A take away item from the December meeting of the members was that the security committee would put out a survey to get a better idea of the scope of our security needs.
If anyone missed it, it was sent by the board via email on Feb 16th with the list of meeting dates for the year.
Admittedly after reading the 4 questions in the survey this was my reaction:
Let's take a deep dive.
- Do you want the HOA to improve safety at a neighborhood level?
This makes the assumption that people don't feel safe and that someone must do something. The first question should be one to establish the baseline of people's feelings of safety before jumping to whose responsibility it is.
There are 4 options that a resident may choose. Yes - if dues don't increase, Yes - even if dues increase, No - its not their responsibility, or I don't know. The answers further conflate the data that's being collected. The question has nothing to do with cost but some of the answers do. Is cost the only factor that people answering 'yes' care about?
- The security committee has proposed a plan [plan details] The plan will cost [$$$] . Do you feel the cost of this plan is reasonable?
This isn't a terrible question and the answers are yes, no, or I don't know, but it makes the assumption that the plan is a good one. I don't think it's fair to say that we've confirmed that assumption.
- It is understood that privacy in our neighborhood is a concern for some residents. Please keep in mind that the roads in our neighborhood are owned and maintained by Howard County. Any cameras that are used for security must take photographs of all cars entering or leaving the development. The software that comes with the system can be programmed to decide which pictures to keep and which to delete based on a blacklist of license plates. If you do not want pictures of your car saved in the system, your license plate must be stored on that blacklist. If you have any concerns about this process, or privacy in general, please summarize them below.
This question is very leading. It almost tries to sway you to believe that there is no privacy concern at all. A cleaner question would be "What are the privacy concerns you have?" or "Do you have privacy concerns? Please elaborate if so".
Provided you're OK with being identified in a list in their system, let's go back to the safety blanket 'delete' messaging. What kind of delete is performed? Is it a true delete or is the company just flipping a bit in their database so the results don't come back? Are the images purged in addition to their references? The system also takes pictures of people passing by, there's no mention of this or how we block that tracking. Data, especially behavioral data, is the most valuable asset right now, what company would just throw that away?
The question as it is, also makes the assumption that the only privacy concern you could possibly have is surrounding your vehicle and not the fact that these technologies are biased and disproportionately used against POC. Introducing surveillance technology should always been taken very seriously and we have to really think about if we're OK giving up our rights and those of others so freely.
- If you do not feel comfortable with a camera system, what alternate solution(s) would you prefer?
... community jiu jitsu classes?
But on a serious note, this, again, is based on the assumption that there is action that needs to be taken for an imminent threat. It's not a good question for gathering valuable insights.
Thanks for coming to my farm talk, I hope there's room for conversation in the future because pushing in a direction and trying to drag us all along isn't it.
