This Is Not The Transparency We Were Promised

*|MC:SUBJECT|*

Friend,

In 2020, S.T.O.P. helped pass the Public Oversight of Surveillance Technology (POST) Act into law in New York City, requiring the NYPD to disclose all requested documents relating to its use of surveillance. But the NYPD has failed to keep the public POSTed, regularly refusing to release information about its surveillance programs, hiding, for instance, 2,700 documents on its use of facial recognition and other surveillance technologies during the Black Lives Matter protesters during Summer 2020. And the documents the NYPD has revealed in response to the passage of the POST Act, including a slew of surveillance contracts from 2007 – 2019 totaling $3 billion, are partial wins but have been heavily redacted.

Earlier this year S.T.O.P. and Quinn, Emanuel, Urquhart & Sullivan, LLP filed a lawsuit against the NYPD for systematically and unlawfully refusing to comply with requests for information related to its use of surveillance technology. But we should not have to take the NYPD to court in order to get them to follow basic oversight laws. That is why S.T.O.P. and our Privacy NY coalition partners are calling on City Council to strengthen the POST Act, passing measures that would compel the NYPD to comply with Freedom of Information Law requests and provide comprehensive information about its surveillance practices. Join our rally outside of City Hall on Tuesday, October 31st ahead of the Public Safety Committee’s hearing on the POST Act to demand that the Council takes sufficient action to deliver New Yorkers the transparency we were promised.

In Solidarity,

Sarah Roth
Advocacy & Communications Associate

Forward

NewsletterLeticia MurilloOctober 27, 2023