We haven’t talked about the Oakland Privacy Advisory Commission (OPAC), but that changes right now, because you need to know about this powerful, secretive organization.
OPAC is one of those little-known Oakland government boards, stuffed with unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats, that dislikes police, is dominated by racialists, imagines that its primary responsibility is to achieve equity (not fighting crime), is controlled by the most woke members of the City Council, and does its anti-OPD work in the dark.
Meet Brian Hofer, its head since 2016. Ever hear of him? Neither did I, until a few days ago, when he was on the news criticizing Gov. Newsom’s very welcome (to most of us) contribution of 500 surveillance cameras to our city and area. Hofer immediately accused Newsom and us proponents of security of being motivated by “fear,” and he slammed what he called our (and Newsom’s) “unproven, misguided belief” in the efficacy of security cameras.
“Fear”? Yes, Mr. Hofer, Oaklanders are fearful for our lives and property. And for good reason, even if you don’t get it. And we don’t buy your propaganda that security cameras don’t work.
Let’s learn a little more about Mr. Hofer and his OPAC.
In January, 2016, the City Council unanimously approved OPAC’s creation. It was an era when emergent technologies, such as facial recognition, drones and license plate readers, were becoming available to law enforcement. Oakland electeds decided, in their infinite wisdom, “to protect citizen privacy rights” by creating the new oversight group. OPAC would have nine appointed members, led by a Chairperson. The new Commission was to report directly to the City Council.
At its first recorded meeting, in January, 2018, OPAC conceded that “… surveillance technology may…be a valuable tool to bolster community safety,” but declared that its dangers far outweighed its usefulness in law enforcement. “The City Council finds that…the abuse of surveillance technology may threaten the privacy of all citizens,” OPAC warned, adding that “surveillance efforts have been used to intimidate and oppress certain communities and groups more than others...”. You know, of course, which “communities and groups” they were talking about. One might reasonably conclude that racial issues, rather than fighting crime, inspired OPAC from Day One.
Enter Brian Hofer. As the City Council debated the use of surveillance technology, resistance to it arose in Oakland. The city was considering the creation of a Domain Awareness Center (DAC), which was to be an official centralized hub of intelligence-gathering, including “live streams of video, audio, and/or data, watching for time-critical events that require an immediate response.”
But due to the privacy concerns, the City Council created an “Ad Hoc Advisory Committee” to oversee DAC and recommend to the City Council “changes” that would allow “for informed public debate and decision making by the City Council regarding privacy and retention policies for all Surveillance Technologies in the future.” Hofer, who already had a significant reputation as an anti-surveillance activist, was chosen to head that Ad Hoc Advisory Committee, which led to his chairmanship of OPAC. From the start, Hofer signaled his skepticism regarding every surveillance technology the Oakland Police Department ever asked for. OPAC was sensitive to “community complaints” about surveillance technology and its impact upon “civil rights and civil liberties;” the Commission afforded these complaints equal weight to the ability of surveillance technology to combat crime. OPAC mandated ongoing analyses of all current and future surveillance projects, in order to “identify the race of each person that was subject to the technology’s use.” Again, we see the camel’s nose of racialism poking into the tent of public safety.
Surveillance technology is one of those things about which reasonable people can disagree. I personally believe it can help cops combat crime, and I’m therefore a big fan. The civil liberties types, such as the ACLU and Hofer, are critics, which, if it doesn’t make them pro-crime, comes pretty close. Hofer, in fact, has a long history with the ACLU. In a blog post he wrote in 2016 for the ACLU of Northern California, Hofer said that that “my own city of Oakland [has] futuristic surveillance problems,” (“futuristic” being used in a pejorative, Brave New World-ish way). He explained that his involvement with anti-surveillance activism began when he read an East Bay Express article (!!) on the DAC. “We organized to pump the breaks on the DAC project. We brought together a coalition of local groups to speak out about civil liberties concerns. We educated the city council on the DAC’s potential capabilities and ability to do real harm. And we flooded the City Council chambers with people demanding a voice in how law enforcement uses surveillance technology in our community.” And so this powerful lobbying group, using the classic organizing techniques of the left, became a power player in Oakland, and Hofer found himself at the top of the pyramid opposing surveillance technology.
My support for the strongest possible surveillance technologies is based on two things: First, these tools actually and obviously work. Secondly, I have implicit trust that law enforcement agencies will not misuse these tools or the data they provide. I’m not worried about being “spied on.” Privacy disappeared long ago in the national security state of America. None of us can reasonably expect government at all levels not to be aware of us, or to have records on us. It’s always seemed to me that, if I’m not breaking the law, then I’m safe from unwarranted government intrusion in my life—and if there are bad actors out there, which there are, then I want government to know about them. During periods of safety and security in America, we may not need surveillance technology, but we don’t live in such a period, and we probably never, ever will again. Crime, not invasion of privacy, is the primary threat to our security. To the extent surveillance technology can prevent and solve crime, we should welcome it, not put up roadblocks to its institution and use.
OPAC has lately been acting to identify specific forms of surveillance technology as they become available, including thermal imaging cameras, unmanned aerial vehicles (drones), automated license plate readers, cell site stimulators (which can track and intercept cell phone calls), robot and pole cameras, and others. OPAC has placed severe restrictions on all these technologies, which the Oakland Police Department maintains hamper its ability to combat crime, and also hinder employee morale.
And so that is what you need to know about Brian Hofer and his OPAC. We need a City Council that will immediately disband and defund OPAC, the Department of Violence Prevention and the rest of these wasteful, redundant and politicized agencies, and start treating crime as the emergency it is.
Steve Heimoff