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This week, Denver Mayor Mike Johnston’s office provided an update to the city council on its Surveillance Task Force, which was established to research surveillance technology and its vendors with whom Denver has contracts, such as Flock, and to establish safeguards around them.
There seemed to be a shift in tone among some members, who voiced appreciation for collaboration and the progress made toward a solution.
“It took a while to get our feet on the ground, and I feel like we’re making progress,” said Councilman Kevin Flynn.
City leaders have been working hard to find a way to keep communities safe.
“Because that’s what the people of Denver want,” said Councilwoman Amanda Sawyer. “And they’re real clear about it.”
They’re trying to do this while avoiding unintentionally putting others at risk through the technologies they use.
“This is a really hard balance to find,” Sawyer added. “I think it is also an incredibly necessary balance for a city of 750,000 people, because this technology is not going away, and there are real benefits to it as it relates to community safety.”
Over the course of the last few months, guardrails have been placed around this technology from both the mayor’s office and as a result of the task force.
“Now it’s just Denver and Denver Police officers that have access to the data,” said Tim Hoffman, the mayor’s Director of Policy. “And then that regular auditing process, making sure that that’s also a very robust security check to make sure that Denver’s and our citizens’ data are being protected.”
Denver has also opted out of any updates or rollouts of new technologies with the Flock system without explicit approval.
Those are just some of the changes that have been made, but now the city council is working on something more permanent.
“Are there ways and are there areas of agreement to codify into some sort of ordinance, some of those safeguards?” said Hoffman.
The city council’s goal is to have everything finalized before the city’s Flock contract expires at the end of March.
“We need to have something in place before we continue to utilize that technology,” said Councilwoman Serena Gonzales-Gutierrez.
Gonzales-Gutierrez was among the city council members frustrated after Mayor Johnston used his authority to enter into the short-term extension and requested that the mayor’s office run any future decisions on surveillance technology past the city council.
“I think it’s only the right thing to do,” said Gonzales-Gutierrez.
Hoffman said, “I think it’s part of what this task force has been designed to do, is to make sure that there’s a regular touch point with city council members.”
He told CBS Colorado that they have not found any instances of improper access to the Flock system during their research and are confident they’ll have sufficient solutions in place by the time the city’s contract ends.
“We’re moving at a pace that I’m optimistic that we’ll have additional changes in place and other improvements, certainly in the next month or two,” Hoffman said.
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