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Committee accepts surveillance impact report for Smart Tree Inventory; staff says images are tree-focused
Summary
The committee accepted the surveillance-technology impact report for the Smart Tree Inventory, a one-time vehicle-mounted LiDAR and photography survey processed with AI that produced a roughly 16,000-tree digital inventory and 3-D models. Staff said imagery is focused on trees, hosted by a vendor, and not publicly accessible; incidental capture of people is possible but access is limited to authorized users.
The committee accepted the surveillance-technology impact report for Somerville’s Smart Tree Inventory (STIR), a one‑time assessment that used vehicle-mounted LiDAR, GPS and photography processed by AI to create a digital inventory and 3‑D models of roughly 16,000 public trees. Dr. Bukele, who presented the slides, said the system was designed for urban-forest asset management: maintenance planning, risk assessment and long‑term inventory.
Dr. Bukele said imagery focuses on trees and that the dataset is hosted by a third‑party vendor; she acknowledged incidental capture of people walking by and said images are currently accessible only to authorized staff or contractors for urban‑forestry purposes. "The technology is used solely to improve the city's management of public trees," she said. The committee noted the report's detail and voted to recommend acceptance of the STIR impact report.
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