Public comment on cameras, ordinances, and ag lands
What the county recorded
This item is not from the published agenda
It is a stretch of the recording that this archive identified as a separate matter — a call to order, a recess, or something taken up that the agenda does not list. There is no official title, no staff recommendation and no disposition, because the county never recorded one. Everything below is inferred.
What was said
Machine transcription of 28m of recording, with speaker names inferred from voice matching. 95% of 106 lines carry a name. It shows what was said, not what was decided, and both the words and the names can be wrong.
Here, and please excuse Commissioner Weightman. Now is the time for public comment. Citizens given an opportunity to comment on any current and future agenda item coming before the board or any other business under the board's purview. Today's public comment will be handled as follows. First we'll take public comment for those who are here in person. Then we will take public comment for those who are pre-registered for an online link and currently on queue. We request that you address the board. Comments are not directed that the comments are not directed personally at a commissioner or a team member, but rather directed at the issues. This provides mutual
respect between board members and the public. After stating your name and address for the clerk, a three-minute timer will be activated. A green light will be shown in the podium. After two minutes, a yellow light will indicate you have one minute left. When your time is up, a red light will be displayed, three beeps will sound, and you should close your comments. Online participants will be disconnected automatically when their time is up. Madam Clerk, do we have anyone signed up for public comment?
I have um I think five people signed up for public comment. I will call you in order of s of the way you signed.
Before we get to public comment, I'd just like to make a statement. Um we are going to be continuing the item on Orange Lake Trail, Orange Bell Trail. So if you do want to speak to that, you can wait, but we will not be discussing that item today.
Thank you. Um Thomas Smyers, followed by Amy Baird, followed by Adam Brusselback. Mr. Smyers?
Thomas Myers?
Thank you.
And Mr. Smyers before you start your comments if you could state your name and address for the record.
Move Jury
say five.
All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye.
Aye.
My name is Thomas Myers, Editor 103.15 on the middle for Newport region.
Oh sir, could you put pol We can't hear you. Can you your microphone coming? Sorry. Perfect. Thank you.
My name is Tom Smyers. Um I live at [address removed]. I was here in May, and I'm back here again to discuss the changes needed for ordinance 53016 created in 21, which allows commercial vehicles to be parked and stored in an ER residential subdivision. For the past two years, my neighbor has been running. А семі рестораційний
реперешоп. Out of a forty by eighty, thirty two hundred square foot building that he put up in twenty twenty three along the property line. The shop is open seven days a week. from about eleven o'clock in the morning till ten thirty at night. We've been dealing with Pasco County code enforcement compliance with this entire time and mostly recent with Pasco
County Assistant Administrator. My deed until late December of 21 coincides with zoning of ER residential lot. This unsolicited ordinance. Has changed the zoning and the county commissioner has known about this for over two years that it lacks police ability and code compliance. Without concise definition of commercial
vehicles in the different zones. You have allowed the subdivision to become a noisy area, and our property has become unrecognizable from the deeds. My once beautiful country home is gone. I'm asking you to please rewrite this ordinance so we can safeguard the property and neighbors who live next to these commercial vehicles. Who are allowed to park and store in an enclosed building
so we can restore the way the ER residential lots are supposed to be. On August 4th, 26, 2026. I have sent out a detailed letter that detailed letter that has happened over the two two years showing that code conforcement, code compliance cannot police this ordinance. And I pray that you can rewrite. This
ordinance so we can have our peaceful home back. I have provided a copy of the letter and photos attached to it. My neighbor has now planted bamboo all along the whole property line, two foot from my fence, to hide his operation. Now I'm gonna have to deal with bamboo encroaching on my property. He will continue to run this semi-restoration and repair business
and there's nothing that's gonna stop him. He has d been doing this for over two years.
Couldn't finish up. Go ahead and finish up.
Okay. Uh he's been plant he's um where was I? He wa so now he you're you're gonna have that bamboo growing up over there so he can hide his operation. Um This should not be allowed. One semi or a semi with a sixty foot trailer shouldn't be allowed in an ER residential lot. It is too large, noisy, and it goes it goes against Pasco County defined under rezoning for
the ER lot. Yeah.
Let me stop because it's past the three minutes. But let me just say this. I appreciate you driving all the way out here to this. Uh sorry you have to do this. But the picture that I see up here is even the most damning is this one right here. That shows a picture of a bunch of semis that are in there, at least four, shows tires along there, and then on this, it looks like a Facebook post. It says, busy day in the shop today. Had my son and driver busting blank while I was chasing down pirates. Love when I can leave him a job, and it's done by the time I get
back. Thanks for the help. Blank. So I know we've used this for you know electr electronic media for different things with with the county as far as trying to process things. Um this here tells you that this man is running a shop. So I don't know what we need to shut this thing down, but this clearly is self-incriminating by having this post that's out there. Pictures of his own inside shop that's there. I want to see the county attorney and Mr. Allen. Um David, you could work with him
right now, but you need to see this picture. This this alone should be enough to to get something done. Thank you.
Thank you. Um Amy Baird?
Good morning. Uh Amy Baird. I live at [address removed]. Uh [address removed]. And I am here today to speak about the flop type cameras that are being placed around the county. Just to be clear about the uh what we're talking about here. I have lived in Pasco County for 30 years. I have worked here as a local business owner for more than 20 years, as has my husband. He's been here
even longer as a business owner. I have kids and grandkids who live here in Pasco County. I am here to speak about the Axon cameras. I believe that is the brand of surveillance cameras that are being placed around the county. Um And I am absolutely here to tell you that we did not sign up for this. The people of Pasco County have had no say in this happening to us.
There's been no public discourse regarding the placement of this surveillance network.
I am here to tell you also that the ways this can go wrong far outweigh any benefit to uh. to the police uh gaining information. There are too many risks.
This is definitely not just license plate tracking, it is people tracking.
The data that is being collected would absolutely require a warrant, and the Supreme Court ruling last Friday proves it.
Your job as my county commissioner is to protect me and remove the surveillance network cameras. From any location in Pasco County that they are currently installed. and to not allow any future ones to be placed.
This is a whole network of surveillance that is already documented as being abused by law enforcement in particular. There have been officers arrested for stalking people. There is an integration of these surveillance networks, which is our true concern. Data is being stored in the cloud, and the chances of our data being hacked by unintended parties is real.
And there are no controls in place to protect Our data. And I might remind you your data as well. You as well are being tracked as you move around Pasco County currently. Please do your job to protect the citizens of Pasco County. Please. This is serious stuff. um and protect us from the mass surveillance immediately. This is Critical. Thank you. Thank you.
Thank you. We have Adam Brusselback, followed by Elaine Lance, followed by Anthony Uh Sicant Sicanes? Sorry, I'm sure I slaughtered that last name, but you can correct me.
Hello, my name is Adam Brusselback. I live at [address removed]. I'm a software engineer and a small business owner. I'm asking you not to approve more license plate cameras, and I don't think the ones that are already up should be there. One camera reading one plate tells you nothing about a wider pattern of life. Neither does a hundred separate readings sitting in a hundred separate places. But put them together in a database and the pattern bec appears
that nobody intentionally collected and nobody approved. which neighborhood a car sleeps in, where it goes on weekday mornings, where which church, which doctor, which meetings, and who else's car was parked there. That pattern isn't a single record. It comes out of assembling them. And once the system exists, assembling them takes a few seconds. There's a reason the Fourth Amendment exists. Before
it, officers could search whoever they felt like without naming a person or giving a reason first. So the rule became that we have to do that. The reason comes first. And it must be about someone specific. A camera network runs that backwards, it collects on everybody, and the reason gets attached later if one ever comes up. The excuse for it is that a private company holds the data instead of the county. That doesn't change what's on it or who searches
it.
You'll be told that the courts have approved this. Read the rulings rather than what the companies say about them. A Massachusetts case that gets quoted held that with enough cameras in enough places, this becomes a search that needs a warrant. It let the program stand because it was four cameras on two bridges. The vendors quote that outcome and leave out the reasoning. But actually what's actually being bought here is the database.
The cameras just feed it. With Action, the integration is the product, plate readers, body cameras, in-car video, drones, and a mapping platform wired into the state and national databases. All of which from or all of it comes from the same vendor under one contract. Every piece added makes the pattern sharper. None of it comes back to this board for a vote. It shows up as a feature. So don't approve these and take down the ones that are already
up. Thank you.
Thank you. Elaine Lance, followed by Anthony Sikhenes. Followed by Nancy Hazelwood.
Yes, like he said, uh oh Elaine Lotz, uh [address removed] Uh yeah, some against the cameras as well. When I work for the county, we're we're a non-profit organization as all counties should be, government. And we were also not allowed to pray or put stuff on our desk unless other people with different religious beliefs were also allowed to put stuff on their desks, including Satan worshippers, Islamics,
Jewish people, Quaker people, people of different faiths. So I'm really appalled that you're sitting here praying in a government building. Because if anybody remembers history, there's supposed to be a separation of church and state. When you say the Pledge of Allegiance, justice for all, that means all. So anyway, uh about the cameras. Over 50 police officers, like she said, were caught using data from the uh data to harass women from past relationships, but
only 25 were charged. And are they going to be disciplined? I don't think so. They're not disciplined for killing people, so I doubt they're going to be disciplined for this. I also know that Texas used the cameras to hunt down a woman who had an abortion and that was her only crime. And this is ridiculous because we all know that there's more going on in Texas than one woman getting an abortion. And I'm just have to say that I'm tired of women being harassed, hunted down, prosecuted, policed, and
killed. Women are also being arrested for having miscarriages and judged for their life choices. So if you have all these cameras, you can track where they're going. Uh they're going to the doctor, they're going to the store, what's going on. I know that a lot of government agencies want to start policing our bodies more than they already are, and I'm against that. Um I don't want to live in a Nazi Germany kind of police state. And I don't know if any of you are profiting from these cameras, but
if you are That's not good either. Thank you.
All right, Anthony Sickenes and uh followed by Nancy Hazelwood.
Good morning commission. Anthony Sicineys, [address removed]. I'm here today actually to talk about, I want I want to ask the board to end Pasco County's participation in the Sheriff's Automated License Plate Reader Network by terminating interlocal agreement CAO25-0003. I obtained the agreement from the clerk and its terms make the path forward very clear. It was approved December tenth, twenty four, as part of the consent agenda. And it passed without separate discussion. I
don't raise that to accuse anyone of hiding anything, but a policy with implications with this significance for the privacy of Pasco residents deserves direct public discussion. More importantly, the agreement gives this board a clear off-ramp. So if you refer to the agreement, Section 2.5 requires the sheriff to obtain additional county right-of-way permit use or use permits for additional systems and locations. And it expressly says that the county may, within its sole discretion, withhold approval. So the county can stop expansion of this network right now.
Section 3.2 allows the county to terminate the agreement without cause with 90 days written notice. Section 2.11 says upon termination, the sheriff must remove the systems and restore county roads where they were installed. So this board does not need to prove any misconduct. It doesn't need to establish a breach of contract or wait for a higher court to determine the constitutional limits of this technology. That's not a debate for here. The question this is a question of county property and county policy. There's a meaningful difference
between a deputy observing a plate during police work and an automated network that records vehicles at camera locations and makes those observations searchable afterwards. I recognize this technology can be useful to law enforcement. I mean, we can all agree on that, but usefulness alone should not determine how much surveillance infrastructure government builds. I'm asking this board to take three actions. Today, I'm asking you: first, stop approving additional ALPR right-of-way use permits under Section 2.5. of the agreement today. Second, begin the termination
process of CAO 25-0003 and provide the sheriff with the 90-day notice authorized by section 3.2. Third, upon termination, enforce section 2.11 and require these systems to be removed from county rights. We can support law enforcement without turning every available surveillance technology into permanent government infrastructure. The county wrote an off-ramp into this agreement and I'm asking the commission to use it. Thank you.
And Nancy Hazelwood.
Good morning, Commissioners. It's good to see you again. Nancy Hayeswood, [address removed]. So this is kind of off the wall compared to what everybody else is speaking about, but I was going over a new ordinance and ran into conditional uses in ag lands. That's section 503. And the purpose is to preserve the rural and open character of various lands within the county. These
lands are ag lands, sites of vital natural water resources, functions, area with highly productive natural plants and animal communities. Areas with valuable topography and subsurface features, all of which are necessary to sustain and enhance the quality of life in the county. So then 503.3 conditional uses, the things that can be allowed in
aglands. Parachute jumps, amusement parks, automobile racetracks, medical waste disposal, construction and demolition debris dumps, sanitary landfell, yard trash disposal, mining and reclamations, sludge septage, and other waste disposal. Wastewater treatment plants, auction houses, flea market, drive in flea theaters, to name a few. So back to the purpose of the ag district.
I would say conditional uses in our coal will destroy our ag lands. All over Florida, egglands have become what people want to preserve and cherish and are essential for our counties. If you look back to the twenty fifty meeting for public For the public across the county for the 2050 plan, open spaces came out number one and two as what your citizens want to save.
It's not just me that wants to save these open spaces. It's your whole county and your citizens. We want to save the woods, wetlands, forests, and pastures. So of course it would be devastating in the Northeast Rural area plan, which is my favorite place in Pasco County. And um it has the Brooksville Ridge, which is a high recharge rare area, and the Green Swamp in it. So I'm
hoping that the county and I think it's time that y'all took a step back and looked at the conditional uses in your ag lines. Please be thoughtful about this before we don't have any left. Thank you.
Thank you.
Mr. Chair, that's the that's all that I have signed up. I don't know if you understand.
Under public comment.
We're gonna close public comment here. We have someone online.
Yes. We have Brian Michaels online. You're being elevated.
Can you can you
make
sure
he knows that the orange belt was
moved?
But he can speak if he wants. Mr. Michael, you probably have heard that. Um the orange belt item has moved. It's not on today's meeting. My understanding is if you speak today you're m you can, but um you would not be able to speak again in the future meeting on the item. Oh no,
he can't
do your rights. Okay. So you could speak on both at both meetings. Cahil, is he um elevated? Key is a microphone. Okay. Mr. Michaels, you're um you're muted. If you unmute you should be able to speak and we should be able to hear you.
Yeah.
Good morning. Um I'd like to reserve my right to speak once the item is put on the agenda. If that's our if that's uh possible.
So Mr. Michaels, I misspoke. You have the right to speak now and again in the future when it is before the board. What is what is your pleasure?
Um I'll go ahead and speak now. Um So I'm a bicycle pedestrian advocate for Pasco County. Um Pasco has the opportunity to Uh Two. Propose something that will last for decades, which is the Orange Belt Trail, which is thirty-seven mile trail throughout uh Pasco County. Um we recently or I recently reviewed the alignments for the uh Orange Belt Trail and would would recommend that the
Board of County Commissioners approved the staff recommendations for the the new alignments.
Okay. Right.
All right, thank you.
Is there anyone else on uh virtually?
Okay. Uh Mr. Cannon, you are being elevated. Hold on just one moment.
Okay, you should be able to speak. If you could just take yourself off of mute, state your name and address for the record, and then begin your comments.
Uh so my name is Jeff Cannon. My address is [address removed]. And I just wanted to sp speak regarding the flock camera situation. Um I don't know if the county commissioners realize Uh when they sign the interlocal agreement. Um And the sheriff signed uh continuing agreements with the flock safety There's actually a clause in there that allows flock safety to use Pasco County's data. even
after the contract's terminated And the wording basically states that they're allowed to use it for training purposes or to um create better services for those that they provide service to. So the issue there is It basically opens Flock to use Pasco County's data that it's collected. indefinitely, perpetually, worldwide and even after that contract uh uh is terminated. Why would anybody in their right mind
enter into a contract that has clauses in it? that lock you into something forever. Now I know the the Sheriff's Office defense to this to this Part of the c the contract is That's so they can share it in her office with other agencies. The issue is that's not what the contract says. So I would encourage the board to terminate the interlocal agreement. And if we move forward we need to explore what these cameras are really doing
and what the contracts really say. And I yield my time.
Thank you. Thank you. Um anyone else for public comment virtually?
I don't believe the other two who had previously signed up are on. Is that correct?
Okay. So Steve Church Barra, you are being elevated. Hold on just a moment.
Okay. You should be able to speak if you want to take yourself off of mute and then state your name and address for the record and then begin your comments.
Mr. Church Barrow?
You're still on mute.
Mr. Church Vara.
Last call.
Oh here we go.
Here we go.
It looks like you're off of mute. Can you please um state your name and address for the record?
So Mr. Church Fire, we are not hearing you. And your box is not lighting up when you're if you're talking?
Mr. Churchfire, we are not hearing you.
Uh we have to move on.
And then is Mr. Caden on the virtually or is he not on? Okay, so that's it, Mr. Chair. No one else.