Petition - No ALPRs, No Mass Surveillance in Vista — Not Now, Not Ever!
Vista City Council
As residents of Vista and concerned community members, we call on the Vista City Council to reject the proposed installation of Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRs), and Gunshot detection systems. We believe that this mass surveillance system poses a direct threat to our privacy, our rights and the safety of our community.
Our reasons are clear:
- It violates our rights: ALPRs and Gunshot detection systems conduct warrantless, mass surveillance on every driver, resident, and visitor, creating a permanent record of our lives. This violates our Fourth Amendment rights and our right to privacy under the Constitution.
- It fuels deportation: The San Diego County Sheriff’s Department has a documented history of sharing ALPR data with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). We refuse to allow Vista’s streets to become a pipeline for the surveillance and deportation of our immigrant neighbors.
- It is ripe for abuse: We cannot install a system that is inherently prone to misuse and stalking.
- ALPRs are ineffective: Independent studies show they waste public funds on technology that misreads number plates, leading to dangerous encounters with innocent people. 99.5 percent of scans were of cars not associated with crimes. It's mass surveillance, not crime-fighting. The core function of ALPRs is to log the movements of innocent people. With 99.5 percent of scans targeting law-abiding drivers, this technology is not a precision tool for safety, but a dragnet that wastes resources and invades privacy.
- Introducing microphones all over our cities to listening for gunshots or human voices in distress, is an invasion of privacy. With the risk of false positives, police could arrive in an aggressive posture at a location expecting a gunfight, only to find surprised people on the street. As is often the case, police surveillance can cause police excessive force.
Our demand is simple:
We urge the Vista City Council to stand for liberty and community trust by voting NO on the proposal to install Automated License Plate Readers and Gunshot detection systems.
Sponsored by
To:
Vista City Council
From:
[Your Name]
Reject any ALPR contract, no matter the company or guardrails
Dear Vista City Council,
Thank you for listening to the community this August by postponing the vote on ALPRs, and Gunshot detection in Vista. While I hoped there would have been the opportunity for you to take a firm stance against ALPRs by voting NO, now you can continue to listen to the broad and diverse voices urging you to not invest in mass surveillance through the use of automated license plate readers.
You heard from different constituents, experts, and impacted community members that the best way to protect data and preserve the privacy of ALL Vista residents is by not collecting this data in the first place. A company that derives its profits from mass surveillance does not have the best interests of our community at heart and will not protect our data.
When abuse happens, there’s no meaningful recourse. A Riverside County Sheriff used ALPR cameras to track a woman he met at festival. There have been multiple cases of police officers using ALPR data to stalk ex-partners. Escondido police used ALPR data to track people attending a protest, and impounded 11 cars. Immigrants are being targeted for deportation based on license plate data, specifically in El Cajon. In 2025, the San Diego Sheriff searched ALPR data on behalf of ICE and CBP, while Sheriff Kelly Martinez told the Board of Supervisors in 2024, that no entity outside of California would be able to access the collected ALPR data. San Diego PD, illegally installed ALPRs around Hillcrest during Pride, without getting approval from city council. These are not theoretical risks. They are already happening and demonstrating what happens when Big Tech equips law enforcement with the tools to have unfettered access to people’s lives and movements.
No guardrail can stop a bad actor with access. No deletion policy can undo a leak. No audit can untrack a person who never should’ve been surveilled in the first place.
The safest, most ethical approach is simple: don’t collect the data at all.
Instead of prioritizing surveillance technologies that do not significantly contribute to public safety, I urge you to instead invest in services that directly benefit Vista’s residents, such as:
— Fund public services like parks and recreational activities
— Mental health and behavioral health services
— Eviction prevention and affordable housing initiatives
— Legal defense and support for immigrant communities
Vista deserve solutions that promote safety, well-being, and equity for everyone, not surveillance systems that disproportionately harm vulnerable populations.
I ask that when the time comes to vote on an ALPR contract, or a Gunshot detection contract, you consider the concerns of your constituents and vote AGAINST any ALPR, or Gunshot detection, contract proposed, no matter the company or guardrails proposed. We must prioritize the needs of our community, and a system of surveillance is not the way forward.