legitimate to use license plate readers to identify those who are alleged to have committed crimes, the overwhelming majority of people whose movements are monitored and recorded by these machines are innocent, and there is no reason for the police to be keeping records on their movements. Ordinary people going about their daily lives have every right to expect that their movements will not be logged into massive government databases.
The vast majority of license plate data are collected from people who have done nothing wrong at all. Often, only a fraction of 1 percent of reads are hits — and an even smaller fraction result in an arrest.
In our records requests, documents from Maryland illustrate this point. Approximately three-quarters of Maryland’s law enforcement agencies are networked into Maryland’s state data fusion center, which collected more than 85 million license plate records in 2012 alone.
44 According to statistics compiled by the fusion center for that year to date through May: 45
• Maryland’s system of license plate readers had over 29 million reads. Only 0.2 percent of those license plates, or about 1 in 500, were hits. That is, only 0.2 percent of reads were associated with any crime, wrongdoing, minor registration problem, or even suspicion of a problem.
• Of the 0.2 percent that were hits, 97 percent were for a suspended or revoked registration or a violation of Maryland’s Vehicle Emissions Inspection Program. 43 Scarsdale Police Department, General Order on ELSAG Automatic License Plate Readers (Sept. 1, 2008), Public Records Responses, p. 12638, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-york/alprpra_scarsdalepolicedepartment_scarsdaleny_1.pdf. 44 Governor’s Office of Homeland Security, Intelligence/Information Sharing (Dec. 2012), http://www.gohs.maryland.gov/ii_sharing_ accomplishments.html.
45 Maryland Coordination and Analysis Center, Networked Mobile License Plate Reader Alerts (May 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 440, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/maryland/alprpra_msp_md%20(1).pdf. (T)he use of license
plate readers “is only
limited by the officer’s
imagination.”
— Scarsdale, NY Police Department
15.39 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 14
ONE MILLION PLATES READ
While these vehicles perhaps should not be on the road, they are not the dangers to society that law enforcement agencies routinely describe when justifying their use of license plate readers.
For every one million plates read in Maryland, only 47 were potentially associated with more serious crimes—a stolen vehicle or license plate, a wanted person, a violent gang or terrorist organization, a sex offender, or Maryland’s warrant-flagging program.
Furthermore, even these 47 alerts may not have helped the police catch criminals or 2,000
HITS
47 SERIOUS
CRIMES
15.40 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 15 prevent crimes. While people on the violent gang, terrorist, and sex offender lists are under general suspicion, they are not necessarily wanted for any present wrongdoing.46 In short, Maryland’s license plate readers collect massive amounts of data, almost none of which are tied to any known or even suspected wrongdoing. Even the vast majority of hits are for minor regulatory violations.
While Maryland provided us with the clearest data on this practice, we found similar patterns across the country:
TOWN/CITY COLLECTION PERIOD PLATE READS STORED
HIT
RATE
Burbank, IL i August 2011– July 2012 706,918 0.3%
Rhinebeck, NY ii January– March 2012 99,771 0.01%
High Point, NC iii August 2011– June 2012 70,289 0.08%
706,918
99,771
i. Burbank Police Department, Reads Statistics (July 31, 2012), Public Records Responses, pp. 10886-902, http://www.aclu.org/ files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/illinois/alprpra_burbankpd_burbankil.PDF. ii. Rhinebeck Police Department, Quarterly License Plate Reader Progress Reports (2011 & 2012), Public Records Responses, p.12621-22, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-york/alprpra_rhinebackpolicedepartment_rhinebackny_1.pdf. Seven suspended licenses, thirteen suspended registrations, five uninsured motor vehicles, and one unlicensed operator. Id. iii. High Point Police Department, Reads Statistics (Aug. 13, 2012), Public Records Responses, pp. 801-10, http://www.aclu.org/ files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/north-carolina/alprpra_HighPointPD_HighPointNC%20(3).pdf.
The above information reflects the hit rate, which is the best evidence of efficacy most agencies provided but is imperfect because hits are not always accurate or even generated based upon the suspicion that someone is violating the law. A more helpful statistic is provided by the Minnesota State Patrol. Of the 1,691,031 plates scanned between 2009-2011, just 852 citations were issued and 131 arrests were made. 47 That is 0.05 percent of plate reads.
Again, there is no problem with the use of license plate readers to identify individuals suspected of violating the law. But the above data provide a striking illustration of the wide dragnet that license plate readers often cast. Because they snap pictures of every passing vehicle, they generate millions of data points on the movements of individuals whom no one suspects of violating any law.
46 According to government training materials, placement on its “violent gang or terrorist” list is “based on investigative information not previously subject to independent judicial review,” and indicates that someone is of interest, not that they are wanted for a crime. Violent Gang and Terrorist Organization File, Operator’s Lesson Plan (Feb. 2005), http://www.in.gov/isp/files/ Violent_Gang_Terrorist_Organization_File.pdf
47 Minnesota State Patrol, License Plate Reader Data Totals, Public Records Responses, p. 753, http://www.aclu.org/files/ FilesPDFs/ALPR/minnesota/alprpra_minnesotastatepatrol_stpaulmn_1%20(6).pdf.
15.41 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 16 Many agencies retain data on innocent
Americans for long periods of time
There is no reason for law enforcement agencies to retain data on the comings and goings of innocent Americans. While holding onto “hit” data while an investigation or case is ongoing is legitimate, law enforcement agencies should not be storing data about people who have done nothing wrong.
Some law enforcement agencies delete non-hit data rapidly, proving that such privacyprotective practices are workable:
• The Ohio State Highway Patrol’s license plate reader policy states that “all ‘non-hit’ [license plate reader] captures shall be deleted immediately.” It further specifies that license plate reader “captures shall not be collected, stored, or shared with the intent of data mining.”48
• The Minnesota State Patrol keeps license plate data for 48 hours before deleting it, keeping data longer only when there are “extenuating circumstances.”49 Some other police departments, while not as quick to delete as the departments above, also keep data for relatively short periods of time:
• Brookline, Mass., retains data for 14 days.50
• Police in Tiburon, Calif., delete all license plate reader data after 30 days or less.51 Deleting data quickly prevents license plate reader systems from compiling huge storehouses of our location information. The Minnesota State Patrol, for example, scans tens of thousands of license plates per month — a total of almost 1.7 million plates over three years.52 However, in the absence of “extenuating circumstances,” the agency has 48 Ohio State Highway Patrol, Policy on Mobile and Stationary License Plate Recognition (Dec. 23, 2008), Public Records Responses, p. 14851, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/ohio/14749-14851%20Department%20of%20Public%20Safety.pdf. 49 Minnesota State Patrol, General Order on License Plate Readers (Sept. 28, 2009), Public Records Responses, p. 730, http:// www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/minnesota/alprpra_minnesotastatepatrol_stpaulmn_1%20(3).pdf; Email from Minnesota State Patrol to ACLU of Minnesota (Aug. 9, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 733, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/minnesota/ alprpra_minnesotastatepatrol_stpaulmn_1%20(4).pdf.
50 Shawn Musgrave, License Plate-Reading Devices Fuel Privacy Debate, Boston Globe (Apr. 9, 2013), http://www. bostonglobe.com/metro/2013/04/08/big-brother-better-police-work-new-technology-automatically-runs-license-plateseveryone/1qoAoFfgp31UnXZT2CsFSK/story.html 51 Tiburon Town Council Minutes (Mar. 4, 2009), Public Records Responses, p. 7201, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/ california/alprpra_tiburonpd_tiburonca%20(1).pdf; Tiburon Town Council Minutes (Nov. 18, 2009), Public Records Responses, pp. 7234-35, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/california/alprpra_tiburonpd_tiburonca%20(1).pdf. 52 Minnesota State Patrol, License Plate Reader Data Totals, Public Records Responses, pp. 750-53, http://www.aclu.org/files/ FilesPDFs/ALPR/minnesota/alprpra_minnesotastatepatrol_stpaulmn_1%20(7).pdf.
15.42 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 17 a policy of deleting all license plate data 48 hours after it is collected.53 As a result, the amount of data in the agency’s possession, according to a document we obtained, “depends on the day.”54 Given that records show the daily number of plate scans rarely 53 Minnesota State Patrol, General Order on License Plate Readers (Sept. 28, 2009), Public Records Responses, p. 730, http:// www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/minnesota/alprpra_minnesotastatepatrol_stpaulmn_1%20(3).pdf. 54 Email from Minnesota State Patrol to ACLU of Minnesota (Aug. 9, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 733, http://www.aclu. org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/minnesota/alprpra_minnesotastatepatrol_stpaulmn_1%20(4).pdf.
MINNESOTA STATE PATROL
Population: 5.3 million
Data policy: Delete after 48 hours
Stored plate reads: Less than 20,000
JERSEY CITY, NJ
Population: 250,000
Data policy: Delete after 5 years
Stored plate reads: 10 million (estimated)
(as of 8/2/12)
MILPITAS, CA
Population: 67,000
Data policy: None
Stored plate reads: 4.7 million
(as of 8/2/12)
GRAPEVINE, TX
Population: 47,000
Data policy: None
Stored plate reads: 2 million
(as of 8/29/12)
Retention policies: All over the map
15.43 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 18 exceeds 10,000, it is unlikely that the number of records would be more than 20,000 in a 48-hour period.55
In the absence of tight retention time limits, police departments rapidly accumulate vast stores of location tracking data — again, nearly all of it on innocent people. For example:
• The Piedmont Police Department in California produced records showing that it had accumulated 1,641,841 scanned records in the time period between August 2011 and August 2012. These records were still in storage as of Aug. 8, 2012.56 • In September 2012, Grapevine, Texas (a city in the Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area) reported scanning on average 14,547 plates a day and had nearly 2 million plates in its database.57
• Jersey City, N.J., collected 2.1 million plate reads in 2012.58 Because a New Jersey attorney general directive compels all law enforcement agencies in the state to ensure that license plate reader data is retained for five years, assuming that 2012 is representative, it is likely that there are approximately 10 million plate reads stored at any given time.59
See page 20 for a selection of the retention policies we have obtained, demonstrating the range of existing data retention periods around the country.
All the pieces are lining up for widespread
sharing of license plate reader data
The mass collection and retention of plate data about innocent Americans is alarming in and of itself, but it is all the more worrying because these data are increasingly being fed into larger regional databases. These databases can be in the possession and control of other government jurisdictions. Once a law enforcement agency shares data, it can lose any say about how these data are used, stored, and shared. 55 Minnesota State Patrol, License Plate Reader Data Totals, Public Records Responses, pp. 750-53, http://www.aclu.org/files/ FilesPDFs/ALPR/minnesota/alprpra_minnesotastatepatrol_stpaulmn_1%20(7).pdf. 56 PRA Response letter from Piedmont PD (Aug. 9, 2012), Public Records Responses, pp. 22341-43, http://www.aclu.org/files/ FilesPDFs/ALPR/california/22341-22396 Piedmont PD ALPR Response (1901-56).pdf. 57 Letter from Grapevine Police Department to ACLU of Texas (Sept. 10, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 2424, http://www.aclu. org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_grapevinePD_grapevineTX(6).pdf. 58 Jersey City, Reads Statistics, Public Records Responses, p. 17584, https://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/newjersey/17569-17584 Jersey City Supp OPRA Response 2 of 8.pdf. 59 New Jersey Attorney General, Guidelines for the Use of Automated License Plate Readers and Data (Dec. 3, 2010), Public Records Responses, p. 6144, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-jersey/alprpra_divisionofcriminaljustice_trentonnj_1%20(6).pdf.
15.44 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 19 That said, today many law enforcement agencies share license plate reader data on a case-by-case basis in response to specific requests from other law enforcement agencies (and a few report no sharing).60 Requiring a case-by-case demonstration of need is preferable to wholesale sharing because it ensures that data about innocent people isn’t needlessly spread to additional government computer systems, a step that increases the risk of its being misused or wrongfully disclosed.
However, there are already examples of license plate reader data being systematically pooled into large regional databases:
• Greenbelt, Md., feeds plate information into the state fusion center, the Maryland Coordination and Analysis Center (MCAC),61 and also participates in a regional database called the National Capital Region LPR Project (NCR),62 which collects plate information from police departments in Washington, D.C., Virginia, and Maryland.63 Although Greenbelt’s policy is to purge data from its local hard drive after 30 days,64 its sharing practices undercut that policy. MCAC stores all license plate data for one year, no matter what the 60 For example, Grapevine, Texas, Jacksonville, North Carolina, and Mesquite, Texas do not allow third parties to access their license plate data, while Hutchinson, Kansas and the Minnesota State Patrol only share data when a specific request is made. The City of El Paso, Texas shares license plate reader data for “legitimate law enforcement purposes.” Newark, Delaware complies with requests from other law enforcement agencies for specific license plate reads “related to criminal or traffic investigations.” Lincoln, Nebraska shares license plate reader data only in response to an inquiry made by a prosecutor or defense attorney in an active criminal case. Letter from Grapevine Police Department to ACLU of Texas (Sept. 10, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 2424, http:// www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_grapevinePD_grapevineTX(6).pdf; Letter from Jacksonville Police Department to ACLU of North Carolina (Aug. 21, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 1481, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/northcarolina/alprpra_jacksonvillepd_jacksonvillenc.pdf; Mesquite Police Department, Response to ACLU of Texas Records Request, Public Records Responses, p. 10466, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_mesquitepd_mesquitetx%20(2). pdf; Email from Hutchinson Police Department to ACLU of Kansas and Western Missouri (Aug. 3, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 342, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/kansas/alprpra_hutchinsonpd_hutchinsonka.pdf; Email from Minnesota State Patrol to ACLU of Minnesota (Aug. 9, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 733, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/minnesota/ alprpra_minnesotastatepatrol_stpaulmn_1%20(4).pdf; City of El Paso, License Plate Reader Policy and Guidelines, Public Records Responses, p. 10078, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR//texas/alprpra_elpasoPD_elpasotx%20(5).pdf; Letter from Newark City Solicitor to ACLU of Delaware (Oct. 1, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 7559, https://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/ delaware/7558-7559 City of Newark FOIA Response.pdf; Letter from Lincoln Police Department to ACLU of Nebraska (Sept. 7, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 4683, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/nebraska/alprpra_lincolnpolicedepartment_ lincolnne_1.pdf.
61 Letter from Maryland Governor’s Office of Crime Control & Prevention to Greenbelt Police Department (Mar. 21, 2011), Public Records Responses, p. 27406, https://www.aclu.org/national-security-technology-and-liberty/response-public-records-request7-greenbelt-police; Maryland’s LPR Program and Policy Overview: How We Differ from Most Agencies and Why (2011), http://www. theiacp.org/Portals/0/pdfs/LEIM/2011Presentations/Maryland%27s-LPR-Program-and-Policy-Overview.pdf. Approximately three quarters of Maryland’s law enforcement agencies are networked into MCAC, and the fusion center collected more than 85 million license plate records in 2012 alone. Governor’s Office of Homeland Security, Intelligence/Information Sharing (Dec. 2012), http:// www.gohs.maryland.gov/ii_sharing_accomplishments.html.
62 Addendum to 2008 Grant Agreement for ALPR Equipment between Arlington County, Virginia and City of Greenbelt, Maryland (Mar. 28, 2012), Public Records Responses, pp. 27378-81, https://www.aclu.org/national-security-technology-and-liberty/responsepublic-records-request-6-greenbelt-police; Memorandum of Understanding between National Capital Region’s License Plate Reader Information Sharing Program and Greenbelt Police (Mar. 28, 2012), Public Records Responses, pp. 27384-90, https://www.aclu.org/ national-security-technology-and-liberty/response-public-records-request-6-greenbelt-police. 63 Prince William County Government, Motion to Approve MOU for the National Capital Region’s License Plate Reader Information Sharing Program (July 17, 2012), http://eservice.pwcgov.org/documents/bocs/agendas/2012/0717/4-h.pdf. 64 City of Greenbelt, Response to ACLU of Maryland Records Request (Sept. 5, 2012), Public Records Responses, pp. 27367-68, https://www.aclu.org/national-security-technology-and-liberty/response-public-records-request-6-greenbelt-police.
Text continues on p. 22.
15.45 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 20
JURISDICTION PLATE DATA RETENTION PERIOD
NOTE: Retention periods generally refer to non-hit data that has not been flagged as part of an investigation or incident.
Exact policies vary but usually cover the vast majority of automatic license plate reader reads. 1 to 30 days 31 days to 1 yr 1 to 5 years Indefinite
Minnesota State Patrol 48 hours i
Burbank, IL 21 days ii
Deerpark, NY 30 days iii
Jacksonville, NC 30 days iv
Schenectady, NY 35 days v
New Paltz, NY 50 days vi
Boston, MA 90 days vii
Fishkill, NY 90 days viii
Franklin County, OH 90 days ix
Sugar Land, TX 90 days x
Raleigh, NC 6 months xi
New Castle County, DE 360 days xii
Dutchess County, NY 1 year xiii
High Point, NC 1 year xiv
Highland Village, TX 1 year xv
Charlotte-Mecklenburg, NC 18 months xvi
Aurora, CO 2 years xvii
Commerce City, CO 2 years xviii
Los Angeles County, CA 2 years xix
Plano, TX 2 years xx
Delaware Dept of Homeland Security 5 years xxi
New Jersey 5 years xxii
Grapevine, TX Presumed indefinite xxiii
Mesquite, TX Indefinite retention xxiv
Yonkers, NY Indefinite retention xxv
Automatic license plate reader retention periods around the country
15.46 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 21 i. Minnesota State Patrol, General Order on License Plate Readers (Sept. 28, 2009), Public Records Responses, p. 730, http:// www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/minnesota/alprpra_minnesotastatepatrol_stpaulmn_1%20(3).pdf. ii. Burbank Police Department, General Order on Automated License Plate Recognition Systems (Nov. 1, 2011), Public Records Responses, p. 10702, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/illinois/alprpra_burbankpd_burbankil.PDF. iii. Deerpark Police Department, Special Order on License Plate Readers (Dec. 10, 2010), Public Records Responses, p. 12171, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-york/alprpra_townofdeerparkpolicedepartment_deerparkny_1.pdf. iv. Letter from Jacksonville Police Department to ACLU of North Carolina (Aug. 21, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 1480, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/north-carolina/alprpra_jacksonvillepd_jacksonvillenc.pdf. v. Schenectady Police Department, Response to New York Civil Liberties Union Records Request (Oct. 31, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 15558, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-york/alprpra_schenectadypolicedepartment_ schnectadyny_1.PDF.
vi. Letter from New Paltz Police Department to New York Civil Liberties Union (Aug. 8, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 12393, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-york/alprpra_newpaltzpolicedepartment_newpaltzny_1.pdf. vii. Boston Police, Special Order on License Plate Recognition System (Sept. 14, 2011), Public Records Responses, p. 4793, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/massachusetts/4790-4793 Boston_Special Order 11_026.pdf. viii. Letter from Fishkill Police Department to New York Civil Liberties Union (Sept. 17, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 12225, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-york/alprpra_fishskillpolicedepartment_fishskillny_1.pdf. ix. Revised Memorandum of Understanding between Franklin County Sheriff’s Office and Agency Police Department Outside Region #4, Public Records Responses, p. 14856, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/ohio/14852%20-14894%20 Franklin%20County.pdf.
x. Sugar Land Police Department, General Order on Use of LPR Technology (Aug. 26, 2011), Public Records Responses, p. 14595, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_sugarlandpd_sugarlandtx%20(2).pdf. xi. Raleigh Police Department, Directive on Automated License Plate Recognition and Internet Protocol Camera System (Sept. 5, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 4033, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/north-carolina/alprpra_raleighpd_ raleighnc.pdf.
xii. Letter from New Castle County Attorney to ACLU of Delaware (Aug. 31, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 9284, http:// www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/delaware/alprpra_ncc_newcastlecountyde%20(2).pdf. xiii. Dutchess County Sheriff’s Office, Response to New York Civil Liberties Union Records Request (Dec. 7, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 14943, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-york/alprpra_duchesscountysheriffsoffice_ poughkeepsieny_1.pdf.
xiv. High Point Police Department, General Order on Automated License Plate Readers (June 1, 2011), Public Records Responses, p. 811, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/north-carolina/alprpra_HighPointPD_HighPointNC%20(3).pdf. xv. Highland Village Police Department, General Order on Automated License Plate Readers (Sept. 23, 2011), Public Records Responses, p. 2824, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_highlandpd_highlandvillagetx%20(7).pdf. xvi. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department, Standard Operating Procedure on License Plate Readers (Apr. 29, 2011), Public Records Responses, p. 1250, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/north-carolina/alprpra_charlotte-mecklenburgpd_ charlotte-mecklenburgnc%20(1).pdf.
xvii. Aurora Police Department, Special Order on Automated License Plate Readers (Dec. 14, 2011), Public Records Responses, p. 7708, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/colorado/alprpra_aurorapd_auroraca%20(2).pdf. xviii. Commerce City Police, Policy and Procedures Manual (Feb. 1, 2011), Public Records Responses, p. 7916, http://www.aclu. org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/colorado/alprpra_commercecitypd_commercecityca%20(13).pdf. xix. Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, Field Operations Directive on Automated License Plate Recognition (ALPR) System (Aug. 17, 2009), Public Records Responses, p. 4886, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/missouri/alprpra_ professionaldevelopmentandresearchbureau_kansascitymo_1.pdf. xx. Email between Plano Police Department and PlateScan (May 11, 2010), Public Records Responses, p. 13906, http://www. aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_planopd_planotx%20(16).pdf. xxi. Delaware State Police, Automated License Plate Reader Policy (Sept. 2010), Public Records Responses, p. 4743, http://www. aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/delaware/alprpra_delawarestatepolice_de.pdf. xxii. New Jersey Attorney General, Guidelines for the Use of Automated License Plate Readers and Data (Dec. 3, 2010), Public Records Responses, p. 6144, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-jersey/alprpra_divisionofcriminaljustice_ trentonnj_1%20(6).pdf.
xxiii. Letter from Grapevine Police Department to ACLU of Texas (Sept. 10, 2012), Public Records Responses, pp. 2423-24, http:// www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_grapevinePD_grapevineTX(6).pdf. xxiv. Mesquite Police Department, Response to ACLU of Texas Records Request, Public Records Responses, pp. 10465-66, http:// www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_mesquitepd_mesquitetx%20(2).pdf. xxv. See generally Documents from Yonkers Department of Law in Response to New York Civil Liberties Union Records Request, Public Records Responses, pp. 15894-15943, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-york/alprpra_ yonkerspolicedepartment_yonkersny_1.pdf.
15.47 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 22 retention policies are of the police department that collected it.65 It is unclear what NCR’s retention policy is, or whether it even has one, but when license plate information is shared via NCR’s system, the receiving agency may store and use that data “in compliance with [its own] data retention policy.”66 Accordingly, any law enforcement agencies obtaining Greenbelt’s data through NCR may retain it indefinitely.
• License plate data are widely shared in California’s Bay Area through the Northern California Regional Intelligence Center (NCRIC), although the full extent of sharing is not publicly known.67 According to a May 2012 document, this fusion center’s goal is to collect license plate information from approximately 22 police departments, and grant access to several more.68 NCRIC maintains a broad mandate for its use of license plate information — in addition to law enforcement, NCRIC maintains that it may use license plate information for the “protection of special events; protection of critical infrastructure; and responding and mapping the license plate landscape of critical events.”69
• Very little was known about the use of automatic license plate readers in Vermont before the ACLU of Vermont joined with other ACLU affiliates across the country in public records requests for information. The ACLU of Vermont learned that police departments in all parts of the state were using them, data was being uploaded to a centralized computer database and retained for four years, and no statutes or rules were in place to govern their use. A new law sets statewide regulations. 70 The law shortens to 18 months the length of time data may be retained (with longer preservation of data allowed with a court order), clearly defines who can have access to the data and under what circumstances, and requires annual reporting on the use of automatic license plate readers and data requests.
65 Maryland Coordination and Analysis Center, Automatic License Plate Recognition Program Standard Operating Procedure, p. 3 (2012), http://www.mcac.maryland.gov/resources/LPR/20120809_MCAC_LPR_SOP.pdf; City of Greenbelt, Presentation on ELSAG Automated License Plate Reader & Mobile Plate Hunter 900, Public Records Responses, p. 27451, https://www.aclu.org/nationalsecurity-technology-and-liberty/response-public-records-request-3-greenbelt-police. 66 National Capital Region’s License Plate Reader Information Sharing Program, Program Requirements, Public Records Responses, p. 27380, https://www.aclu.org/national-security-technology-and-liberty/response-public-records-request-6-greenbeltpolice. 67 County of San Mateo, NCRIC Answers to Questions Submitted from Potential Vendors, p. 2 (May 22, 2012), http://www. co.sanmateo.ca.us/Attachments/sharedservices/PDFs/RFP/2012/NCRIC%20RFP1266%20Answers%20To%20Vendor%20Qs.pdf. 68 Id.
69 Id. at pp. 22737-40.
70 23 V.S.A. § 1607, http://www.leg.state.vt.us/docs/2014/Acts/ACT069.pdf.
15.48 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 23 With a little bit of organizing effort and access to the right information, local communities can act to ensure that police departments implement sensible, privacy-protective license plate reader policies.
That’s what happened in Brookline, Mass., where the ACLU of Massachusetts and local activists came together to work with the city government to implement a data policy that both enables law enforcement to use the tool to great public safety benefit and mitigates the serious privacy harms that result from its unregulated deployment.
Kade Crockford, director of the Technology for Liberty Project at the ACLU of Massachusetts, tells the story:
Massachusetts has a fairly unique town government structure, but people who live in states with strong town or county powers can follow the Brookline model to great effect. Our organizing followed some basic principles.
First, find out what’s going on. In order to do that, we did a cursory web search to see what kind of information existed in the public sphere. We found that the state had recently received funding from the federal government that it planned to use to purchase license plate readers for city and state law enforcement. Alarmingly, the state website describing the grant said that all police departments that received funds would be required to submit all captured license plate data to the state criminal justice database.
That alerted us to a serious threat: the possibility that the state would amass detailed records of our driving habits, all without warrants or any probable cause whatsoever.
Next we filed a public records request to find out which cities and towns had received funding from the state. Upon receiving those records, we learned that Brookline — an affluent Boston suburb with a higher-than-average ratio of privacy advocates to residents — was on the list.
We then began the next phase of our organizing: getting the word out.
Working with activists in Brookline, we penned op-eds in the local newspapers, warning residents and town government officials that if the police accepted the state ith a little bit of organizing effort and access to the right information, local A Success Story
PUSHING BACK ON INVASIVE LICENSE
PLATE READER USE
15.49 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 24 grant money, all of their motoring movements would be shared with the state, and the city would lose control over the data forever. It made for a convincing argument, and the local government held a hearing about the matter.
The last step was turning out like-minded people to join us in raising concerns. We asked interested residents to come to the hearing to deliver testimony arguing that the local government should reject the license plate reader grant.
After much back and forth with the town government and lots of discussion in the local media, Brookline’s Board of Selectmen eventually agreed with us and the town’s privacy advocates: The plan’s risks outweighed its benefits. The grant was voted down. Ultimately, our arguments had been so winning that even the chief of police — a major advocate of license plate reader technology — agreed that it was probably best to skip the state’s grant, since it was tied to data sharing requirements that put Brookline residents at risk for privacy violations.
But the fight still wasn’t over.
The police really wanted a license plate reader, and were willing to purchase it without the help of the state grant. So we continued to work with the police department, the town government, and local activists, submitting comments on a proposed license plate reader policy that required the police to delete data after 14 days unless it was evidence of a crime or infraction, or the police were required to retain it by law. The ACLU doesn’t agree with everything in the Brookline policy, but it nonetheless stands out as one of the best we’ve seen nationwide, with a data retention period of 14 days.
After we successfully raised the issue throughout the town, the government knew that it had to consider the public’s input before approving any license plate reader or policy. We found that the democratic process worked, as long as ordinary people were willing to put the work in. Our organizing effort showed that active, alert residents can affect major policy decisions on the local level.
If you have the time and energy to invest in holding your police department accountable, you can do it, too. If you aren’t sure about whether or not your department uses license plate readers or has a good data policy, go to your next local government meeting and raise the issue.
A little effort goes a long way towards making sure we are both safe and free, no matter what technologies come down the road.
grant money, all of their motoring movements would be shared with the state, and the city would lose control over the data forever. It made for a convincing argument, and the local government held a hearing about the matter.
The last step was turning out like-minded people to join us in raising concerns. We asked interested residents to come to the hearing to deliver testimony arguing that the local government should reject the license plate reader grant.
After much back and forth with the town government and lots of discussion in the local media, Brookline’s Board of Selectmen eventually agreed with us and the town’s privacy advocates: The plan’s risks outweighed its benefits. The grant was voted down. Ultimately, our arguments had been so winning that even the chief of police — a major advocate of license plate reader technology — agreed that it was probably best to skip the state’s grant, since it was tied to data sharing requirements that put Brookline residents at risk for privacy violations.
But the fight still wasn’t over.
The police really wanted a license plate reader, and were willing to purchase it without the help of the state grant. So we continued to work with the police department, the town government, and local activists, submitting comments on a proposed license plate reader policy that required the police to delete data after 14 days unless it was evidence of a crime or infraction, or the police were required to retain it by law. The ACLU doesn’t agree with everything in the Brookline policy, but it nonetheless stands out as one of the best we’ve seen nationwide, with a data retention period of 14 days.
After we successfully raised the issue throughout the town, the government knew that it had to consider the public’s input before approving any license plate reader or policy. We found that the democratic process worked, as long as ordinary people were willing to put the work in. Our organizing effort showed that active, alert residents can affect major policy decisions on the local level.
If you have the time and energy to invest in holding your police department accountable, you can do it, too. If you aren’t sure about whether or not your department uses license plate readers or has a good data policy, go to your next local government meeting and raise the issue.
A little effort goes a long way towards making sure we are both safe and free, no matter what technologies come down the road.
15.50 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 25
THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT IS
FUELING STATE AND LOCAL USE
OF LICENSE PLATE READERS
Federal funding has fueled the spread of license plate readers among state and local law enforcement agencies. The Wall Street Journal reported in 2012 that, over the past five years, the Department of Homeland Security distributed over $50 million in grants to fund the acquisition of license plate readers.71 Company materials corroborate the major role that federal funding plays. According to a government “grant guide” on the website of license plate reader manufacturer ELSAG North America, the Department of Homeland Security has distributed “billions of dollars in grants” through the Homeland Security Grant Program and the Infrastructure Protection Program.72 ELSAG’s website also states that the Justice Department is the “lead Federal funding agency.”73 Federal money plays such a critical role in supporting the purchase of license plate readers that PIPS Technology, another major manufacturer, maintains Grant Assistance Coordinators on staff to work directly with police departments applying for government funds.74 Documents obtained by the ACLU are replete with examples of local and state agencies building license plate reader networks with federal grant money. Police departments that would otherwise be limited by local budgets have received tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of dollars from the federal government to establish or expand license plate reader programs. To provide just a few examples:
• Many police departments received grants from the Department of Homeland Security. For example, San Rafael, Calif., purchased four license plate reader cameras with a grant of $19,040.75 El Paso County, Texas, purchased license plate readers with $90,000 out of a $2.5 million grant to improve security at the U.S. border.76
• The Department of Justice was also a key source of funding. For example, New Castle County, Del., purchased a system that included eight license plate readers 71 Angwin & Valentino-Devries, supra note 10.
72 ELSAG North America, Grant Guide, http://elsag.com/grant_guide.htm. 73 Id.
74 PIPS Technology, Police Grants Help, http://pipstechnology.com/contact/grants/. 75 San Rafael City Council, Resolution No. 13309 (Mar. 19, 2012), Public Records Responses, pp. 3-4, http://www.aclu.org/files/ FilesPDFs/ALPR/california/alprpra_sanrafaelpd_sanrafaelca%20(1).pdf. 76 CBP, Revised Operations Order Report FY 2011, Operation Stonegarden El Paso (July 16, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 2371, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_elpasosheriffsoffice_elpasotx%20(3).pdf.
15.51 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 26 with a grant of $200,000.77 Hutchinson, Kan., purchased a system that included four license plate readers with a grant of $24,000.78 The Maryland Transportation Authority Police purchased a system that included 14 license plate readers with a grant of $161,000.79 Edison, N.J., purchased one license plate reader with $20,223 out of a $22,076 grant.80 Cheyenne, Wyo., purchased a system that included two license plate readers with $19,017.63 out of a $48,472 grant.81 77 DOJ Memo to New Castle County Police Department and Invoices (Aug. 21, 2009), Public Records Responses, p. 9287-93, http:// www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/delaware/alprpra_ncc_newcastlecountyde (2).pdf. 78 Letter from Kansas Criminal Justice Coordinating Council to Hutchinson Police Department (June 8, 2011), Public Records Responses, p. 351, https://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/kansas/alprpra_hutchinsonpd_hutchinsonka (4).pdf; Invoices from PIPS Technology (Apr. 28, 2011), Public Records Responses, p. 349, https://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/kansas/ alprpra_hutchinsonpd_hutchinsonka (3).pdf.
79 Letter to Maryland Transportation Authority Police (July 31, 2009), Public Records Responses, p. 534, http://www.aclu.org/ files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/maryland/alprpra_MarylandTransportationAuthorityandPolicy_md.pdf; Maryland Transportation Authority Special Report (Aug. 11, 2009), Public Records Responses, p. 535, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/maryland/alprpra_ MarylandTransportationAuthorityandPolicy_md.pdf.
80 Letter from Edison Police Department to New Brunswick Police Department (Apr. 17, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 16804, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/new-jersey/16802-16810 Edison 2nd Supp Response.pdf. 81 DOJ Grant Award Letter and Invoice (Aug. 19, 2011), pp. 3976-78, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/wyoming/ alprpra_cheyennepolicedepartment_cheyennewy_1.pdf.
15.52 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 27
TOO LITTLE IS KNOWN ABOUT
THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT’S
OWN USE OF LICENSE PLATE
READERS
In addition to funding state and local purchases of license plate readers, some federal agencies maintain their own networks of license plate readers across the United States, and engage in data-sharing on a national level. Unfortunately, too little is known about how the federal government uses license plate data. As part of our public records initiative we filed Freedom of Information Act requests with the Departments of Justice, Homeland Security, and Transportation, but received few voluntary responses and have had to file a federal lawsuit to force the departments to respond. As of this writing, that litigation is ongoing (we will update this report once we obtain responsive documents).
For now, here is what we do know:
• Customs and Border Protection uses license plate readers to scan the license plates of almost every car entering the United States, as well as many cars leaving the country.82
• Immigration and Customs Enforcement has experimented with operating license plate readers as well.83 It has also looked into purchasing access to private repositories of plate data.84
• The Drug Enforcement Administration had deployed cameras in Arizona, Texas, New Mexico, and California as of 2012,85 and was working to expand its network of license plate readers throughout the northern and southern borders, as well as in “hub cities and the high-traffic corridors.”86
82 DHS reports indicate that since 2009, CBP’s license plate readers have logged “nearly 100 percent of land border traffic.” Department of Homeland Security, Northern Border Strategy, p. 17 (June 2012), http://www.dhs.gov/xlibrary/assets/policy/dhsnorthern-border-strategy.pdf. 83 ICE National Bulk Cash Smuggling Center, internal email (Sept. 13, 2011), Public Records Responses, p. 16167, http://www.aclu. org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/federal/ICE/16147-16228%20r_Pages%20from%20Bulk%20Cash%20Combined-1.pdf. 84 ICE, internal emails (Jan. 2011), Public Records Responses, pp. 21223-24, https://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/federal/ ICE/21201-21224 r_ALPR Privacy Documents.pdf.
85 G.W. Schultz, DEA installs license-plate recognition devices near Southwest border, Ars Technica (July 11, 2012), http://arstechnica. com/tech-policy/2012/07/dea-installs-license-plate-recognition-devices-near-southwest-border/. 86 Jay Stanley, DEA Recording Americans’ Movements on Highways, Creating Central Repository of Plate Data, ACLU Free Future (May 18, 2012), http://www.aclu.org/blog/technology-and-liberty-criminal-law-reform/dea-recording-americans-movements-highwayscreating.
15.53 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 28
PRIVATE COMPANIES COLLECT
LICENSE PLATE DATA WITH NO
OVERSIGHT
License plate readers are used not only by law enforcement agencies but also by private companies. This has led to the emergence of numerous privately owned databases containing the location information of vast numbers of Americans.
License plate readers are used in a variety of non-law enforcement roles. Private companies use license plate readers to monitor airports, control access to gated communities, enforce payment in parking garages, and even help customers find their cars in shopping mall parking lots.87 While these uses in and of themselves are not objectionable, private companies can scan thousands of plates each day and store information indefinitely, creating huge databases of Americans’ movements.
Perhaps the largest private users of license plate readers are repossession agents who have recognized the value of license plate location information and built enormous private databases with data from all over the country. MVTrac, one of the biggest companies in this industry, claims to have photographs and location data on “a large majority” of registered vehicles in the United States,88 while the Digital Recognition Network (DRN) boasts of “a national network of more than 550 affiliates.”89 These affiliates, most of whom are repossession agents, are located in every major metropolitan area of the United States.
DRN fuels rapid growth of its database by offering to fully finance up to five automatic license plate readers for affiliates located in major metropolitan areas, such as New York, Los Angeles, Orlando, Boston, and Washington, D.C., which guarantee they will provide DRN with a minimum of 50,000 aggregate plate scans per month.90 DRN affiliates feed location data on up to 50 million vehicles each month (nearly all of which are not wanted for repossession) into DRN’s national database.91 This database now contains over 700 million data points on where American drivers have been.92 Private companies have partnerships with law enforcement. Police departments 87 Michael Harlow, License Plate Recognition: It’s Grown Far Beyond Airports, Parking Today (July 2009), http://www.parkingtoday. com/articledetails.php?id=788; Martha Groves, Servant or Snoop in the Parking Garage?, L.A. Times (Jan. 23, 2011), http://articles. latimes.com/2011/jan/23/local/la-me-santa-monica-parking-20110123. 88 Angwin & Valentino-Devries, supra note 10.
89 Digital Recognition Network, http://www.drndata.com/index.html. 90 MVConnect, LLC et al v. Recovery Database Network, Inc. et al, No. 3:10-cv-01948 (N.D. Tex. Jan. 20, 2011), Amended Complaint, Exhibit 8, ECF No. 31-8. Title to the ALPRs is not transferred from DRN to the affiliates until they have contributed a total of 1,000,000 plate scans.
91 Digital Recognition Network, http://www.drndata.com/index.html. 92 Id.
15.54 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 29 can purchase license plate reader data from private corporations. For example, law enforcement agencies can access MVTrac’s database and search through data collected by private repossession agencies.93 DRN contributes its affiliate-generated data to the National Vehicle Location Service (NVLS), which is run by Vigilant Solutions, a partner of DRN. NVLS aggregates DRN’s data with data received from other private sources, such as access control and parking systems, and from law enforcement agencies.94 According to Vigilant, NVLS “is the largest [license plate] data sharing initiative in the United States.”95 The database holds over 800 million license plate reader records,96 and is used by over 2,200 law enforcement agencies and 25,000 United States law enforcement investigators.97 Each month, the system adds roughly 1,000 new users98 and grows by 35 to 50 million license plate reader records.99 Law enforcement agencies that use or have used NVLS include the Milpitas Police Department in California,100 police in Port Arthur, Texas,101 and Immigration and Customs Enforcement.102
These private databases raise serious privacy concerns. Their massive size suggests that they contain a great deal of information about our movements. These huge databases of plate information are not subject to any data security or privacy regulations governing license plate reader data. These companies decide who can access license plate data and for what purposes.
Last year, California considered a bill103 that would have required private companies to delete license plate records after 60 days and regulated the sale and sharing of privately held plate data. Due in part to the companies’ vigorous opposition, as well as that of law enforcement agencies, the bill died on the Senate floor.104 Today, these companies continue to operate with no regulation of how they use the data they are rapidly collecting. 93 Angwin & Valentino-Devries, supra note 10; MVTRAC, Law Enforcement, http://mvtrac.com/law-enforcement/; MVTRAC, MVENFORCE, http://mvtrac.com/law-enforcement/mvenforce/. 94 Vigilant Solutions, National Vehicle Location Service FAQs, http://nvls-lpr.com/nvls/nvls_faq.html?pp=1#ans9. 95 Vigilant Solutions, National Vehicle Location Service (NVLS), http://vigilantsolutions.com/products/nvls. 96 Vigilant Video, National Vehicle Location Service, p. 2 (2012), http://vigilantsolutions.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/VigilantNVLS-Datasheet-092012.pdf. 97 Id.
98 Supra note 24.
99 Vigilant Solutions, National Vehicle Location Service (NVLS), http://vigilantsolutions.com/products/nvls. 100 Letter from Milpitas Police Department to ACLU of Northern California (Aug. 8, 2012), Public Records Responses, p. 128, http:// www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/california/alprpra_milpitaspd_milpitasca.pdf. 101 Port Arthur Police Department, Invoice from Vigilant Video for Annual Subscription Renewal, Public Records Responses, p. 2062, http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/texas/alprpra_portharthurPD_portarthurtx (6).pdf. 102 ICE, internal emails (Jan. 2011), Public Records Responses, pp. 21223-24, https://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/ALPR/federal/ ICE/21201-21224 r_ALPR Privacy Documents.pdf.
103 S.B. 1330 (introduced on Feb. 23, 2012), http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/11-12/bill/sen/sb_1301-1350/sb_1330_bill_20120529_ amended_sen_v96.pdf. For further discussion, see Farivar, supra note 24. 104 Press Release, Digital Recognition Network, Digital Recognition Network Defeats California SB1330 (June 5, 2012), http://web. archive.org/web/20121209024203/http://drndata.com/pdf/CASB1330Releasev2.060512.pdf; Angwin & Valentino-Devries, supra note 10.
15.55 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 30
DATA MINING LICENSE PLATE RECORDS
If privacy protections aren’t instituted, we can expect license plate readers to be used in many new ways and new places. In particular, we can expect all kinds of cross-referencing and data mining techniques to be applied to the information streams generated by license plate reader scanners.
We could easily see scenarios such as:
A DEA risk-analysis system alerts the police in Utah that the same car is traveling between Salt Lake City and Nogales, Ariz., on a monthly basis.
The next night, a divorced father visiting his child in Arizona receives a knock on the door from federal agents to interrogate him about his travel. Drug dealer or dedicated dad? Data-mining systems can’t tell the difference.
An affluent suburbanite has a friend who lives in a poor neighborhood where drugs are often sold. The police get an alert that he is a regular visitor to this neighborhood, and he gets pulled over on a pretext (“driving erratically”) several times so they can search his car, and a police “intelligence squad” opens a file on him.
A student working nights as a bartender gets stopped
frequently on suspicion of DUI because the police know
that she is driving home from a bar.
The FBI begins investigating a man because he visited a series of places — a mosque, a hardware store, and a money-transfer service — that the government’s computers have flagged as “suspicious.” But he’s a perfectly law-abiding Home Depot employee and practicing Muslim who helps out his extended family in Somalia.
The FBI opens a probe into the background of a kindergarten teacher because her car was parked at an apartment building — and then coincidentally again later at a store — at the same time as a man who is on a terrorist watch list.
Agents appear at her workplace to interview her co-workers.
15.56 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 31
THERE ARE TOO FEW RULES IN
PLACE TO PROTECT PRIVACY
Given that license plate readers facilitate the mass collection of information on Americans’ movements, that too many jurisdictions are retaining data on innocent Americans for long periods of time, and the inevitable trend towards greater sharing of this data, it is apparent that there are too few rules in place to ensure that license plate reader technology is not abused.
In a small 2009 survey, over half of responding agencies that used license plate readers had no policy addressing license plate reader use.105 Among the agencies that did have or were developing license plate reader policies, most policies did not address data retention (52 percent) or data sharing (56 percent).106 Only five states have laws on the books governing license plate readers, and the laws have different approaches as well as strengths and weaknesses.107 New Hampshire all but bans license plate readers with narrow exceptions for EZ-Pass and for use by government agencies at public buildings and three named bridges in Portsmouth.108 Maine prohibits all private use of license plate readers (except as part of an EZ-Pass system) and requires law enforcement to delete captured plate data that is not part of a criminal or intelligence investigation within 21 days.109 Arkansas strictly limits private use of license plate readers, requires captured plate data that is not part of an ongoing investigation to be deleted within 150 days and prohibits all sharing unless it is evidence of an offense.110
105 David J. Roberts & Meghann Casanova, International Association of Chiefs of Police, Automated License Plate Reader Systems:
Policy and Operational Guidance for Law Enforcement, p. 25 (2012), http://www.theiacp.org/portals/0/pdfs/IACP_ALPR_Policy_ Operational_Guidance.pdf.
106 Id.
107 These states are New Hampshire, Maine, Arkansas, Vermont, and Utah. N.H. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 261:75-b (2007), http://www. gencourt.state.nh.us/rsa/html/xxi/261/261-75-b.htm; Me. Rev. Stat. tit. 29-A, § 2117-A (2010), http://www.mainelegislature.org/ legis/statutes/29-a/title29-Asec2117-A.html; H.B. 1996, 89th Gen. Assemb., Reg. Sess. (Ark. 2013), http://www.arkleg.state.ar.us/ assembly/2013/2013R/Acts/Act1491.pdf; Sec. 1. 23 V.S.A. § 1607, http://www.leg.state.vt.us/DOCS/2014/ACTS/ACT069.PDF; 2013 Utah Laws Ch. 447 (S.B. 196), http://le.utah.gov/~2013/bills/sbillenr/SB0196.htm. In addition, Virginia’s Attorney General has issued an advisory opinion concluding that the state’s Government Data Collection and Dissemination Practices Act prohibits state law enforcement’s use of license plate readers for passive data collection — that is, collecting and pooling the license plate information of every car that passes them by. Instead, license plate readers can only be used “actively” — that is, in pursuit of particularly identified license plates “evaluated and determined to be relevant to criminal activity.” Attorney General Opinion 12-073, p. 1 (Feb. 12, 2013), http://www.oag.state.va.us/Opinions%20and%20Legal%20Resources/OPINIONS/2013opns/12-073%20Flaherty.pdf. Also, New Jersey’s Attorney General has issued a directive regarding license plate reader use. The directive requires all New Jersey law enforcement agencies to retain license plate reader data for five years and contemplates data-mining and pattern analysis of the captured plate data “to detect suspicious activities that are consistent with the modus operandi of criminals.” Attorney General Directive No. 2010-05, p. 2 (Dec. 3, 2010), http://www.state.nj.us/oag/dcj/agguide/directives/Dir-2010-5-LicensePlateReadersl-120310.pdf. 108 N.H. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 261:75-b (2007), http://www.gencourt.state.nh.us/rsa/html/xxi/261/261-75-b.htm. 109 29-A M.R.S.A. § 2117-A (available on Westlaw)
110 H.B. 1996, 89th Gen. Assemb., Reg. Sess. (Ark. 2013), http://www.arkleg.state.ar.us/assembly/2013/2013R/Acts/Act1491.pdf.
15.57 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 32
RECOMMENDATIONS
To ensure that license plate readers can be used by law enforcement agents for legitimate purposes without infringing on Americans’ privacy and other civil liberties, the ACLU calls for the adoption of legislation and law enforcement agency policies adhering to the following principles:
• License plate readers may be used by law enforcement agencies only to investigate hits and in other circumstances in which law enforcement agents reasonably believe that the plate data are relevant to an ongoing criminal investigation. The police must have reasonable suspicion that a crime has occurred before examining collected license plate reader data; they must not examine license plate reader data in order to generate reasonable suspicion. • Law enforcement agencies must not store data about innocent people for any lengthy period. Unless plate data has been flagged, retention periods should be measured in days or weeks, not months, and certainly not years. • It is legitimate to flag plate data (1) whenever a plate generates a hit that is confirmed by an agent and is being investigated, (2) in other circumstances in which law enforcement agents reasonably believe that the plate data are relevant to a specific criminal investigation or adjudication, (3) when preservation is requested by the registered vehicle owner, or (4) when preservation is requested for criminal defense purposes.
• Once plate data has been flagged, a longer retention period commensurate with the reason for flagging is appropriate.
• Law enforcement agencies must place access controls on license plate reader databases. Only agents who have been trained in the departments’ policies governing such databases should be permitted access, and departments should log access records pertaining to the databases.
• People should be able to find out if plate data of vehicles registered to them are contained in a law enforcement agency’s database. They should also be able to access the data. This policy should also apply to disclosure to a third party if the registered vehicle owner consents, or for criminal defendants seeking relevant evidence.
• Law enforcement agencies should not share license plate reader data with third parties that do not conform to the above retention and access principles, and should be transparent regarding with whom license plate reader data are shared.
15.58 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 33 • Hot lists should be updated as often as practicable and, at a minimum, at the beginning of each shift. Whenever a license plate reader alerts on a plate, law enforcement, before taking any action, should be required to confirm visually that a plate matches the number and state identified in the alert, confirm that the alert is still active by calling dispatch and, if the alert pertains to the registrant of the car and not the car itself, for example in a warrant situation, develop a reasonable belief that the vehicle’s occupant(s) match any individual(s) identified in the alert.
• Any entity that uses license plate readers should be required to report its usage publicly on at least an annual basis.
15.59 AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION YOU ARE BEING TRACKED 34
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This report has been a project of the American Civil Liberties Union. The primary author is Catherine Crump, staff attorney, Speech, Privacy & Technology Project. The ACLU would also like to acknowledge the following individuals who made substantial contributions to this report: Ibrahim Alsaygh, Christina Argueta, Josh Bell, David Benhamou, Tess Bloom, Allie Bohm, Stevaughn Bush, Matt Cagle, Kade Crockford, Sandra Fulton, Naomi Gilens, Katherine Haas, Brian Hauss, Mike Katz-Lacabe, Doug Klunder, Mica Moore, Sejal Singh, Jay Stanley, Bennett Stein, Nathan Freed Wessler, Ben Wizner, and Noa Yachot. Thanks also to the participants in the NYU Technology Law and Policy Clinic, and professor Jason Schultz, for their valuable feedback.
The ACLU would like to thank the following affiliates for participating in this multi-state coordinated public records request: Alaska, Arizona, Northern California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas/W. Missouri, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nebraska, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, D.C., and Wyoming.
15.60 15.61
1 Rosemary Balsley
From: Keith McHenry <[email protected]>
Sent: Friday, November 24, 2023 3:13 PM
To: Fred Keeley
Cc: City Council; Matt Huffaker; Bernie Escalante
Subject: I am against recording the entry of every vehicle entering Santa Cruz. I oppose the Automatic License Plate Readers
I am against recording the entry of every vehicle entering Santa Cruz. I oppose the purchase and permanent installation of Automatic License Plate Readers.
This is a dystopian invasion of everyone’s right too privacy. The idea that every vehicle entering the city will have their license plate numbers captured.
As the proposal currently states the ALPR is supposed to be limited to converting the license plate numbers and letters into machine‐readable text, tags them with the time and location, and uploads that data to large, searchable databases owned and operated by private companies which are not transparent or accountable to the public or elected officials. The use is sure to be expanded and used to limit many of our freedoms.
The installation of this surveillance system is like the construction of high‐rise towers that don't provide parking, its another step in the implementation of the digital prison of the 15 minute smart cities. It wont be long before state and federal law enforcement will be adding other features such as your health and financial history to this data bank providing a detailed picture of everyone that enters the city.
Another 22 cameras and the police will also be able to monitor everyone as the leave town. Advances in AI makes it possible to quickly analyze and connect this data with other data bases.
This is a dictator's wet dream. Where is it going to stop? Law enforcement agencies that use ALPR compare plates to a "hot list" of plates suspected of being connected to crimes, or even that belong to owners with outstanding court fees.
The ALPR is a mass surveillance technology in that it collects information on every driver, the overwhelming majority of whom are innocent. The technology poses a threat to locational privacy: in aggregate the data can reveal detailed driving patterns or identify the drivers who frequent particular locations, such as protests, gun shows, and health care facilities.
We should remove the ALPRs in the Breach Flats and reject the installation of any more.
The fact that Homeland Security is offering such a grant only adds to my concerns that there are plans to use this intrusion to our privacy to add to the many other tools of social control. If the US has every intention of continuing to commit war crimes, facing anger towards the political and financial corruption while millions of Americans are facing hunger and homelessness it only makes sense to increase every police state measure available.
Keith McHenry
15.62 2
PO Box 422
Santa Cruz, CA 95061 USA
15.63 1
Rosemary Balsley
From: Gina René <[email protected]>
Sent: Friday, November 24, 2023 4:35 PM
To: City Council
Subject: Disagreement Letter - Oppose purchase of ALPR
Dear Santa Cruz City Council Members,
I am writing to communicate my opposition of the purchase and permanent installation of Automatic License Plate Readers (ALPR) by SCPD or any other Santa Cruz City or County organization in that the use if ALPR’s would present a threat to the lawful privacy of every single Santa Cruz resident and all tourists and visitors of our amazing region.
I urge you consider the long term consequences of such an implementation on the privacy, quality of life, well‐being, of yourself, all local citizens and the economic effects on tourism and the numerous people who often choose to visit Santa Cruz because of our universally conscious principles and culture that aim to support life, our humanity and freedom for all.
Implementing ALPR or any smart city technology has greater harmful consequences than what we’re hearing in the popularized
view of technology and smart cities.
Thank you Sincerely,
Gina René
(Regina M René)
Sent from my iPhone
15.64 1
Rosemary Balsley
From: Andy Carman <[email protected]>
Sent: Friday, November 24, 2023 7:38 PM
To: City Council
Subject: Automatic License Plate Readers
Dear City Council,
I oppose the Automatic License Plate Readers.
Thank you,
Andy Carman
15.65 1
Rosemary Balsley
From: Jamilah Vittor <[email protected]>
Sent: Friday, November 24, 2023 7:43 PM
To: Fred Keeley; City Council; Matt Huffaker; Bernie Escalante Subject: Oppose automatic license plate readers
I live in the County of Santa Cruz, and I object to having my whereabouts logged every time I drive into the city of Santa Cruz. Do we want Santa Cruz to become a city of constant surveillance? I don't think it is a good idea. Please oppose the plan to install automatic license plate readers. Thank you.
Jamilah Vittor
Corralitos
15.66 1
Rosemary Balsley
From: Ellen Manko <[email protected]>
Sent: Friday, November 24, 2023 8:31 PM
To: Fred Keeley; City Council; Matt Huffaker; Bernie Escalante Subject: Opposition to SC installation of Automatic License Plate Readers To Whom It May Concern:
I oppose the purchase and permanent installation of ALPR in Santa Cruz. As a city resident since 1988 I see this as an invasion of privacy and a blow against my personal freedoms.
The money spent on this project could be better used in strategies for preventing crime including more boots on the ground, in rehab and education for those incarcerated, and in overall community building through programs designed to establish trust between the police and our citizens. As a city resident I would like to have a say in how my taxpayer money is spent.
I see ALPR as a useless waste, an accumulation of data. What will this do to increase the safety of our residents?
Thank you,
Ellen Manko, RN
130 Mentel Ave.
SC, 95062
15.67 The Santa Cruz Police plan to record every vehicle that enters the city using Automatic License Plate Readers (ALPR)
Please oppose the purchase and permanent installation of Automatic License Plate Readers, an additional step towards the implementation of a “smart city”.
These high-speed cameras capture license plate numbers of every vehicle that passes the camera. ALPR then converts the license plate numbers and letters into machine-readable text, tags them with the time and location, and uploads that data to large, searchable databases owned and operated by private companies which are not transparent or accountable to the public or elected officials.
Law enforcement agencies that use ALPR compare plates to a "hot list" of plates suspected of being connected to crimes, or even that belong to owners with outstanding court fees. However, ALPR is a mass surveillance technology in that it collects information on every driver, the overwhelming majority of whom are innocent. The technology poses a threat to locational privacy: in aggregate the data can reveal detailed driving patterns or identify the drivers who frequent particular locations, such as protests, gun shows, and health care facilities.
SCPD Chief Escalante announced plans to purchase 22 Automatic License Plate Readers (ALPR), 8 from his budget and 14 from a Homeland Security grant. He wants to install them at every entrance to the City and along major streets. He plans to present the grant proposal to the Council at their 11/28 meeting.
Please email the City your opposition by this Sunday. Speak at the November 28, 2023 Santa Cruz City Council Meeting. Public comment starts at 12:30 noon. Call 831-420-5020 and email those below.
Mayor Fred Keeley • [email protected]
Santa Cruz City Council • [email protected] Santa Cruz City Manager Matt Huffaker • [email protected] Santa Cruz Chief of Police Bernie Escalante • [email protected] Email: [email protected]
Twitter: @BraveAndFreeSC Website: braveandfreesantacruz.org take
action!
15.68 1
Rosemary Balsley
From: Chowning Poppler <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, November 25, 2023 9:33 AM
To: [email protected]; Renee Golder; Sandy Brown; Martine Watkins; Sonja Brunner; [email protected]; Scott Newsome
Cc: City Council
Subject: November 28 Meeting Agenda Item 15: Opposition to Acquisition of Automated License Plate Readers
Dear Mayor and Council Members:
I am writing to express my significant concerns regarding the Santa Cruz Police Department’s proposed purchase and use of automated license plate readers (ALPRs) in Santa Cruz.
A decision regarding vehicle-monitoring cameras requires careful consideration of costs - legal, ethical, financial, and communal. The proposed purchase of additional automated license plate readers would further infringe on the rights of Santa Cruz residents and visitors and require much more community involvement before taking such high-risk steps.
● Inadequate public input. California law requires an opportunity for public comment. It also requires a written, publicly available use policy that is “consistent with respect for an individual’s privacy and civil liberties;” and reasonable security safeguards for any use of automated license plate readers. ● Public access to private data. As you know, these surveillance systems collect and store location information about drivers whose cars pass through their cameras’ fields of view. This information, after being matched to dates, times, and locations, can be compiled into databases that reveal sensitive information about where community members work, live, associate, and visit. Breaches and ransomware are a regular occurrence, and the misuse of surveillance data is not uncommon. ● Automated license plate readers are frequently and disproportionately used against marginalized people, leading to real-life harm and unnecessary police encounters. The use of these surveillance systems to harm marginalized communities – including immigrants, Black people, and Muslim Americans – is well documented. For example, ICE has been shown to exploit these surveillance systems and databases to locate and deport immigrants. As with other surveillance technologies, police often deploy license plate readers disproportionately in poor areas, regardless of crime rates. Indeed, the only automated license plate readers in Santa Cruz are in Beach Flats where over half of the population lives below the poverty line and residents are predominantly Latino/a/x. ● Cost and Liability. Santa Cruz’s liability exposure would be enormous if it adopted additional automated license plate readers. San Francisco’s experience should serve as a cautionary tale: Misuse of automated license plate readers led to the detention of a Black woman at gunpoint, leading to an expensive civil rights lawsuit against the city. In addition, a study in Vallejo found that 35 percent of “hits” from mobile automated license plate readers and 37 percent of all “hits” from fixed readers were misreads — an unacceptable high rate of error.
● Automated license plate readers do not make communities safer. Santa Cruz must consider policies and the allocation of resources to programs that actually improve the safety and health of our communities.
For these reasons, I strongly oppose the adoption of any new automated license plate readers and the expansion of existing ones. The deployment of the unblinking eye of law enforcement presents numerous
15.69 2
constitutional, legal and ethical concerns; the costs of which are far-reaching. Before voting on any expansion of surveillance systems, please consider the serious concerns and recommendations noted in the ACLU of California’s Making Smart Decisions About Surveillance.
Sincerely,
Chowning Poppler
Santa Cruz resident
15.70 1
Rosemary Balsley
From: Judi Grunstra <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, November 25, 2023 12:46 PM
To: City Council
Subject: Consent Agenda 15 - ALPR grant
Dear Mayor and Council:
I feel that this item deserves some discussion and should be pulled from the Consent Agenda.
I have some questions:
Does the $84K grant cover only the installation and maintenance of equipment, or does it cover training of police personnel over the course of the period?
How many police staff will be trained and operating the system? How many police hours and at what cost? Will this take police personnel away from other duties? Will more attention be given to this high‐tech tool, at the cost of less attention given to patrolling neighborhoods or responding in person when called? And more importantly, how effective is it to apprehend lawbreakers of crimes that are not even prosecuted, or allowed to cycle through the system with little accountability? It seems ironic that the police see a need for ALPRs, when I recently read that cars and RVs in which people are living are not even required to have current registrations.
I'm sure the police chief is tempted by the high‐tech equipment, but is it really right for our community? How secure is the data from hackers?
There seems to be a lot of "fear‐mongering" with terms like schools or tourist sites being "soft targets" for terrorists, etc. And reference to the "Authorized Body of Five" evokes an Orwellian world.
I see that Capitola has ALPRs. I know from personal experience that those cameras DO record the driver's face. Can we be sure that in Santa Cruz, this grant is only for the stated purposes, and NOT for traffic violations?
Thank you.
Judi Grunstra
15.71 1
Rosemary Balsley
From: philip grinich <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, November 25, 2023 1:50 PM
To: City Council
Subject: Automatic License Plate Readers A.L.P.R.
Hi Councilmembers,
Please oppose the purchase of ALPR's.
They provide data to people with no right to access it.
Also, many people will be swept up by frequenting areas that are of interest to police just by coincidence. This will provide suspects with no evidence from proper police procedure.
Also this information can be used illegally.
We already had a Supreme Court decision about an illegal tracker the SC police put on a man of Middle East descent car discovered by his mechanic.
Did the city take the case all the way to the Supreme Court, only to lose? Who is doing this legal action?
Thanks,
Long time supporter,
Philip Grinich
15.72 1
Rosemary Balsley
From: [email protected]
Sent: Friday, November 24, 2023 11:42 AM
To: Fred Keeley; City Council; Matt Huffaker
Subject: Fwd: NO SURVEILLANCE CAMERAS
Slipper slope, folks, VERY slippery slope. Ridiculous move to get in bed with the illegal trend toward a Big Brother type of world. How could you?
-------- Original Message --------
Subject:NO SURVEILLANCE CAMERAS
Date:2023‐11‐24 11:36
From:[email protected]
To:[email protected]
Once again the military industrial complex wants to bait us with their militaristic Black Friday sales of Homeland Security garbage!!!!!!!! Remember the tank we citizens refused to have in our town? Do you not understand the actualities and implications of this proposal, Mr. Bescalante? As Benjamin Franklin said, "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
I VEHEMENTLY OPPOSE THIS PURCHASE AND QUESTION THE MINDSET THAT WOULD EVEN THINK THIS A GOOD IDEA!!!!!!!!!!
Citizen Sharon McGraham
Santa Cruz, CA (since 1982, and formerly a Los Angeles resident - check out how their overreach is working)
15.73 1
Rosemary Balsley
From: [email protected]
Sent: Saturday, November 25, 2023 4:13 PM
To: City Council
Subject: No "Automatic License Plate Readers"
I oppose "Automatic License Plate Readers."
This is not communist China.
Please oppose this and any other measures that threaten our privacy, civil liberties and constitutional rights.
Thank you,
Karsten Mueller MS, PhD
15.74 1
Rosemary Balsley
From: angela smith <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, November 25, 2023 6:49 PM
To: Fred Keeley; City Council; Matt Huffaker; Bernie Escalante Subject: NO to Automatic License Plate Readers!!!
We reject the use of ALPR in anywhere in Santa Cruz City and Santa Cruz County!!! We do not want to be surveilled or controlled.
Angel
15.75 From: Diane Dutton
To: Fred Keeley; City Council; Matt Huffaker; Bernie Escalante Subject: I Oppose ALPR in Santa Cruz
Date: Saturday, November 25, 2023 8:01:59 PM
Mr. Keeley, SC City Council, Mr. Huffaker, and Mr, Escalante, I oppose the purchase and any intended use of Automatic License Plate Readers in and around the city of Santa Cruz. This is a surveillance tool that We, the people, do not want to be thrust upon us.
Gearing up for smart city Santa Cruz is a shameful mark on who you are as a people, whether a politician, city council member, city manager, or police chief.
I oppose this use of ALPR as it will ultimately be used against the very good people of Santa Cruz.
Serve the people of our community, not the global elitists whom it appears you are really working for. -Diana Dutton
15.76 1
Rosemary Balsley
From: Jerilyn Bock <[email protected]>
Sent: Sunday, November 26, 2023 9:26 AM
To: City Council
Subject: NO to the installation of spying devices to tract residents' driving history! To Santa Cruz City Council,
We are opposed to Santa Cruz installing spying equipment of any kind on residents including drivers entering and leaving Santa Cruz! This smells like the WEF globalists' agenda to eventually control everything we do by turning every democratically‐run town into a "smart city" to control residents!
NO to surveillance spying on Santa Cruzans!
Thank you!
Jerilyn Bock
Santa Cruz, CA
Steve Bock
Santa Cruz, CA
15.77 1
Rosemary Balsley
From: John Malkin <[email protected]>
Sent: Sunday, November 26, 2023 10:43 AM
To: Fred Keeley; City Council
Subject: Oppose SCPD License Plate Readers - Santa Cruz City Council Dear Mayor Fred Keeley and Council members,
I strongly urge you to oppose the purchase of Automatic License Plate Readers by the Santa Cruz Police Department.
As an activist journalist I've done considerable research about ALPRs and also draw on the opinions of the ACLU and Electronic Frontier Foundation. These devices have been used by police to spy on activists and people attending mosques
in New York. Often the data is shared with vast networks of "national intelligence centers" and corporate entities unless it
is held on local servers.
Please read below the ACLU's report on ALPR's and my 2014 story for the Santa Cruz Good Times, "Surveillance City?" Also below is a link to my presentation at a 2014 Santa Cruz ACLU forum on ALPR's. In 2014 there were many discussions about ALPRs and a large number of locals vocally opposed SCPD acquiring these devices.
Besides the invasion of privacy of ALPR's, I also object to the fast‐track process by which SCPD is attempting to acquire ALPRs now. Many of us heard about this new attempt to acquire ALPRs only one or two weeks ago. There's been no media coverage of this yet and no public discussion organized by the city or the activist community. Given that ALPR's were strongly opposed by Santa Cruz citizens in 2014, we would hope that SCPD would contact those who had been most vocal in that opposition, now as they move again to try to implement ALPRs. That would be an expression of trust and mutual
respect with the community. Instead, SCPD has moved to acquire city and DHS funds before engaging in a community discussion on new surveillance systems for the city.
Please recall that in 2015 an SCPD representative told City Council members that they needed to approve a DHS grant immediately for a Lenco Bearcat Armored Personnel Carrier, without time for public discussion. Later it was discovered that SCPD had clearly violated city policy by informing City Council of the DHS grant application only after the grant was approved. City policy required that requests to purchase new equipment that hasn't been used before, or equipment over a certain cost, be approved by City Council before the grant application process begins.
Additionally, it may be wise to consider the history of SCPD abuse of power and data to estimate the likelihood of SCPD abuse with this very sweeping, invasive ALPR technology. For example; In 2015 an SCPD officer met with then Council member Micah Posner to discuss the purchase of ALPRs. The SCPD officer told Posner that he'd prefer if the issue were not discussed publicly and he threatened the Council member, "If we were adversaries, I would find a way
to get at you. I wouldn't do it directly. I'd do it through a third party." See below my 2015 Good Times article titled "Blurred
Blue Lines."
Similarly, SCPD has kept information secret from the public and City Council in the past. Obviously, this decreases the trust one can hold in SCPD promises to use ALPRs in a way that doesn't infringe on citizens' civil rights. Four examples:
In 2017 an AR‐15 assault rifle was lost or stolen from the SCPD and the theft was kept secret until I broke the story in 2021. See link below. Second: In 2005 two SCPD officers attempted to pose as activists and infiltrate a planning meeting
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for the DIY Holiday Parade. Third and significantly: In 2017 SCPD Chief Vogel assured the Santa Cruz community and City Council that local police would not cooperate with ICE and Homeland Security in immigration‐related enforcement. City Council had designated Santa Cruz a sanctuary city in March, 2017. Only after activists continually raised concerns about SCPD cooperation with Homeland Security did SCPD Chief Vogel reveal that a Homeland Security Investigations agent had
a workspace at SCPD and had been working there for five years. Lastly: Predictive Policing technology as developed and used by SCPD has often been understood to rely on racial profiling and other unwarranted police actions like searching a vehicle or person because "they don't look like they live in this neighborhood." Given that history, ALPRs will likely also be abused in similar ways that violate laws and civil rights.
Please do not approve the DHS grant and SCPD request for ALPR's at this time. Wide and thorough input and understanding is necessary before you make a decision that may alter the social landscape of our city for the long term.
Thank you for your attention to this matter. Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions.
Best regards,
John Malkin
831‐457‐2721
Santa Cruz, California
https://www.goodtimes.sc/surveillance‐city/
Surveillance City? | Good Times
Santa Cruz officials, locals and others weigh in on implementing Automatic License Plate Readers It had been a bright day in September and the clocks were striking 8 p.m. “You’ve had a long day,” said the man in the police uniform. It was Sept. 10, 2013, and the Santa Cruz City Council was about to […] www.goodtimes.sc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=saCCV8e_yp8
Surveillance City: John Malkin on Police License
Plate Scanners (ALPRs)
Journalist John Malkin talks about the Santa Cruz city council's approval of the police department's request for automatic license plate scanner (ALPRs).came...
www.youtube.com
https://znetwork.org/zmagazine/police‐surveillance‐takes‐a‐bite‐out‐of‐privacy‐part‐1/
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Police Surveillance Takes a Bite Out of Privacy, Part 1 As more details of federal surveillance come to light, revelations of the domestic use of similar tools and systems of surveillance by police are surfacing as well znetwork.org
https://www.goodtimes.sc/blurred‐blue‐lines/
Blurred Blue Lines | Good Times
Deputy Chief Steve Clark was transferred after his role as spokesman for both the department and the union attracted councilmembers’ ire On March 24, former Santa Cruz mayors Chris Krohn and Tim Fitzmaurice appeared at City Hall to speak against the police department’s plan to acquire a BearCat armored truck. They then stepped outside the […]
www.goodtimes.sc
https://kzsc.org/blog/2021/08/11/ar‐15‐stolen‐from‐santa‐cruz‐police‐department‐four‐years‐ago‐still‐missing‐by‐john‐ malkin/
AR-15 Stolen From Santa Cruz Police Department
Four Years Ago Still Missing By John Malkin -
Campus News | KZSC Santa Cruz
In 2017 an AR-15 assault rifle was stolen from the Santa Cruz Police Department (SCPD) and the theft was never made public. The gun remains missing today. In
kzsc.org
https://www.aclu.org/issues/privacy‐technology/you‐are‐being‐tracked You Are Being Tracked
How License Plate Readers Are Being Used To Record Americans' Movements
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www.aclu.org
https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2014/12/28/18766107.php Santa Cruz Police Department: Political Smears,
Unfair Profiling, and Harassment : Indybay
There are numerous cases in which Santa Cruz Police Department leaders have strayed from their role as law enforcers, instead engaging in political smears and unfair profiling and harassment. This makes it more difficult to trust in their objectivity and commitment to serve everyone, and fosters an adversarial rather than cooperative relationship with many community members.
www.indybay.org
https://www.mercurynews.com/2017/04/27/ice‐agent‐loses‐workspace‐at‐santa‐cruz‐pd/ ICE agent loses workspace at Santa Cruz PD
SANTA CRUZ >> A Homeland Security Investigations agent no longer has workspace at Santa Cruz Police Department, a police spokeswoman said Wednesday.Spokeswoman Joyce Blaschke also said the de… www.mercurynews.com
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Rosemary Balsley
From: Stephen Bare <[email protected]>
Sent: Sunday, November 26, 2023 8:35 PM
To: City Council
Subject: No ALPRs
Councilmembers,
I’ve lived in Santa Cruz for over 40 years, and I’ve seen some changes over the decades.
Yes, I’ve some complaints, but this has been, and still is a great place. Like the rest of the country, however, and perhaps the entire world, we seem to be more fearful now. Closed circuit is everywhere, fences grow taller and stronger, and cell phone cameras and security lighting have us all feeling as fearful as we are feeling secure. Fear seems to breed more fear, and it’s our responsibility and our community’s responsibility to reduce the fear.
Okay, like it or not, we seem to be living in a security obsessed, fearful environment, and the tech, security, and policing industries are profiting from and perpetuating our fear. Okay, that’s the way it is, I’m afraid, and it’s hard to put that genie back in the bottle. But this idea to put ALPRs at every entrance to Santa Cruz is dystopian, down right paranoiac and creepy. The idea evidently is that every car will/can be tracked and data about the comings and goings of that vehicle can be used by authorities. The reasons for NOT going to the use of the high‐speed cameras are myriad, too many to even begin listing.
Please dismiss the idea of installing these devices, these ALPRs. Please don’t let this tail wag the dog; it’s Orwellian.
Peace, Steve Bare
Virus-free.www.avast.com
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Rosemary Balsley
From: sheila carrillo <[email protected]>
Sent: Sunday, November 26, 2023 9:05 PM
To: City Council
Subject: SAY NO ALPR's for our community
Dear CC folks,
There is no proven need or call to expend the time and expense to install ALPR's in our community, and their implementation is prone to abuse. Additionally, here is no evidence that they are effective. The community wasn’t given sufficient notification time to respond and there is no evidence that they are effective to improve community safety. Take a stand and say NO!!
Thanks.
Sheila
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Rosemary Balsley
From: Pete Shanks <[email protected]>
Sent: Sunday, November 26, 2023 9:49 PM
To: City Council
Subject: Automated License Plate Readers
To: Mayor Fred Keeley and Santa Cruz City Council Members Re: Nov 28 City Council Agenda Item 15, regarding Automated License Plate Readers:
Privacy is a fundamental right in the United States. I am not an attorney but I did study such matters as part of my degree in Philosophy, Politics and Economics, for which I was awarded an MA by Oxford University in the UK. I chose to emigrate to the United States in the mid‐1970s in large part because of the freedom US law and custom offers its residents (I have been a citizen for decades now).
There are of course absurdities in the law, some of which benefit personal freedom, such as Griswold v. Connecticut, which specifically held that the right to privacy includes the right for married couples to use contraceptives. Others, such as this proposal, serve to limit personal freedom under the rubric of law enforcement. The Council should consider very carefully before increasing such limits.
Most of the information gathered by any such system as that proposed would be information about innocent people, going about their business, and not expecting data about their particular whereabouts at any specific point in time to be filed in a police database. Yes, in some particular cases such data might perhaps be of use in criminal investigations. One price of freedom is that not all data is in the hands of the authorities.
I note that the discussion of “lawful purpose” lists six items, which range from the obviously useful (locating stolen vehicles) through several speculative ideas (finding suspects or witnesses or children or absent‐minded old people) to the vaguely threatening (“situational awareness”) to the seriously concerning: to “Protect Critical Infrastructure.” Is it not obvious how this anodyne phrase could lead to dangerous repression? Are we living in a totalitarian state? Are we about to be?
I urge the Council to deny this motion.
Pete Shanks
410 Dakota Ave
Santa Cruz, CA 95060
[email protected]
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Rosemary Balsley
From: rebecca bogdan <[email protected]>
Sent: Sunday, November 26, 2023 10:12 PM
To: City Council
Subject: Automatic license plate readers
I do not want my license plate read, nor do I want my tax dollars used to consolidate data on my or anyone else's whereabouts. This is Orwellian surveillance overreach. Next the police department will ask for additional funding to analyze and manage the data, or perhaps they can monetize the data and sell it to another city. Do we not have a constitutional right to privacy? Are we not innocent until proven guilty? I am disgusted and ashamed that this is even a possibility on how we prioritize needs in this community. Please vote no on this absurd request from the police department.
Rebecca Bogdan, Citizen, Voter, Retired Nurse
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Rosemary Balsley
From: Lee Brokaw <[email protected]>
Sent: Monday, November 27, 2023 6:45 AM
To: Barbara Riverwoman; City Council
Subject: Re: we need letters opposing Automatic License Plate Readers Just write, I'll find out w/o bcc.
[email protected]
"Why can't we all just get along"..Rodney King
On Sunday, November 26, 2023 at 08:16:56 PM PST, Barbara Riverwoman <[email protected]> wrote:
Hi Lee,
I want to write a letter but it would be easer if there were a live link to the City Council and if you could write a short, sample letter with 2 or 3 of the most important points. Then if folks are more committed they can read your longer (excellent) explanation, and add some more points to the basic letter.
I think you will get lots more letters sent in if you do this. Are you asking people to bcc you? -barbara
On Nov 26, 2023, at 6:43 PM, Lee Brokaw <[email protected]> wrote:
Here's the data to use for your letter.
There are only three letters in opposition as
of NOW
What are ALPRs?
These high-speed cameras capture license plate numbers of every vehicle that passes the camera, and upload the time, date, and locations of the plates to large, searchable databases owned and operated by private companies that are not transparent or accountable to the public or elected officials.
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There is no demonstrated need for these highly invasive cameras There have been no reports of åany member of the public, much less a large number of people, asking SCPD to install ALPR cameras, and Chief Escalante has not even suggested his desire is motivated by any public clamor. There has been no news of a crime wave in Santa Cru much kess one that could be addressed by these cameras that track every single person here, 99.9 % of whom are innocent of any wrongdoing. Why then install them, when there are enormous downsides in terms of cost, invasion of privacy, and infringement on Constitutional rights and civil liberties? Apparently just because SCPD wants a new way to gather more information about our residents, as law enforcement predictably wants to do.
There is no demonstrated positive impact on public safety SCPD is unable to demonstrate that the existing ALPR in Beach Flats has had any positive impact on public safety. I asked the Chief, “:Do you have any data regarding the efficacy of the Beach Flats ALPR? I'm thinking of such things as the number of plates read, the number of hits against hot lists, the number of arrests made as a result of those hits, the number and type of charges brought as a result of those hits, the number of convictions obtained as a result of those hits, and the number of incorrect hits.” The Chief responded that he did not have any of the information I requested, The only relevant information he had was that the ALPR got a “hit” on a car that was wanted in a case from Fremont - apparently there has not been a single case involving a crime in Santa Cruz that was affected in any way by data picked up by the Beach Flats ALPR.
Other law enforcement agencies in the County do not use or want ALPRs Sheriff Hart has told us that he does not want or need ALPRs, Sheriff Hart is a thoughtful and highly respected and experienced law enforcement leader. His decision to not use ALPRs is powerful evidence that SCPD does not need them. (The Sheriff’s Office borrowed two ALPRs for a couple weeks at one point to help with an investigation of shootings in a particular place, and removed them promptly when the ALPRs did not capture any relevant information. This is extremely different than Chief Esclante’s plan to permanently install 22 cameras throughout the City simply to spy on every single driver, and not to solve or investigate a particular crime.)
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Insufficient notice
Chief Escalante sent me an email on November 14, informing me that he wanted to purchase 22 ALPR cameras - eight from his budget and an additional 14 with funds from a Homeland Security grant, and asking me to review a draft ALPR policy. The Chief said he planned to present the proposed acquisition to the City Council on November 28, 14 days later. Those 14 days include four weekend days and two holiday days. I asked him to postpone the request to a later Council meeting, but he refused, saying “I apologize for the tight timeline. We’ve been working hard on the draft policy and we just wrapped it up. . . . Unfortunately I can’t push this item out because the board that selects the recipients of the grant funding needs a commitment from Council so they can move forward on their decision on how to distribute the funds.”
Contrary to the Chief’s statements, the policy itself shows that it was prepared by Lexipol, not SCPD, and Chief /Esclabnte has admitted that in an email to me. Moreover, the Chief said that “We already had a policy for the LPR, but we’ve updated our policy which is attached.” In any event, it is unclear why SCPD did not begin the process sooner. This tactic is reminiscent of how SCPD, under a prior administration, rushed this Council into approving the acquisition of the BearCat, telling the Council that it had to act immediately to obtain the grant money. That hasty decision caused a public uproar, which forced the Council to reconsider the matter and hold additional public meetings.
The Council should not let that happen again. More time is needed to consider this purchase and to allow sufficient time for robust public comment and input on this important matter. And, if this grant money truly will disappear if the Council does not act on November 28, that’s OK. The Council should not approve the purchase anyway. But even if the Council decides after thorough public input that it is a good thing to have themselves and every other resident of the City tracked and surveilled every time they drive their car, there will certainly be more money available in the future from other military and law enforcement sources.
No public meeting
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There has been no public meeting to inform the public and gather input about the grave dangers and invasions of privacy caused by the ALPRs. When the SCPD deployed the only existing ALPR in the City, in Beach Flats, SCPD held at least one public meeting where the Beach Flats residents were given the opportunity to weigh in on the proposed use.
General objections to ALPRs
As a general matter, we perceive that the Constitutional expectation of privacy in our public actions are being eroded to near nothing. Installing ALPR cameras throughout the City will greatly, unnecessarily, and unjustifiably accelerate that erosion.
ACLU opposes the deployment of ALPR systems, period. We have the following concerns about ALPRs in general:
1.ALPR systems make our community less, not more, safe
because they violate privacy, facilitate dangerous police stops, and risk exposing our immigrant community members to harm.
2. ALPR systems are high-speed cameras. They capture not only images of license plates and the precise time and location of the vehicles, but also whatever is in the field of vision of the camera. This can include photos of individuals inside vehicles, children playing in their front yard, etc.
3. The vast majority of ALPR data are collected on law-abiding people going about their daily activities – taking children to school, work, worship, shop, receiving medical care, etc. With this sensitive location information, government agents can closely map and track a person’s movements, habits, and associations over time.
4. Equity issues: ALPR cameras are often placed in working class neighborhoods and communities of color, disproportionately impacting their lives. This is true in Santa Cruz, where the only existing ALPR camera is in lower income, heavily Hispanic Beach Flats. In some jurisdictions,
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police have also used ALPR to target religious minorities and others exercising First Amendment rights.
In 2015, the New York Police Department (“NYPD”) recorded and collected pictures of Muslim worshippers’ license plate numbers as they arrived at Mosques to pray and exercise their First Amendment rights.
5. ALPR systems facilitate police stops of drivers and police violence against motorists.
In San Francisco, blind reliance by police on a flagged ALPR scan led to the wrongful detention of a Black woman at gunpoint, triggering a multi-year civil rights lawsuit.
In Colorado, police officers forced four Black children to lie face down on the hot pavement after misidentifying their car as a “stolen” vehicle based on an incorrect reading of an ALPR system.
6. About sharing data with other agencies
Despite the state law barring agencies from sharing ALPR data with out-of-state agencies, some jurisdictions shared or share ALPR data with non-California agencies.
In May 2023, Electronic Frontier Foundation, ACLU-NorCal, and ACLU-SoCal issued demand letters to 71 California police agencies for such violations. Neighboring city Gilroy has violated this.
https://www.eff.org/press/releases/civil-liberties-groupsdemand-california-police-stop-sharing-drivers-location-data Sharing data with other California agencies can lead to a statewide, draconian surveillance network.
7. Data Collection and Retention
A year-long retention period, which is the standard in the current proposed policy, is extremely long. This is a very long period for retaining sensitive location information that the Santa Cruz Police
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Department has not found relevant to a specific criminal investigation or civil action. Importantly, even if sharing were limited to ensure compliance with state law as discussed above, as long as the City chooses to retain information about the locations of drivers it may be subject to legal demands for that information from agencies outside the state and that do not share the City’s values. Recently Stanford PD & Santa Clara Sheriff had their data hacked and held for ransom. How secure is this data, almost all of which is of innocent people?
Misuse and abuse of ALPR data
In Menlo Park, an officer used ALPR data to track his girlfriend's travels
Texas is apparently using ALPR data to track women leaving the state to get abortions. Some companies that provide the service make the information available to private investigators, allowing antiabortion activists to continue compiling their own license plate data access.
https://www.austinchronicle.com/daily/news/2014-08-12/undercoveraudio-reveals-anti-abortion-tactics/ An Ohio officer pleaded guilty to stalking an ex through ALPR; a Michigan officer looked up home addresses of women he found attractive; and two Miami-Dade officers ran checks on a journalist after he aired unflattering stories about the department.AP: Across US, police officers abuse confidential databases
AP: Across US, police officers abuse confidential
databases
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An investigation by The Associated Press finds that scores of police officers are abusing confidential law enfor...
FLOCK
Working with police departments, neighborhood watches, and other private customers, Flock not only allows private camera owners to create their own “hot lists” that will generate alarms when listed plates are spotted, but also runs all plates against state police watchlists and the FBI’s primary criminal database, the National Crime Information Center (NCIC). Flock’s goal is to expand to “every city in the United States,
and its cameras are already in use in over 2,000 cities in at least 42 states.
Unlike a targeted ALPR camera system that is designed to take pictures of license plates, check the plates against local hot lists, and then flush the data if there’s no hit, Flock is building a giant camera network that records people’s comings and goings across the nation, and then makes that data available for search by any of its law enforcement customers. Such a system provides even small-town sheriffs access to a sweeping and powerful mass-surveillance tool, and allows big actors like federal agencies and large urban police departments to access the comings and goings of vehicles in even the smallest of towns. And every new customer that buys and installs the company’s cameras extends Flock’s network, contributing to the creation of a centralized mass surveillance system of Orwellian scope. Motorola Solutions, a competitor to Flock, is pursuing a similar business model.
SAMPLE COALITION LETTER OPPOSING THE ACQUISITION OF
AUTOMATED LICENSE PLATE READERS
Date
Mayor Councilmember Councilmember Councilmember Councilmember Your City Council Street address City, CA ZIP
Re: Community Opposition to the Proposed Acquisition of Automated License Plate Readers
Dear Members of the [X City Council/ X Board of Supervisors], We are a community coalition of groups and individuals dedicated to protecting civil rights and civil liberties, including the right to be free from intrusive, discriminatory, and dangerous government surveillance. We write to raise concerns over the City’s proposed acquisition of Automated License Plate Readers (“ALPR”). We express strong opposition to the proposed acquisition of ALPR systems in the [City/County Name and
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Department]. ALPR systems will make our community less, not more, safe because they violate privacy, facilitate dangerous police stops, and risk exposing our immigrant community members to harm.
The [City Council/Board of Supervisors] should not authorize a new deployment of ALPR systems in our community. ALPR surveillance cameras automatically record the images of license plates, the vehicle’s precise location, and at times even the photographs of the individuals inside of vehicles. ALPR cameras are often placed throughout a community, including on light poles, overpasses, and patrol cars.
Government agencies can – and have – used the location information collected by ALPR to deport immigrants and track people exercising their First Amendment rights.
ALPR cameras record and store time and location specific images of thousands of drivers per day, regardless of whether those drivers have violated any law. For drivers who regularly drive past ALPR surveilled areas, the cameras can capture multiple snapshots of their location and vehicles a day. With this sensitive location information, government agents can closely map and track a person’s movements, habits, and associations over time, including where they live, work, worship, receive medical care, or where their child attends school.
All people should feel safe to worship, to attend a protest, and go about their personal lives safely without unwarranted surveillance. But in communities with ALPR, there is often no way for a driver to avoid having their location captured by such a system, short of choosing not to drive.
Police have also used ALPR to target religious minorities and others exercising First Amendment rights. In 2015, the New York Police Department (“NYPD”) recorded and collected pictures of Muslim worshippers’ license plate numbers as they arrived at Mosques to pray and exercise their First Amendment rights. 1
1 Adam Goldman & Matt Apuzzo, With cameras, informants, NYPD eyed mosques, ASSOCIATED PRESS (Feb. 23, 2021) https://www.ap.org/ap-inthe-news/2012/with-cameras-informants-nypd-eyed-mosques.
Local law enforcement agencies frequently share ALPR location information with federal immigration agencies and exposes the lives and futures of immigrants to needless harm. Public records show that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”) and Customs and Border Patrol (“CBP”) exploit ALPR-collected location information to target, locate, detain, and deport immigrants as they drive to work, run errands, or drop their children off at school.2 At least one California law enforcement agency has been sued for sharing the locations of drivers with out- of-state and federal agencies, a practice which is illegal under California law.3 Any community considering an ALPR system must take seriously that the
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possibility that the sensitive location local drivers will end up in the hands of a rogue government agency such as ICE.
ALPR systems facilitate police stops of drivers and police violence against motorists. In San Francisco, blind reliance by police on a flagged ALPR scan led to the wrongful detention of a black woman at gunpoint, triggering a multi-year civil rights lawsuit.4 More recently, police in Walnut Creek detained the director of a non-profit at gunpoint after another unnoticed license plate reader system error.5 And in Colorado, police officers forced four Black children to lie face down on the hot pavement after misidentifying their car as a “stolen” vehicle based on an incorrect reading of an ALPR system.6 Whether due to computer or police error, the use of ALPR systems to stop drivers poses a threat to the health and safety of all motorists.
Finally, ALPR systems have not been meaningfully demonstrated to prevent crime or meaningfully improve public safety. To the contrary, studies indicate that ALPRs do not have a deterrent effect on crime, with a recent analysis of ALPR cameras in Alameda County finding that auto thefts actually increased following installation of a system in 2020, ending a period of steady decline.7 And while ALPR vendors and police agencies often tout the effectiveness of ALPR in reducing crime, public safety experts point out that any reduction in crime cannot be attributed to ALPR themselves.8
We urge the [City Council/Board of Supervisors] to reject this ALPR proposal. We also encourage the [City Council/Board of Supervisors] to adopt an ordinance prohibiting the future acquisition of ALPR by city departments including the police. Moving forward, we urge the [City/County] to engage community members in a discussion about nonsurveillance 2 Vasudha Talla, Documents Reveal ICE Using Driver Location Data From Local Police for Deportations, ACLU of Northern California (Mar, 13, 2019), https://www.aclu.org/blog/immigrants-rights/ice-and-border-patrolabuses/documents-reveal-ice-using-driver-location-data. 3 Case page, Lagleva v. Doyle, ACLU of Northern California website, https://www.aclunc.org/our-work/legal- docket/lagleva-v-doyle-licenseplate-surveillance. 4 Kade Crockford, San Francisco Woman Pulled Out of Car at Gunpoint Because of License Plate Reader
Error, ACLU, May 13, 2014, https://www.aclu.org/blog/privacytechnology/location-tracking/san-francisco-woman- pulled-out-car-gunpointbecause; Matt Cagle, San Francisco – Paying the Price of Surveillance Without Safeguards, ACLU of Northern California, May 22, 2014, https://www.aclunc.org/blog/san-francisco-paying- price-surveillancewithout-safeguards. 5 Zach Norris, Opinion: At gunpoint, police handcuffed me after license15.94 10 plate reader error, The Mercury News, June 23, 2021, https://www.mercurynews.com/2021/06/23/opinion-at-gunpoint-policehandcuffed-me-because-of-a- license-reader-error/. 6 Matt Novak, Cops terrorize Black family but blame license plate reader for misidentifying ‘stolen’ vehicle, GIZMODO (Aug. 4, 2020) https://gizmodo.com/cops-terrorize-black-family-but-blame-license-platerea-1844602731. 7 Cynthia Lum, Julie Hibdon, Breanne Cave, Christopher S. Koper, & Linda Merola, License plate reader (LPR) police patrols in crime hot spots: an experimental evaluation in two adjacent jurisdictions, JOURNAL OF
EXPERIMENTAL CRIMINOLOGY,
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11292-011-9133-9 (2011); Lauren Do (@laurendo), Twitter (Dec. 21, 2021, 2:05 PM),
https://twitter.com/laurendo/status/1473414317605150722?s=11. 8 Louise Matsakis, Flock Safety Says Its License Plate Readers Reduce Crime. It’s Not That Simple, WIRED (Oct. 24, 2019),
https://www.wired.com/story/flock-safety-license-plate-readers-crime/. alternatives to ALPR that have been demonstrated to actually improve the health and safety of communities like our own.
Sincerely,
_______________
"Why can't we all just get along"..Rodney King
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Rosemary Balsley
From: Lee Brokaw <[email protected]>
Sent: Monday, November 27, 2023 9:59 AM
To: Jeff Rudisill; City Council
Subject: Re: we need letters opposing Automatic License Plate Readers City Council- [email protected]
Have until 5PM
- 99.9% of data is of innocent people
- Flack (vendor) is not bound by our privacy regulations - ALPR do not make citizens safer, like red light cameras or speed cameras do - Chief has had ALPF in Beach Flats and does not have or know of any date from those cameras that has solved any crime
that'd be a good start
"Why can't we all just get along"..Rodney King
On Monday, November 27, 2023 at 08:59:57 AM PST, Jeff Rudisill <[email protected]> wrote:
Lee, waa-aa-ay TMI. What I didn't see is where to send a letter, addressed to whom. And, if this decision is to be made tomorrow, a letter won't get there in time.
I can make a case for a City non-resident to oppose ALPRs, but don't know if it will get there in time.
On 11/26/2023 6:43 PM, Lee Brokaw wrote:
Here's the data to use for your letter.
There are only three letters in opposition as of
NOW
What are ALPRs?
These high-speed cameras capture license plate numbers of every vehicle that passes the camera, and upload the time, date, and locations of the plates to large, searchable databases owned and operated by private companies that are not transparent or accountable to the public or elected officials.
There is no demonstrated need for these highly invasive cameras
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There have been no reports of åany member of the public, much less a large number of people, asking SCPD to install ALPR cameras, and Chief Escalante has not even suggested his desire is motivated by any public clamor. There has been no news of a crime wave in Santa Cru much kess one that could be addressed by these cameras that track every single person here, 99.9 % of whom are innocent of any wrongdoing. Why then install them, when there are enormous downsides in terms of cost, invasion of privacy, and infringement on Constitutional rights and civil liberties? Apparently just because SCPD wants a new way to gather more information about our residents, as law enforcement predictably wants to do.
There is no demonstrated positive impact on public safety SCPD is unable to demonstrate that the existing ALPR in Beach Flats has had any positive impact on public safety. I asked the Chief, “:Do you have any data regarding the efficacy of the Beach Flats ALPR? I'm thinking of such things as the number of plates read, the number of hits against hot lists, the number of arrests made as a result of those hits, the number and type of charges brought as a result of those hits, the number of convictions obtained as a result of those hits, and the number of incorrect hits.”
The Chief responded that he did not have any of the information I requested, The only relevant information he had was that the ALPR got a “hit” on a car that was wanted in a case from Fremont - apparently there has not been a single case involving a crime in Santa Cruz that was affected in any way by data picked up by the Beach Flats ALPR.
Other law enforcement agencies in the County do not use or want ALPRs Sheriff Hart has told us that he does not want or need ALPRs, Sheriff Hart is a thoughtful and highly respected and experienced law enforcement leader. His decision to not use ALPRs is powerful evidence that SCPD does not need them. (The Sheriff’s Office borrowed two ALPRs for a couple weeks at one point to help with an investigation of shootings in a particular place, and removed them promptly when the ALPRs did not capture any relevant information. This is extremely different than Chief Esclante’s plan to permanently install 22 cameras throughout the City simply to spy on every single driver, and not to solve or investigate a particular crime.) Insufficient notice
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Chief Escalante sent me an email on November 14, informing me that he wanted to purchase 22 ALPR cameras - eight from his budget and an additional 14 with funds from a Homeland Security grant, and asking me to review a draft ALPR policy. The Chief said he planned to present the proposed acquisition to the City Council on November 28, 14 days later. Those 14 days include four weekend days and two holiday days. I asked him to postpone the request to a later Council meeting, but he refused, saying “I apologize for the tight timeline. We’ve been working hard on the draft policy and we just wrapped it up. . . . Unfortunately I can’t push this item out because the board that selects the recipients of the grant funding needs a commitment from Council so they can move forward on their decision on how to distribute the funds.”
Contrary to the Chief’s statements, the policy itself shows that it was prepared by Lexipol, not SCPD, and Chief /Esclabnte has admitted that in an email to me. Moreover, the Chief said that “We already had a policy for the LPR, but we’ve updated our policy which is attached.” In any event, it is unclear why SCPD did not begin the process sooner. This tactic is reminiscent of how SCPD, under a prior administration, rushed this Council into approving the acquisition of the BearCat, telling the Council that it had to act immediately to obtain the grant money. That hasty decision caused a public uproar, which forced the Council to reconsider the matter and hold additional public meetings.
The Council should not let that happen again. More time is needed to consider this purchase and to allow sufficient time for robust public comment and input on this important matter. And, if this grant money truly will disappear if the Council does not act on November 28, that’s OK. The Council should not approve the purchase anyway. But even if the Council decides after thorough public input that it is a good thing to have themselves and every other resident of the City tracked and surveilled every time they drive their car, there will certainly be more money available in the future from other military and law enforcement sources.
No public meeting
There has been no public meeting to inform the public and gather input about the grave dangers and invasions of privacy caused by the ALPRs. When the SCPD deployed the only existing ALPR in the City, in Beach Flats, SCPD held at least one public meeting where the Beach Flats residents were given the opportunity to weigh in on the proposed use.
General objections to ALPRs
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As a general matter, we perceive that the Constitutional expectation of privacy in our public actions are being eroded to near nothing. Installing ALPR cameras throughout the City will greatly, unnecessarily, and unjustifiably accelerate that erosion.
ACLU opposes the deployment of ALPR systems, period. We have the following concerns about ALPRs in general:
1.ALPR systems make our community less, not more, safe because they violate privacy, facilitate dangerous police stops, and risk exposing our immigrant community members to harm.
2. ALPR systems are high-speed cameras. They capture not only images of license plates and the precise time and location of the vehicles, but also whatever is in the field of vision of the camera. This can include photos of individuals inside vehicles, children playing in their front yard, etc.
3. The vast majority of ALPR data are collected on law-abiding people going about their daily activities – taking children to school, work, worship, shop, receiving medical care, etc. With this sensitive location information, government agents can closely map and track a person’s movements, habits, and associations over time.
4. Equity issues: ALPR cameras are often placed in working class neighborhoods and communities of color, disproportionately impacting their lives. This is true in Santa Cruz, where the only existing ALPR camera is in lower income, heavily Hispanic Beach Flats. In some jurisdictions, police have also used ALPR to target religious minorities and others exercising First Amendment rights. In 2015, the New York Police Department (“NYPD”) recorded and collected pictures of Muslim worshippers’ license plate numbers as they arrived at Mosques to pray and exercise their First Amendment rights.
5. ALPR systems facilitate police stops of drivers and police violence against motorists.
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In San Francisco, blind reliance by police on a flagged ALPR scan led to the wrongful detention of a Black woman at gunpoint, triggering a multi-year civil rights lawsuit.
In Colorado, police officers forced four Black children to lie face down on the hot pavement after misidentifying their car as a “stolen” vehicle based on an incorrect reading of an ALPR system.
6. About sharing data with other agencies
Despite the state law barring agencies from sharing ALPR data with out-ofstate agencies, some jurisdictions shared or share ALPR data with nonCalifornia agencies. In May 2023, Electronic Frontier Foundation, ACLU-NorCal, and ACLU-SoCal issued demand letters to 71 California police agencies for such violations.
Neighboring city Gilroy has violated this.
https://www.eff.org/press/releases/civil-liberties-groups-demandcalifornia-police-stop-sharing-drivers-location-data Sharing data with other California agencies can lead to a state-wide, draconian surveillance network.
7. Data Collection and Retention
A year-long retention period, which is the standard in the current proposed policy, is extremely long. This is a very long period for retaining sensitive location information that the Santa Cruz Police Department has not found relevant to a specific criminal investigation or civil action. Importantly, even if sharing were limited to ensure compliance with state law as discussed above, as long as the City chooses to retain information about the locations of drivers it may be subject to legal demands for that information from agencies outside the state and that do not share the City’s values.
Recently Stanford PD & Santa Clara Sheriff had their data hacked and held for ransom. How secure is this data, almost all of which is of innocent people? Misuse and abuse of ALPR data
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6 In Menlo Park, an officer used ALPR data to track his girlfriend's travels Texas is apparently using ALPR data to track women leaving the state to get abortions. Some companies that provide the service make the information available to private investigators, allowing anti-abortion activists to continue compiling their own license plate data access.
https://www.austinchronicle.com/daily/news/2014-08-12/undercover-audioreveals-anti-abortion-tactics/ An Ohio officer pleaded guilty to stalking an ex through ALPR; a Michigan officer looked up home addresses of women he found attractive; and two MiamiDade officers ran checks on a journalist after he aired unflattering stories about the department.AP: Across US, police officers abuse confidential databases AP: Across US, police officers abuse confidential
databases
An investigation by The Associated Press finds that scores of police officers are abusing confidential law enfor...
FLOCK
Working with police departments, neighborhood watches, and other private customers, Flock not only allows private camera owners to create their own “hot lists” that will generate alarms when listed plates are spotted, but also runs all plates against state police watchlists and the FBI’s primary criminal database, the National Crime Information Center (NCIC). Flock’s goal is to expand to “every city in the United States, and its cameras are already in use in over 2,000 cities in at least 42 states.
Unlike a targeted ALPR camera system that is designed to take pictures of license plates, check the plates against local hot lists, and then flush the data if there’s no hit, Flock is building a giant camera network that records people’s comings and goings across the nation, and then makes that data available for search by any of its law enforcement customers. Such a system provides even small-town sheriffs access to a sweeping and powerful mass-surveillance tool, and allows big actors like federal agencies and large urban police departments to access the comings and goings of vehicles in even the smallest of towns. And every new customer that buys
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7 and installs the company’s cameras extends Flock’s network, contributing to the creation of a centralized mass surveillance system of Orwellian scope. Motorola Solutions, a competitor to Flock, is pursuing a similar business model.
SAMPLE COALITION LETTER OPPOSING THE ACQUISITION OF AUTOMATED
LICENSE PLATE READERS
Date
Mayor Councilmember Councilmember Councilmember Councilmember Your City Council Street address City, CA ZIP
Re: Community Opposition to the Proposed Acquisition of Automated License Plate Readers
Dear Members of the [X City Council/ X Board of Supervisors], We are a community coalition of groups and individuals dedicated to protecting civil rights and civil liberties, including the right to be free from intrusive, discriminatory, and dangerous government surveillance. We write to raise concerns over the City’s proposed acquisition of Automated License Plate Readers (“ALPR”). We express strong opposition to the proposed acquisition of ALPR systems in the [City/County Name and Department]. ALPR systems will make our community less, not more, safe because they violate privacy, facilitate dangerous police stops, and risk exposing our immigrant community members to harm.
The [City Council/Board of Supervisors] should not authorize a new deployment of ALPR systems in our community. ALPR surveillance cameras automatically record the images of license plates, the vehicle’s precise location, and at times even the photographs of the individuals inside of vehicles. ALPR cameras are often placed throughout a community, including on light poles, overpasses, and patrol cars.
Government agencies can – and have – used the location information collected by ALPR to deport immigrants and track people exercising their First Amendment rights.
ALPR cameras record and store time and location specific images of thousands of drivers per day, regardless of whether those drivers have violated any law. For drivers who regularly drive past ALPR surveilled areas, the cameras can capture multiple snapshots of their location and vehicles a day. With this sensitive location information, government agents can closely map and track a person’s movements, habits, and associations over time, including where they live, work, worship, receive medical care, or where their child attends school.
All people should feel safe to worship, to attend a protest, and go about their personal lives safely without unwarranted surveillance. But in communities with ALPR, there is often no way for a driver to avoid having their location captured by such a system, short of choosing not to drive. Police have also used ALPR to target religious minorities and others exercising First Amendment rights. In 2015, the New York Police Department (“NYPD”) recorded and collected pictures of Muslim worshippers’ license plate numbers as they arrived at Mosques to pray and exercise their First Amendment rights. 1
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8 1 Adam Goldman & Matt Apuzzo, With cameras, informants, NYPD eyed mosques, ASSOCIATED PRESS (Feb. 23, 2021) https://www.ap.org/ap-in-the-news/2012/withcameras-informants-nypd-eyed-mosques.
Local law enforcement agencies frequently share ALPR location information with federal immigration agencies and exposes the lives and futures of immigrants to needless harm. Public records show that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”) and Customs and Border Patrol (“CBP”) exploit ALPR-collected location information to target, locate, detain, and deport immigrants as they drive to work, run errands, or drop their children off at school.2 At least one California law enforcement agency has been sued for sharing the locations of drivers with out- of-state and federal agencies, a practice which is illegal under California law.3 Any community considering an ALPR system must take seriously that the possibility that the sensitive location local drivers will end up in the hands of a rogue government agency such as ICE.
ALPR systems facilitate police stops of drivers and police violence against motorists. In San Francisco, blind reliance by police on a flagged ALPR scan led to the wrongful detention of a black woman at gunpoint, triggering a multi-year civil rights lawsuit.4 More recently, police in Walnut Creek detained the director of a non-profit at gunpoint after another unnoticed license plate reader system error.5 And in Colorado, police officers forced four Black children to lie face down on the hot pavement after misidentifying their car as a “stolen” vehicle based on an incorrect reading of an ALPR system.6 Whether due to computer or police error, the use of ALPR systems to stop drivers poses a threat to the health and safety of all motorists.
Finally, ALPR systems have not been meaningfully demonstrated to prevent crime or meaningfully improve public safety. To the contrary, studies indicate that ALPRs do not have a deterrent effect on crime, with a recent analysis of ALPR cameras in Alameda County finding that auto thefts actually increased following installation of a system in 2020, ending a period of steady decline.7 And while ALPR vendors and police agencies often tout the effectiveness of ALPR in reducing crime, public safety experts point out that any reduction in crime cannot be attributed to ALPR themselves.8 We urge the [City Council/Board of Supervisors] to reject this ALPR proposal. We also encourage the [City Council/Board of Supervisors] to adopt an ordinance prohibiting the future acquisition of ALPR by city departments including the police.
Moving forward, we urge the [City/County] to engage community members in a discussion about non-surveillance
2 Vasudha Talla, Documents Reveal ICE Using Driver Location Data From Local Police for Deportations, ACLU of Northern California (Mar, 13, 2019), https://www.aclu.org/blog/immigrants-rights/ice-and-border-patrol- abuses/documentsreveal-ice-using-driver-location-data. 3 Case page, Lagleva v. Doyle, ACLU of Northern California website, https://www.aclunc.org/our-work/legal- docket/lagleva-v-doyle-license-platesurveillance. 4 Kade Crockford, San Francisco Woman Pulled Out of Car at Gunpoint Because of License Plate Reader
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9 Error, ACLU, May 13, 2014, https://www.aclu.org/blog/privacy-technology/locationtracking/san-francisco-woman- pulled-out-car-gunpoint-because; Matt Cagle, San Francisco – Paying the Price of Surveillance
Without Safeguards, ACLU of Northern California, May 22, 2014, https://www.aclunc.org/blog/san-francisco-paying- price-surveillance-withoutsafeguards. 5 Zach Norris, Opinion: At gunpoint, police handcuffed me after license-plate reader error, The Mercury News, June 23, 2021,
https://www.mercurynews.com/2021/06/23/opinion-at-gunpoint-police-handcuffed-mebecause-of-a- license-reader-error/. 6 Matt Novak, Cops terrorize Black family but blame license plate reader for misidentifying ‘stolen’ vehicle, GIZMODO (Aug. 4, 2020) https://gizmodo.com/copsterrorize-black-family-but-blame-license-plate-rea-1844602731. 7 Cynthia Lum, Julie Hibdon, Breanne Cave, Christopher S. Koper, & Linda Merola, License plate reader (LPR) police patrols in crime hot spots: an experimental evaluation in two adjacent jurisdictions, JOURNAL OF EXPERIMENTAL CRIMINOLOGY, https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11292-011-9133-9 (2011); Lauren Do (@laurendo), Twitter (Dec. 21, 2021, 2:05 PM), https://twitter.com/laurendo/status/1473414317605150722?s=11. 8 Louise Matsakis, Flock Safety Says Its License Plate Readers Reduce Crime. It’s Not That Simple, WIRED (Oct. 24, 2019), https://www.wired.com/story/flock-safetylicense-plate-readers-crime/. alternatives to ALPR that have been demonstrated to actually improve the health and safety of communities like our own.
Sincerely,
_______________
"Why can't we all just get along"..Rodney King
Virus-free.www.avg.com
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1 Rosemary Balsley
From: John Hall <[email protected]>
Sent: Monday, November 27, 2023 10:20 AM
To: City Council; Fred Keeley
Subject: My strong opposition to item 15, ALPR
Dear Mayor Keeley and Council members,
Thank you for your service.
I write to register my very strong opposition to passage of item #15 on your agenda for tomorrow’s meeting. Others have provided deep analysis, I’m sure. I’ll just summarize my major points.
ALPR is a deep invasion of privacy, a real move toward an Orwellian, big‐brother, 1984 world. It is over the top government surveillance that will draw into its data net a huge number of individuals who have committed no crime.
The data will not be controlled be the City and it will not be secure.
Those controlling the data in other jurisdictions have occasionally used it for non‐law enforcement purposes.
It is unnecessary.
It is ineffective.
It is a waste of money, including when compared to other uses that grant money in this program can be used.
I would take passage of this item as a sign that the City Council is not fully thinking through its law enforcement policies.
Please vote NO!
John Hall
. . . . . . . .
John Hall
[email protected]
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1 Rosemary Balsley
From: Scott <[email protected]>
Sent: Monday, November 27, 2023 10:44 AM
To: City Council
Subject: Licence plate Readers
Mayor and Council Members ,
Please Do Not approve the placement of these Licence Plate Readers in Santa Cruz .
The SCPD has not shown a realist need for these devices .
The Constitution Guarantees the Right to Privacy , these devices erode that right .
There must be something that could be done with this grant money that doesn't Violate the Rights of the People .
Resist the drift towards a "Police State".
Scott Graham
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From: Bonnie Bush
To: City Council
Subject: FW: Objection to Item 15 on 11.28.23 meeting Agenda - ALPRs Date: Monday, November 27, 2023 10:35:27 AM
Attachments: image001.png
Bonnie Bush
City Clerk
City of Santa Cruz
809 Center St., Room 8, Santa Cruz, CA 95060
Phone: 831-420-5035
Email: [email protected]
Web: www.cityofsantacruz.com
Public Records Requests may be submitted online via the Public Records Request form, by email, or by hard copy form available at the City Clerk’s Office located at 809 Center Street, Room 9, Santa Cruz, CA 95060.
Please note: Public Record Act Requests submitted via email, fax, USPS, or dropoff after 5:00 p.m. on a business day, Saturdays, Sundays, or holidays will be processed as received on the next open business day. The 10-day response period begins when the request is received.
From: Ami Chen Mills-Naim <[email protected]>
Sent: Monday, November 27, 2023 10:29 AM
To: Peter Gelblum <[email protected]>
Cc: [email protected]; Renee Golder <[email protected]>; Sandy Brown <[email protected]>; Martine Watkins <[email protected]>; Sonja Brunner <[email protected]>; [email protected]; Scott Newsome <[email protected]>; Bonnie Bush <[email protected]>; Bernie Escalante <[email protected]>; Tony Condotti <[email protected]> Subject: Re: Objection to Item 15 on 11.28.23 meeting Agenda - ALPRs At a time when we are losing privacy rights by the second and desperately need resources for social services, I support Mr. Geblum's statements regarding ALPRs.
Thank you for your kind attention to this matter,
Ami Chen Mills
Constituent, District 3
Peter Gelblum <[email protected]> wrote:
Dear Mayor, Vice Mayor, and Council Members:
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On behalf of the Santa Cruz County Chapter of the ACLU of Northern California, I submit these objections to Item 15 on the Agenda for the 11.28.23 City Council meeting. This item should not have been placed on the Consent Agenda. It is known to be controversial, and is a matter of great concern to the residents of the City. We urge you to reject the artificially rushed proposal for the SCPD to acquire and install multiple ALPR cameras that will indiscriminately track the movements of every person driving a vehicle in the City at great cost and with no demonstrated ability to reduce crime or make residents safer.
At an absolute minimum, the item should be continued to a later meeting to allow fuller consideration by the Council and more opportunity for public input.
Our detailed reasons follow.
What are ALPRs?
These high-speed cameras capture license plate numbers of every vehicle that passes the camera, and upload the time, date, and locations of the plates to large, searchable databases owned and operated by private companies that are not transparent or accountable to the public or elected officials.
There is no demonstrated need for these highly invasive cameras There have been no reports of any member of the public, much less a large number of people, asking SCPD to install ALPR cameras, and Chief Escalante has not even suggested his desire is motivated by any public clamor. There has been no news of a crime wave in Santa Cruz, much less one that could be addressed by these cameras that track every single person here, 99.9 % of whom are innocent of any wrongdoing. Why then install them, when there are enormous downsides in terms of cost, invasion of privacy, and infringement on Constitutional rights and civil liberties? Apparently just because SCPD wants a new way to gather more information about our residents, as law enforcement always and predictably wants to do.
There is no demonstrated positive impact on public safety SCPD is unable to demonstrate that the existing ALPR in Beach Flats - or any other ALPR - has had any positive impact on public safety. I asked the Chief, “Do you have any data regarding the efficacy of the Beach Flats ALPR? I'm thinking of such things as the number of plates read, the number of hits against hot lists, the number of arrests made as a result of those hits, the number and type of charges brought as a result of those hits, the number of convictions obtained as a result of those hits, and the number of incorrect hits.”
The Chief responded that he did not have any of the information I requested, The only relevant information he had was that the ALPR got a “hit” on a car that was wanted in a case from Fremont - apparently there has not been a single case involving a crime in Santa Cruz that was affected in any way by data picked
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up by the Beach Flats ALPR.
The Chief's submission does not contain a single piece of evidence or data demonstrating that ALPRs make the public safer. Nothing. And it is certainly not obvious in that they would.
Indeed, the City of Menlo Park recently decided to not use ALPRs, in significant part because there was no demonstrated need or positive impact of the system. https://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/2023/09/29/citing-privacy-concerns-menlopark-says-no-to-automated-license-plate-readers “‘I'm also thinking about the cost to civil liberties and privacy that have been expressed by members of our community and the ACLU,’” [Mayor Jen] Wolsoin said. “‘If it's such a needle in a haystack [referring to the fact that 99.9% of the data is never used], how are we then showing the need for this? (How are we showing) the benefit of this, given the cost to privacy, leaving ourselves more vulnerable to data hacking and whatnot.’” “The council decided not to consider installing ALPRs unless new data proves their efficacy in deterring crime.” This Council should make the same reasonable decision.
Other law enforcement agencies in the County do not use or want ALPRs Sheriff Hart has told us that he does not want or need ALPRs, Sheriff Hart is a thoughtful and highly respected and experienced law enforcement leader. His decision to not use ALPRs is powerful evidence that SCPD does not need them. (The Sheriff’s Office borrowed two ALPRs for a couple weeks at one point to help with an investigation of shootings in a particular place, and removed them promptly when the ALPRs did not capture any relevant information. This is extremely different than Chief Esclante’s plan to permanently install 22 cameras throughout the City simply to spy on every single driver, and not to solve or investigate a particular crime.)
The cost cannot be justified
According to the article cited above, the Menlo Park PD wanted to install 36 cameras, at an initial cost of $284,900 and ongoing costs of $251,000 per year to rent the cameras. That's an initial cost of almost $8,000 per camera plus almost $7,000 per year. For the 22 cameras SCPD wants, that adds up to about $176,000 in initial costs plus $154,000 per year. Particularly given the City’s weak financial condition, it would be irresponsible for the Council to lock the City into these costs for a product of such unproven and dubious benefit, and with such serious negative impacts on privacy and civil liberties.
Chief Escalante’s submission to the Council says that SCPD would use the $84,000 Homeland Security grant to rent 14 ALPR cameras for two years, or
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$3,000 per camera per year. (It is unclear why there is such a large difference between Menlo Park’s cameras and the ones SCPD wants to rent.). In any event, the submission drastically understates the actual cost to the City. It fails to mention (1) that SCPD wants to acquire 22 cameras, including 8 from its own budget; (2) the installation fee referenced in the FAQ of $150-650 per camera, or $3,300- $14,300 for 22 cameras; (3) the rental cost of the 8 additional caneras, or $24,000 per year, and (4) the cost for the 22 cameras after the first two years, after the grant money is used, of $66,000 per year. These costs simply cannot be justified.
Insufficient notice
Chief Escalante sent me an email on November 14, informing me that he wanted to purchase 22 ALPR cameras - eight from his budget and an additional 14 with funds from a Homeland Security grant, and asking me to review a draft ALPR policy. The Chief said he planned to present the proposed acquisition to the City Council on November 28, 14 days later. Those 14 days include four weekend days and two holiday days. I asked him to postpone the request to a later Council meeting, but he refused, saying “I apologize for the tight timeline. We’ve been working hard on the draft policy and we just wrapped it up. . . . Unfortunately I can’t push this item out because the board that selects the recipients of the grant funding needs a commitment from Council so they can move forward on their decision on how to distribute the funds.”
Contrary to the Chief’s statements, the policy itself shows that it was prepared by Lexipol, not SCPD, and Chief /Esclabnte has admitted that in an email to me. Moreover, the Chief acknowledged that there wasn't a lot of work to do on the Policy, when he wrote to me. “We already had a policy for the LPR, but we’ve updated our policy which is attached.”
In addition, the Chief’s submission itself says that the next step, transmission of the proposed letter to the OR3 Body of Five does not need to happen until 12/31. Even if that timeline is accurate, this matter could be continued at least to the 12/12/23 Council meeting to allow for the fuller, unhurried discussion this important matter deserves and to allow the public more time to weigh in. The Legislature specifically recignized the importance of public input in Civil Code Section 1798.90.55, which prohibits the implementation of any ALPR system before providing the opportunity for public comment at a regularly scheduled meeting of the governing body. (It is worth noting that the City attempted to deprive the public 9f this statutory right by placing Item 15 on the consent calendar.)
In any event, it is unclear why SCPD did not begin the process sooner. (“Your failure to plan is not my emergency.”) This tactic is reminiscent of how SCPD, under a prior administration, rushed this Council into approving the acquisition of the BearCat, telling the Council that it had to act immediately to obtain the grant money. That hasty decision caused a public uproar, which forced the Council to reconsider the matter and hold additional public meetings.
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The Council should not let that happen again. More time is needed to consider this purchase and to allow sufficient time for robust public comment and input on this important matter. And, if this grant money truly will disappear if the Council does not act on November 28, that’s OK. The Council should not approve the purchase anyway. But even if the Council decides after thorough public input that it is a good thing to have themselves and every other resident of the City and every tourist tracked and surveilled every time they drive their car, there will certainly be more money available in the future from other military and law enforcement sources.
No public meeting
There has been no public meeting to inform the public and gather input about the grave dangers and invasions of privacy caused by the ALPRs. When the SCPD deployed the only existing ALPR in the City, in Beach Flats, SCPD held at least one public meeting where the Beach Flats residents were given the opportunity to weigh in on the proposed use.
The Council should reject the request because the SCPD Policy 415 has glaring problems and is not ready.
Among other problems:
Section 415.3.1 requires an SCPD employee to prepare the “guidelines and procedures” required by Civil Code Section 1798.90.5 et seq. These are crucial steps that must be in place before the Council decides whether to approve the purchase, and before the system is acquired and implemented, covering such topics as training, monitoring the system, ensuring accuracy of the data, and how long the data is kept. I asked Chief Escalante to delay asking the Council to approve a purchase without the necessary guidelines required by law, and he refused, saying they weren't ready yet.
Section 415.5 in one place says the data will be kept for at least one year and in another place for 30 days. I have asked the Chief to coarify this apparent contradiction.
Section 415.5 also fails to prohibit SCPD with sharing ALPR data with any out-of-state or federal agency, as required by state law. Civil Code Section 1798.90.5(f) and 1798.90.55(b). The Attorney General has confirmed this prohibition. https://oag.ca.gov/news/press-releases/attorney-general-bontaadvises-california-law-enforcement-legal-uses-and Even if the Council decides to allow SCPD to install the ALPRs, it should not do so unless and until the Policy is fixed and complies with State law.
General objections to ALPRs
As a general matter, we perceive that the Constitutional expectation of privacy in our public actions are being eroded to near nothing. Installing ALPR cameras throughout the City will greatly, unnecessarily, and unjustifiably accelerate that
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erosion.
ACLU opposes the deployment of ALPR systems, period. We have the following concerns about ALPRs in general:
1. ALPR systems make our community less, not more, safe because they violate privacy, facilitate dangerous police stops, and risk exposing our immigrant community members to harm.
2.ALPR systems are high-speed cameras. They capture not only images of license plates and the precise time and location of the vehicles, but also whatever is in the field of vision of the camera. This can include photos of individuals inside vehicles, children playing in their front yard, etc.
3. The vast majority of ALPR data are collected on law-abiding people going about their daily activities – taking children to school, work, worship, shop, receiving medical care, etc. With this sensitive location information, government agents can closely map and track a person’s movements, habits, and associations over time.
4.Equity issues: ALPR cameras are often placed in working class neighborhoods and communities of color, disproportionately impacting their lives.
This is true in Santa Cruz, where the only existing ALPR camera is in lower income, heavily Hispanic Beach Flats. In some jurisdictions, police have also used ALPR to target religious minorities and others exercising First Amendment rights.
In 2015, the New York Police Department (“NYPD”) recorded and collected pictures of Muslim worshippers’ license plate numbers as they arrived at Mosques to pray and exercise their First Amendment rights.
5.ALPR systems facilitate police stops of drivers and police violence against motorists.
In San Francisco, blind reliance by police on a flagged ALPR scan led to the wrongful detention of a Black woman at gunpoint, triggering a multi-year civil rights lawsuit.
In Colorado, police officers forced four Black children to lie face down on the hot pavement after misidentifying their car as a “stolen” vehicle based on an incorrect reading of an ALPR system.
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6. About sharing data with other agencies
Despite the state law barring agencies from sharing ALPR data with out-ofstate agencies, some jurisdictions shared or share ALPR data with nonCalifornia agencies.
In May 2023, Electronic Frontier Foundation, ACLU-NorCal, and ACLU-SoCal issued demand letters to 71 California police agencies for such violations.
Neighboring city Gilroy has violated this.
https://www.eff.org/press/releases/civil-liberties-groups-demandcalifornia-police-stop-sharing-drivers-location-data Sharing data with other California agencies can lead to a state-wide, draconian surveillance network.
7. Data Collection and Retention
A year-long retention period, which is the standard in the current proposed policy, is extremely long. This is a very long period for retaining sensitive location information that the Santa Cruz Police Department has not found relevant to a specific criminal investigation or civil action. Importantly, even if sharing were limited to ensure compliance with state law as discussed above, as long as the City chooses to retain information about the locations of drivers it may be subject to legal demands for that information from agencies outside the state and that do not share the City’s values.
Recently Stanford PD & Santa Clara Sheriff had their data hacked and held for ransom. How secure is this data, almost all of which is of innocent people?
Misuse and abuse of ALPR data
In Menlo Park, an officer used ALPR data to track his girlfriend's travels Texas is apparently using ALPR data to track women leaving the state to get abortions. Some companies that provide the service make the information available to private investigators, allowing anti-abortion activists to continue compiling their own license plate data access.
https://www.austinchronicle.com/daily/news/2014-08-12/undercover-audioreveals-anti-abortion-tactics/ An Ohio officer pleaded guilty to stalking an ex through ALPR; a Michigan
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officer looked up home addresses of women he found attractive; and two Miami-Dade officers ran checks on a journalist after he aired unflattering stories about the department.
https://apnews.com/general-news-699236946e3140659fff8a2362e16f43 Thank you in advance for your careful consideration of these objections.
Peter Gelblum, Chapter Chair
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1 Rosemary Balsley
From: Jeff Rudisill <[email protected]>
Sent: Monday, November 27, 2023 10:44 AM
To: City Council
Subject: Vote against ALPR proposal
Dear Santa Cruz City Council members,
I live in Santa Cruz County, and though I'm not a city resident, I find the proposed installation of ALPRs to track my travels into Santa Cruz City an offense against my right to privacy. This would clearly be a move that would further alienate SCPD, and thus the City, from its citizens by participating in the creeping control through Homeland Security.
The Chief's position that he would lose the funding is specious. It appears to pressure the City Council for an unnecessarily quick decision. This proposal needs additional time for study and citizen input. After giving the citizens such an opportunity, if the City deems it imperative to install the devices, I'm sure funding could or would be found from many Federal agencies.
Please consider the wisdom of SC County Sheriff Hart, who, as I understand it, finds using such devices unnecessary and intrusive.
Sincerely,
Jeff Rudisill
220 Mar Vista Dr., SPC 87
Aptos, CA 95003
‐‐
This email has been checked for viruses by AVG antivirus software. www.avg.com
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1 Rosemary Balsley
From: Marcia Bryant <[email protected]>
Sent: Monday, November 27, 2023 3:18 PM
To: City Council
Subject: URGENT. WE ARE NOT CHINA. NO SPY DATA
Honorable Fred Keeley,
City Council and
Manager Matt Huffaker~
Urgent Attention. NO ONE wants to assimilate Communist China with the proposed surveillance Cameras at 22 sites in Santa Cruz… entrances included, collecting complete data on all, and NOT UPHOLDING The Constitution in the least.
You were never elected to do THIS, and prepare for a surveillance city agenda, just like in communist China.
STOP ALL PROCEEDINGS ON THIS ACTION IMMEDIATELY.
I’m from the Medical Field, and exponentially see how this is a total obstruction of our freedom and pursuit of happiness to travel. Absolutely unnecessary.
Thank You for following your conscience at this crucial time.
Highest Regards,
Marcia Bryant
Sent from Marcia
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1 Rosemary Balsley
From: fred geiger <[email protected]>
Sent: Monday, November 27, 2023 3:47 PM
To: City Council
Subject: My Opposition to license plate surveillance cameras.
Dear Council members.
We wish To state my opposition to the proposed license plate reading cameras.
Reasons
1.Not proven useful in current City installation ‐ according to Police Chief when asked to state examples 2.
Illegally used for personal and political uses in documented cases elsewhere.
3. Invasion of privacy due to background also photographed 4. Info is not hack proof .
5. Lack of public process , as to Community input in advance.
6. Possibllity of misuse leading to lawsuits against the City.
7. The local Sheriff has said he does not see a need for them in our County‐ he is certainly in a position to make such a judgement.
Pls do not allow this mistaken process to advance.
Fred J. Geiger
Susan F. Martinez
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1 Rosemary Balsley
From: Ron Pomerantz <[email protected]>
Sent: Monday, November 27, 2023 3:59 PM
To: City Council
Subject: ALPR
Good day Council members and Mayor.
The Department of “Homeland Security” is in business to take away personal freedoms and undermine 1st Amendment rights under the guise of protecting public safety. The SCPD has not provided a scintilla of local evidence to support spending tens of thousands of dollars for the ALPR system let alone support and maintenance. There are inadequate protections from the private corporation that will access and control it.
You’ve been backed to the wall to purchase this wasteful and unnecessary system to get a DHS grant without adequate public time to scrutinize it. The grant covers less than half of the system purchase and none of the ongoing costs. Our local money can most certainly be better spent on actual local law enforcement issues.
Please deny this grant request and any local money for an ALPR system.
Thank you for your time and thoughtful consider.
Ron Pomerantz
Sent from my Magic phone
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1 Rosemary Balsley
From: Erica Stanojevic <[email protected]>
Sent: Monday, November 27, 2023 4:12 PM
To: Fred Keeley; City Council; [email protected]; Matt Huffaker; Bernie Escalante Subject: Oppose automatic license plate readers
Hello Councilmembers,
My name is Erica Stanojevic, and I oppose the city purchasing automatic license plate readers. These devices are unlikely to deter or prevent crime, and have the capacity to be used in negative ways. A surveillance state is creepy; we don't need that in our city.
Be well,
Erica
15.119
1 Rosemary Balsley
From: Marv Lewis <[email protected]>
Sent: Monday, November 27, 2023 4:45 PM
To: City Council; Fred Keeley
Subject: Subject: Opposition to Automated License Plate Readers - Agenda Item 15 Dear Mayor Fred Keeley and Santa Cruz City Council Members, I am writing to express my strong opposition to Agenda Item 15 on the Nov 28 City Council Agenda regarding Automated License Plate Readers.
The proposed Automated License Plate Readers raise profound concerns about the potential erosion of the right to privacy, an essential pillar within a democracy. While recognizing the vital role of law enforcement, I am apprehensive about the possible encroachment on personal freedom posed by this proposal. This concern is heightened by the potential for abuse, infringement on civil liberties, and the broader impact on individual freedoms.
Drawing parallels to the landmark case of Griswold v. Connecticut, which safeguarded privacy rights, emphasizes the need for careful consideration of any measures that might curtail these fundamental rights.
The prospect of collecting data on innocent individuals is not only troubling but also has far‐reaching implications for personal freedom. While acknowledging the potential benefits in criminal investigations, we must consider the broader impact on individual liberties.
Specifically, the inclusion of "lawful purpose" raises concerns due to its lack of specificity. Without clear delineation of what qualifies as a "lawful purpose," there is a risk that the language could be exploited to justify a range of activities, some of which may not align with community expectations of privacy and individual rights. I encourage the City Council to provide explicit definitions or limitations to avoid misinterpretation and safeguard against potential overreach.
Furthermore, the language within the item, specifically "Protect Critical Infrastructure," particularly raises concerns about potential abuses. While safeguarding critical infrastructure is undoubtedly important, the lack of specificity in defining what constitutes "critical infrastructure" and the measures to protect it raises apprehensions.
The worry is that such vaguely defined terms could be subject to interpretation and manipulation, leading to potential abuses of power. In the absence of clear boundaries, there's a risk that the authority granted under this language might be used in ways that extend beyond genuine protection needs, potentially infringing on individual freedoms and privacy.
In conclusion, I strongly urge Mayor Fred Keeley and the Santa Cruz City Council Members to reject this motion, given its broader implications for privacy and freedom—both for constituents within and outside of law enforcement. It is essential to uphold accountability in defining personal freedom within a democracy.
Sincerely,
Marv Lewis
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Fiscal Year (FY) 2024 State Homeland Security Program
Grant Proposal – Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRs) 1) Motion to approve an FY 2024 State Homeland Security Program Grant proposal letter and direct staff to send the letter to the Santa Cruz County Office of Response, Recovery, and Resilience, Authorized Body of Five, no later than December 31, 2023.
2) Motion to approve the installation of automated license plate readers within Santa Cruz city limits, purchased with funds received through the FY 2024 State Homeland Security Program Grant.
November 28, 2023
Santa Cruz Police Department
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Automated License Plate
Reader Similar Uses
1. Locate stolen, wanted, or
suspect vehicles
2. Locate suspect(s) of an arrest
warrant or criminal investigation
(violent, retail, catalytic
converter, etc.)
3. Locate witnesses or victims of
violent crime(s)
4. Locate missing children and
elderly individuals
(Amber/Silver Alerts)
5. Protect the public during
special events/situational
awareness
6. Protect critical infrastructure
Security
. Oversight . Protection
Camera software captures, and
Flock’s database temporarily
stores rear vehicle/license plate-
related information only
No facial recognition or
personally identifiable
information (PII) supported
software
Multifactor authentication and
single sign-on identity
management tools
Santa Cruz Police policy and
Senate Bill 34 restrict the use
and sharing of data (cannot
share with private, federal, and
out-of-state entities)
Flock Transparency Portal 15.122
Data
Sharing
• ALPR systems are
restricted to law
enforcement personnel
with:
1) An official and
legitimate law
enforcement
purpose for
accessing the system.
2) A criminal case or
incident number/name
• Photos generated by Flock
Safety ALPR devices would
be owned by the Santa
Cruz Police Department
and never sold or shared
by Flock
Data
Retention
• Data retained for a
maximum of 30 days by
Flock
• Only case-relevant data
will be downloaded and
booked as evidence
• Retention period
based on type of
crime.
Database
Use
X No personally identifiable
information (PII) collected
X No facial recognition
software
X No video surveillance
X No traffic enforcement
X Prohibited uses:
immigration enforcement
(Senate Bill 54),
harassment or
intimidation of protected
classes, personal use.
• Only data collected
related to the rear of a
vehicle and rear license
plate, “pointer” location,
and time last seen
Santa Cruz
Police
Department
&
Flock Safety
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Neighboring ALPRs
Alameda County
Atherton
Burlingame
Capitol (Pending)
Colma
Fremont
Gilroy
Hayward
Hillsborough
Los Gatos
Millbrae
Milpitas
Monte Sereno
and more…
Morgan Hill
Newark
Piedmont
Salinas
San Carlos
San Jose
San Leandro
San Mateo
Santa Clara
Seaside
Scotts Valley
Watsonville
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Transparency
Portal
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Law Enforcement Perspective
Full Image
Download, Copy, Full Page, etc.
• ALPR camera is fixed and photo
location is static (i.e., camera does
not move, rotate or zoom)
• Only the rear of a vehicle is
captured
• Need to Know & Right to Know
required to access ALPR data
• ALPR data is verified before law
enforcement action
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Questions?
November 28, 2023
Santa Cruz Police Department
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City Council
AGENDA REPORT
DATE: 11/08/2023
AGENDA OF: 11/28/2023
DEPARTMENT: Public Works
SUBJECT: Consulting Engineering Services for Wastewater Treatment Facility Capital Improvement Projects – Amendment 1 to Agreement (PW) RECOMMENDATION: Motion to authorizing the City Manager to execute Amendment 1 in a form approved by the City Attorney to the Agreement with Brown and Caldwell (San Jose, CA) in the amount of $3,950,000 to provide additional engineering services for Wastewater Treatment Facility capital improvement projects. The Director of Public Works is authorized to execute contract amendments within the approved budget.
BACKGROUND: The City of Santa Cruz (City) Wastewater Treatment Facility (WWTF), originally built in 1928 has been periodically expanded and upgraded. The Advanced Primary modifications were completed in 1988. The Secondary Treatment Facility upgrade was completed in 1998. In 2017 the City contracted Kennedy Jenks to conduct a major equipment condition assessment at the WWTF. Kennedy Jenks assessed WWTF asset conditions, identified high-risk assets, and provided a prioritized list of capital improvement projects to be completed over the next 10 to 15 years.
In February 2022, the City of Santa Cruz solicited statements of qualifications from qualified consultants to provide consulting engineering support services for the upcoming capital improvement projects at the WWTF. Proposals were received from Brown and Caldwell (San Jose), West Yost (Concord), Kennedy Jenks (Santa Clara), MNS Engineers (San Jose) and Dudek (Santa Cruz). Proposals were evaluated based on the criteria listed in the solicitation, and the evaluation committee selected Brown and Caldwell. In June 2022 , the City awarded the contract for consulting engineering services to Bown and Caldwell for a total estimated amount of $3,280,000.
The eventual Service Orders created out of this initial agreement and their costs are listed below:
SO1 – Influent and Headworks Infrastructure Project; Estimated Cost $2,391,000 SO2 – Interstage Pumps and Blower Upgrades; Estimated Cost $147,000 SO3 – Hight Strength Waste Implementation Plan; Estimated Cost $140,000 SO4 – Digester Gas Piping Rehabilitation; Estimated Cost $122,000 SO5 – Funding Strategy and Support; Estimated Cost $15,000 SO6 – 54-inch Sewer Rehabilitation Construction Management; Estimated Cost $450,000
16.1 Brown and Caldwell identified the need to rehabilitate both the headworks and the 54-inch influent sewer line after conducting a comprehensive condition assessment of the plant’s influent and headworks infrastructure. They then provided 100% design plans for both projects, with the 54-inch sewer rehabilitation project being prepared for advertisement in the coming weeks. They have also provided 100% design plans and engineering support for the digester gas piping rehabilitation project and analyzed the feasibility of incorporating pre-processed food waste into the plant. To date, Brown and Caldwell has provided a wide range and types of services, has met the City’s needs, and been responsive to staff input.
DISCUSSION: As staff identifies more components of the WWTF’s aging infrastructure that requires replacement, it is critical to develop a regional master plan for the WWTF to sequence the various projects and address future treatment requirements. The master plan will evaluate considerations such as the climate change resiliency, cyber security, existing collection system capacity, capital improvement projects development, and recycled water/indirect potable reuse (IPR), etc.
Additional expected Service Orders to be funded by this amendment are as follows:
SO7 – Regional Wastewater Master Plan; Estimated Cost $1,450,000 SO8 – Owner Advisor for the Plant-Wide Electrical Upgrade; Estimated Cost $200,000 SO9 – Interstage Pumps and Blowers Design; Estimated Cost $750,000 SO10 – Grit Gate Replacement; Estimated Cost $250,000
SO11 – Secondary Treatment Piping Replacement; Estimated Cost $500,000 SO12 – Primary Sedimentation Tank Rehabilitation; Estimated Cost $400,000 SO13 – Digester 1 thru 4 Rehabilitation; Estimated Cost $350,000 SO14 – Miscellaneous Projects Support; Estimated Cost $50,000 Amendment 1 to the agreement will fund and approve the additional Service Orders which will be scoped/finalized and authorized as needed. The proposed draft scopes of work dated October 27, 2023 are attached.
FISCAL IMPACT: The WWTF capitcal improvement projects engineering services contract is funded in the Wastewater Enterprise Fund Capital Investment Program as City WWTF Headworks Replacement (c402204), the Front-Spruce-Pacific-Sewer Main Rehab (c401606), and the WWTF Infrastructure and Major Equipment Study (c401706). There is no impact to the General Fund.
Prepared By:
Hoi Yu, P.E.
Associate Professional
Engineer
Submitted By:
Nathan Nguyen, P.E.
Director of Public Works
Approved By:
Matt Huffaker
City Manager
ATTACHMENTS:
1. SCOPE OF WORK, DATED OCTOBER 27, 2023 FOR ADDITIONAL ENGINEERING
SERVICE FOR WASTEWATER TREATMENT FACILITY CAPITAL IMPROVEMENT PROJECTS.DOCX
2. AMENDMENT 1 TO PROFESSIONAL SERVICES AGREEMENT.DOCX
16.2 FINAL October 27, 2023