AI-generated transcript of City Council Public Health and Community Safety Committee 05-20-26

[Emily Lazzaro]: I have to do all these. I can't ask any questions. Okay. Hello. This is a meeting of the Medford City Council Public Health and Community Safety Committee, May 20th, 6 p.m. The purpose of this meeting is to discuss the yearly report about surveillance that's conducted by the police department and the parking department. So I'm going to give you a little bit of background on that. This ordinance requires reporting on a report to be submitted to the city council to this committee on March 15th. It's very easy for this report to slip the minds of department heads. That is absolutely fine. These things happen. Everybody's very busy. I have no problem with people forgetting to do a report. I forget to do reports all the time. What is frustrating is when activist groups or public organizations or grassroots organizations from Medford ask me as the chair of this committee to follow up with the police department. And I do that three weeks after the report was due, send a message to the chief of police asking about the report, and do not receive the report for six more weeks. Not only did I not receive the report for six weeks after that, but I did not receive a reply to my first message. I did not, after the second message, a week later, I received a reply that said, I will call you tomorrow. Did not receive a call the following day. The third time I reached out, it was a text message expressing frustration, saying, we're having the committee meeting. This was now May, two months after the report was due. I said, we're having the committee meeting, and the meeting's going to be about how you didn't do the report unless you do the report. And then a fourth time, I sent an email and cc'd the mayor, and then the report appeared. However, the chief of police is not in attendance at this meeting. We have the report. The committee has read the report. We have questions from the committee and from Medford People Power, which is the grassroots local activist organization that worked on the ordinance and has followed up in accordance with the ordinance with questions on a yearly basis based on the report. You can't ask questions to somebody who is not in attendance at a meeting and is not on Zoom. So that's problematic. We do, however, have the department head from the parking department. The parking department also has some surveillance that happens for enforcement of parking laws, parking rules. I didn't remind our department head, again, the issue is not that things slip our minds that are due once a year. If it wasn't part of the social landscape, I would not know about taxes, guys. It's not a big deal. You can be reminded of something. It's not a cardinal sin. The problem is when you're reminded four times and you like willfully do not deliver a report. We will get to the parking conversation, but something that I just want to say in this public meeting is that we have a mayor whose role, and in this case has been performing this role, whose role is to enforce the laws of a community. We have code enforcement officers as part of the building department. They enforce some of the rules. The parking department does some of the enforcement. But the bulk of the enforcement of the laws in Medford, it comes from the police department. And the head of the police department, the role of that person is to lead the police department in enforcing the laws, and the law says that you need to deliver a report in accordance with this ordinance. An ordinance is the law. The highest officer of law enforcement in Medford is the chief of police. Does how make it make sense? I'm feeling extremely frustrated by the series of events that led us here. If we could have had a conversation civilly in this room this evening, I wouldn't have said all of this in a public meeting, but I feel that it's necessary to explain that, you know, we're not In fifth grade, and we're not talking about spelling homework, we're talking about the legal requirements of an ordinance written by the legislative body of the city of Medford, people who were elected by the people of Medford. So I don't think this is appropriate. I don't think any of this should have occurred. That being said, today we received a report from the parking department. So would you mind presenting? We have our, sorry, one second. Now I'm flustered. Yes, please. Yes. Oh, yeah. Why don't you call the roll? Sorry. It's not like strictly necessary in a committee meeting, but let's go for it. Thank you.

[Rich Eliseo]: Councilor Kelly. Present. Councilor Leming. Present. Councilor Scarpelli. Present. Councilor Tseng. Present. And Chair Lazzaro.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Present. Five present, none absent. The meeting was called to order earlier when I banged the gavel. So here we all are. Thank you for being here. Parking director Sarah McDermott. She we we have this report. I reviewed it. It all looks in order. I really appreciate you doing the answering all the questions and I'm sorry enable. really efficiently and I do have so we did you make copies of the report there are copies of the report if you all would like to take a look it's just one page but. I have a question that I don't believe is a required question, but just for my own edification. What is done with the data when it is not being used by you after the fact? Is it deleted or is it stored somewhere?

[Sarah McDermod]: It's stored and actually that's an inquiry that Medford People Power made. I believe in the fall of 2025. And I don't have all my emails back and forth with them. I have the impact report and the reports created last year. But I know that it is stored, it is owned by the city of Medford, the data, so no other vendor can sell that data. And it is stored in a secure, Cloud environment, don't quote me on that, but I could answer that more thoroughly if I have a chance to review emails that I sent to Medford People Power. And if these are representatives from that group, they can correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe the data I sent them was satisfactory to their inquiry in that it, I think, made them feel more secure about the data. But I can follow up with more detail later.

[Emily Lazzaro]: So it's required that it be stored in an ongoing basis?

[Sarah McDermod]: It's stored for reference. I mean, it's helpful to have that data to refer back to. If there's a complaint about a car frequently being parked on a street where it shouldn't be or if a vehicle's been parked or accused of being parked for 48 hours or longer than that, then we can refer back and see if that vehicle has been parked. on that street for multiple days if the cameras have gone down there. So it is helpful for us to have that data. And also it helps me keep track of the work that my enforcement staff does with this equipment to make sure they're utilizing it regularly and that they're utilizing it to its full potential, which unfortunately last year they weren't able to do because we've had some technical difficulties with it that have now been resolved. So the amount of citations issued in 2025 compared to 2024 is fewer, but that's because it was down for a substantial couple of months, which makes a big impact. So yeah.

[Emily Lazzaro]: OK. Another question, and this is really, I think I know the answer to this, but when your cameras are capturing images, the images are just of license plates. people's faces, or the context of the car?

[Sarah McDermod]: Usually LPR has, and I believe ours is the same, it has two kind of cameras. One's a kind of a, it'll capture a photo just of the plate, and it uses high contrast to make out the digits. And then there's a camera that takes a photo of the background for some context, so we can see the street and maybe some signage in the photos. But any faces that come up in the background are automatically blurred, so there's no identifying There's no way to identify people in any of the images that the LPR collects. Okay, great.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Do we have any other questions from Councilors? You can ask questions by the way, if you want to. Okay, seeing none, is there anything you would like to say about the report otherwise?

[Sarah McDermod]: No, it was pretty, it was pretty, I mean, compared, I'm sure compared to what the police had to put together, it was pretty minimal. There haven't been any changes to how we use it, any changes to the technology or the vendors that we use. So, me honestly putting it together was fairly easy once I remembered that it was due. And like I told you, my goal next year is to have it ready before you even ask for it. So anyhow. But no, I have nothing really to add other than what's in the report that pretty much says it all.

[Emily Lazzaro]: OK. Thank you so much. You're welcome. I will say it's, I mean, again, it's not, the issue is not like forgetting something. as long as we can have the report once you're reminded.

[Sarah McDermod]: Sure. But I also personally don't like having to do something so quick. And not that you pressured me to have it done right away. But we have our timeline, our schedule. And when I have to do something else and work it in, that's on me, though. So better prepared next time. But yeah, thank you for letting me know.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Thank you. And I will. allow the opportunity now for public comment on the parking director's report. I know the public hasn't really had a chance to review it. It wasn't really on the agenda so we may decide to. I mean I'm not sure if there will be another opportunity to meet on this with a representative from the police department present but that may be useful. And maybe I should look at the ordinance again and see if there's something that can be done or a loophole to close. But either way, thank you for being here. And if we have any public comment, now would be the moment. Yes, please come to the podium and you can state your name and address for the record.

[Julie Flynn]: My name is Julie Flynn and I'm a member of Medford People Power. Can you come a little closer to the mic? I'm sorry. Again, my name is Julie Flynn and I'm a member of Medford People Power. We just got the report and I haven't been able to look at it. I don't know if the department would be willing to, if there was any questions that we had, to email those to you and then maybe that could be Any if there's any responses and that could be submitted to to the city council.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Yeah I would be comfortable with that. If again I would like to look at the ordinance and review how we might go about. looking at how we may need to do, I may want to do an additional committee meeting. So maybe we can do that at that time. Actually, could you just speak into the mic if you want to?

[Julie Flynn]: Oh, how long is the information stored for?

[Emily Lazzaro]: You can come on up to the mic as well. Sorry.

[Sarah McDermod]: As far as I understand, the data is stored indefinitely unless we ask them to remove. Assuming that they would remove it if we asked them to remove it, it's stored indefinitely until we say otherwise, as far as I understand. And are the reports generated from it? We don't really, I don't really have reason to generate reports from that data other than to check on what my staff has been up to with the equipment. And really that's only viewed by me. So that's what I've generated reports for so far. All right.

[Julie Flynn]: Well, thank you. Sure. I don't have any more questions right now. Thank you.

[Marie Izzo]: Hi, my name's Marie Izzo. And although it sounds very benign, ALPRs are still part of a flock system, which is a concern across the board related to surveillance and how data is used and abused. And so even the fact that this is indefinitely stored, I guess I don't quite understand if you're looking to you know, give someone a ticket, or they've been over the two hour limit, why would it be indefinitely restored? I mean, kept, what is that all about? And also, I'd love to know, is there a policy related to sharing information with the police, how that's used, if it's used in that way? You know, we know so little about these technologies and how potentially they can be abused. The ACLU has a lot of guidelines related to ALPRs. particularly about how they can be abused. So I'm sure People Power will reach out to Ms. McDermott. But I would love the answer to that question. Why are they stored indefinitely?

[Emily Lazzaro]: Thank you. It does seem prudent to me for us to schedule another follow-up meeting to discuss these issues. I would agree, even just from the perspective of storage on a cloud for every violation of a parking rule forever seems wasteful from like a just data storage isn't nothing. And if we're not sure why, it seems like maybe if there is a policy to delete after, if there's a statute of limitations, if somebody was going to contest a ticket, I think that makes sense. Please come up. Because if then, once they have the power to contest it and they decide not to, and then the data is deleted, that makes sense to me. But please correct me if I'm wrong.

[Sarah McDermod]: I also don't know what the consideration for public information storage would be in that regard, if that's something that we would have to keep. But I would have no objection to agreeing on a timeline. But first, I would need to make sure that we could delete it in a way that would ensure that it was actually gone and not still floating around somewhere. So I can look into that through my vendor and see what they say about, if we did want to delete some or all of this after a certain date, can you assure us that it's actually deleted and gone, or is that not something that you can do? I would be a little skeptical if they said they couldn't do it, but I'm going to just I don't want to assume too much. Second, we do store citation data indefinitely. So that's, and the citations themselves, while not using LPR technology, do have GPS coordinates tied to them, photos tied to them, photos of the cars. And those photos, if somebody's in the background, that is not blurred. Yeah, so if somebody's in the background while one of my enforcement officers is taking a photograph of the car for the purpose of backing up their citation, that does not have the same blurring technology as the LPR. It's just the LPR that has that. In those citations, we have to store indefinitely, especially if they're unpaid. We can't get rid of the tickets themselves. So there is other data related to parking being stored indefinitely.

[Emily Lazzaro]: OK.

[Sarah McDermod]: Just saying.

[Emily Lazzaro]: But that's not ever stored by a third party. It's just stored by the Medford parking department?

[Sarah McDermod]: Yes, through our vendor.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Oh, OK.

[Sarah McDermod]: It's on their database, which is protected by a login. You can't access it unless you have credentials to access that database.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Does the vendor? maintain that data in any way besides just holding it? Is there any kind of, like, you wouldn't know?

[Sarah McDermod]: I wouldn't think so, other than just maintaining the database and storing it. I don't know that it's stored in the same way that the LPR is stored, because I've never asked that of them. Yeah, if there's concerns about data being stored indefinitely, I just wanted to make people aware that the citation data is also stored indefinitely, as people who showed up for renewals and had tickets from 2016 that were unpaid found out. So, yeah. I just thought I'd mention that. Okay. I'm happy to come to another meeting to answer more questions. I myself just whipped this report together. I didn't really have time to review the surveillance policy I put together last year or the impact report from last year to see if there's been anything else I should mention. But yeah, folks can just reach out if they have questions to me, if they want to, about this policy or the use of the LPR or tickets or anything.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Okay, thank you. Thank you. Are there any other comments from councillors? Councilor Tseng.

[Justin Tseng]: Thank you. This is not, as said, this is not about parking, but about police. This is an ordinance that community members have worked a really long time, over years, to draft, to pass, to advocate for. And I think the purpose of the ordinance is something that is really valuable. That the idea that in a world where modern surveillance is so prevalent and is so everywhere in our lives, And yet, we're so unaware of it that the public should have some control over surveillance. I think it's a really important idea. I think a lot of us share the frustrations that Chair Lazzaro has expressed at the start of the meeting and throughout the meeting. I myself had a list of questions, most of them very technical about the report. And yet, to not have anyone here to answer those questions is something that's truly frustrating as a Councilor. I think it makes sense to go back to the ordinance to look at what avenues we have, given I'm sure that folks have questions for the police. It might make sense to collect the questions in some form and send them over if we can't get them to schedule another meeting. But I think we should schedule another, try to schedule another meeting first. Because it's best to get people in person and to ask those questions. So I would recommend trying to schedule that meeting first, keeping this paper in committee. I'll make that motion to keep the paper in committee. But it's frustrating. And I think it's important actually to have an opportunity where members of the public can ask questions. That's a huge part of the ordinance, alas.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Thank you. I would have to agree. It's frustrating as well that notice was given and, you know, we have other things we could be doing, all of us, families and jobs. So and it's budget season and we have many budget meetings we still have to have. I mean we'll be seeing the chief soon. We have to review his budget. So it's not like we won't have a conversation. I mean maybe we could do this then but I'd hate to. I'd hate to have to do it then. We could have done it tonight and then talked about his budget during that meeting. Anyway. Councilor Leming.

[Matt Leming]: Yeah, I'll second Councilor Tseng's motion and repeat the general frustration that's been echoed here tonight. I don't even think it would necessarily have to be the chief of police himself and answer this. It could be the lieutenant that's indicated in the report that's in charge of this. Just really any representative. I could understand if there's a scheduling, mishap or something like that, but these meetings are a time for the public to see the Medford Police Department engage in transparency and just be there for the Q&A. I did have questions related to MPD's general understanding of this policy, since we did get an email from a resident who said that they were told something by a member of the MPD that seemed to misunderstand this ordinance. So I would like to clarify that. And also just general questions about what is what is in the report. Beyond that, generally speaking, I don't like to see the attitude that ordinances that are written by the legislative body are optional, which is an attitude that I've seen several members of the administration engage in and that's really not something that we should be seeing, both with these deadlines and with other ordinances that are written by this body. So yeah, I don't really see how we can continue this particular meeting without anybody to answer any questions about the report. So I would I would second Councilor Tseng's motion. That's all.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Thank you. Councilor Malauulu.

[Liz Mullane]: Thank you. And I won't belabor the point because I think it's been said, but as someone that's not actually a committee member but wanted to come specifically because of the report that was sent in and had some specific questions, have also been reached out to by various members. of Medford asking questions about this very topic. It is frustrating to be here and not be able to ask them at all. So I appreciate you, Vice President Lazzaro, and the work of trying to reach out and get this scheduled and get a report done and put together. So it was helpful to at least be able to read it but certainly have many questions that I look forward to hopefully being able to answer at some point in the future so that I too can respond back to residents who send me emails and I'm not able to provide any kind of update because things like this happen at our meetings. So thank you. Thank you.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Okay, so we have a motion on the floor from Councilor Tseng. Councilor, would you mind repeating what that motion was?

[Justin Tseng]: Just a motion to keep this, to schedule another meeting with MPD present and to keep the paper in committee.

[Emily Lazzaro]: And we should probably have the motion include inviting Director McDermott as well, so that we have time to review the report and ask any follow-up questions, though we did have a pretty robust discussion. It's still kind of, if possible, would be nice to do that. OK.

[Justin Tseng]: Given that Matt's online, maybe you can add a journey to it. Oh, yes. Just to save us time.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Great. On the motion of Councilor Tseng, seconded by Councilor Leming to keep the paper in committee, schedule another meeting of this committee on the same topic and adjourn. Mr. Clerk, can you call the roll?

[Rich Eliseo]: Councilor Callahan? Councilor Leming? Yes. Councilor Scott Petley? Yes. Councilor Tseng? Yes. And Chair Lazzaro?

[Emily Lazzaro]: Yes. Five in the affirmative, none in the negative. The motion passes and the meeting is adjourned. Thank you.