Big Brother will be watching

The City of San Diego has cooked up a plan to build an elaborate video spying operation around Mission Bay and Ocean Beach. According to a request for proposal issued March 5, the City wants to install “a high definition video surveillance system to monitor vessel, vehicle and pedestrian traffic in and around Mission Bay and the Mission Bay Channel entrance,” including “Digital Video Recorder (DVR) recording devices with four (4) to 16-channel (or more) ability to retain seven (7) or more days of recorded video.” The document says that “there must be a minimum of sixteen (16), or more, outdoor high definition cameras, suitable for operating in a marine environment.”

Camera locations include the Ocean Beach pier, Hospitality Point, Ski Beach, Riviera Shores South, and the De Anza Mobile Home Park South. “The network of cameras will be utilized for law enforcement purposes by local, state and federal agencies. Therefore, the images must be clear, with quality that is acceptable to court and evidence standards.” No price is specified in the document. … San Diego city council president Ben Hueso has been attracting the usual assortment of special-interest money to his Democratic state Assembly campaign. Last week it was $1000 each from Anheuser-Busch, Anthem Blue Cross of Cincinnati, the California Cable & Telecommunications Association PAC, and the California Building Industry Association PAC. … Former Union-Tribune owner David Copley has quietly obtained a coastal development permit from the City to tear down a house and build off-street parking on 1.3 acres of property he owns on La Jolla’s Country Club Drive next to Fox Hill, his late mother’s Tudor-style mansion, which he also owns.