Parent questions district camera purchase; staff outline privacy rules and Meraki capabilities

A member of the public raised technical and privacy questions about a proposed replacement of the district’s video monitoring system, asking whether the cameras would process biometric or behavioral data, whether facial recognition would be enabled, and whether vendor contracts would prevent footage from being used to train machine‑learning models.

Athena Contreras asked whether cameras would be placed in classrooms, locker rooms, counseling offices or other places with a reasonable expectation of privacy and whether license‑plate recognition or body‑shape/gait analytics would be available. She asked if the district had conducted a student-data privacy impact assessment and whether vendor contracts explicitly prohibit use of footage for third‑party model training.

District IT staff and administrators responded that the district follows administrative rule ECACAR, which prescribes retention, access and use limits for surveillance footage. The IT director said Meraki’s implementation for the district stores footage locally on campus devices and the Meraki portal is used for queries; cloud archiving is an optional, extra-cost feature the district does not plan to use. An administrator added that the AR limits storage to a maximum of 30 days and defines restricted access for investigatory use rather than proactive monitoring.

Board members requested additional contract language and continued reporting on privacy protections as purchases proceed.