A Surveillance Equipment Regulation Ordinance (SERO) is a law enacted by a municipality, county or government regional agency (such as BART) which provides for elected official approval of, transparency for, and regulation of surveillance equipment, software and methodologies used by these government actors.
A Surveillance Equipment Policy is a document specific to a piece of equipment, software or methodology used by a local or regional government, regulating under what conditions and how it may be used. A policy may stand alone, without a SERO, or it may have been created under the aegis and requirements of a SERO.
As of Sept 12th, 2020 10 municipalities (San Francisco, Oakland, Berkeley, Davis and Palo Alto in CA, Seattle, WA, Nashville, TN, Lawrence, Cambridge and Somerville in MA), 1 County (Santa Clara, in CA), and one special district (BART, in the Bay Area), have passed Surveillance Equipment Transparency Ordinances.
Locally, AC Transit has passed a Surveillance Equipment Policy for the cameras used on its rapid transit line platforms. By law, California requires jurisdictions which use Automatic License Plate Readers to have a use policy for that equipment.
Oakland Privacy had a strong hand in crafting and/or lobbying for all the Bay Area SERO’s and policies.
Below is the original template legislative text for a city or county to pass a global surveillance equipment ordinance requiring purchase approval, use policies in place and annual audits. It was proposed by the ACLU in 2016 and was known as the “Model Surveillance & Community Safety Ordinance/Community Control of Police Surveillance” (CCOPS) Template text can be modified in response to local conditions.
The ACLU also co-authored the Fighting Local Surveillance Toolkit, which contains 17 model documents including outreach letters, public records requests, meeting requests, sample op-eds, narrative frameworks, a policy checklist and a glossary of legal jargon.
SERO legislation usually includes the following general provisions:
- Requires City Council or other legislative body approval, after a public hearing, of all acquisitions of surveillance equipment by agencies of the governing entity, a consideration of civil liberties concerns and a determination that benefits outweigh costs
- Requires a use and privacy policy be in place before the equipment is deployed, specifying clearly what it may – and may not – be used for, and for how long data may be kept
- Requires any information sharing of data with outside agencies be explicit and approved
- Requires yearly reports on how and when the equipment has been used, and continuing evaluation of the efficacy of the equipment or software, resulting in termination of use if it is not effective
- Provides for some sort of enforcement mechanism, often beginning with a complaint, followed by a right to address the complaint by the jurisdiction, followed by the right to bring a lawsuit to force compliance
Check out this academic paper which analyses SERO ordinances.
Existing SERO/CCOPS legislation:
Bay Area Rapid Transit District – BART Ordinance
City of Berkeley, California original ordinance
Body Cameras Use Policy, Circa 2020
GPS Locator Device Use Policy
Facial Recognition Ban amendment to SERO, 2.99.030 Section 5
Latest ordinance text (Chapter 2.99)
City of Cambridge, Massachusetts
City of Dayton, Ohio
City of Detroit, Michigan
City of Grand Rapids, Michigan
City of Lawrence, Massachusetts
City of Madison, Wisconsin
City of New York, NY (Post Act – partial SERO).
City/County of San Francisco, California
County of Santa Clara, California
City of Somerville, Massachusetts
City of Yellow Springs, OH