Milwaukee PD officers monitor the May Day 2025 march with a Critical Response Vehicle, outfitted as a surveillance van. (Photo by Isiah Holmes/Wisconsin Examiner)

A group of 19 community organizations have joined forces to push for oversight of police surveillance in Milwaukee. Together the groups signed an open letter addressed to the city’s common council, asking it to adopt a Community Control Over Police Surveillance (CCOPS) ordinance.

The measure would require existing surveillance technologies used by the Milwaukee Police Department (MPD) to receive a public hearing and be subject to approval by the Milwaukee Common Council.  The ordinance would also require the department to produce an annual report of surveillance gear. 

“The proliferation of surveillance technology by the Milwaukee Police Department has occurred with virtually no transparency, no opportunities for community input and — without a real opportunity to reject surveillance techs or advocate for critical guardrails — presents significant threats to civil rights and civil liberties that hurts us all but disproportionately impact communities of color, queer communities, people seeking reproductive healthcare, immigrant communities, people fleeing violence, and low-income communities,” the coalition states in its letter. 

“While we trust our local elected officials in Milwaukee, in light of the current political climate and the uncertainty surrounding future administrations at both the federal and state levels (both in Wisconsin and in other states), it is critical that our community has a say in if and how invasive surveillance technologies are used, how they are deployed against residents, if and how their data is stored and shared with third parties, and whether spending our limited tax dollars on surveillance technologies is the best way to promote public safety,” the letter adds.

CCOPS ordinances have already passed in 26 cities nationwide, and calls to rein in the flow and development of police surveillance technologies have grown in recent years in Milwaukee. Last year, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Wisconsin began advocating for CCOPS ordinances in the Badger State, prompted by a lack of discussion on the issue and the impending Republican National Convention during the summer of 2024. 

As with the 2020 Democratic National Convention four years earlier, the RNC brought with it an influx of new equipment that allowed MPD to augment its surveillance network. Before the DNC the police department upgraded its mobile phone surveillance gear, expanded a camera network capable of using automatic license plate reader technology, and purchased vans equipped with cameras and drones. The RNC likewise opened the door for a new open source intelligence software, growing MPD’s social media surveillance capabilities. 

During the summer of 2020, many people who joined protests following the death of George Floyd witnessed these technologies, and reported suspicions that they were being monitored. As time passed, investigations revealed that local police departments monitored social media closely and drew information from confidential databases, with one agency funneling much of what it’d learned into a “target list” of nearly 200 people. The list had been shared with dozens of local, state, and federal agencies from Milwaukee to Kenosha. 

Since then more attention has been focused on intelligence units such as the MPD’s fusion center, the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s “MATRIX Group”, and on technologies including drones, wiretap devices, gunshot detection sensors like Shotspotter, and spyware. More recently, Milwaukee residents have begun to express concerns about MPD’s plans to acquire facial recognition technology. 

The accumulation of these issues spurred the group of 19 community organizations to sign the letter calling for CCOPS. The coalition includes Planned Parenthood, Black Leaders Organizing Communities (BLOC), the ACLU of Wisconsin, Milwaukee Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression, Ex-Incarcerated People Organizing (EXPO), Voces de la Frontera Action, ComForce, Citizen Action of Wisconsin, the Milwaukee County League of Women Voters and others.  

The letter states that “policies are increasingly enacted, and local governments and their surveillance mechanisms will likely be used to target individuals seeking or providing these services. This scenario is particularly alarming given that Black, Brown, Muslim, queer, low-income, and immigrant communities are already disproportionately affected by law enforcement practices.” 

The letter suggests the stage is being set to repeat law enforcement spying scandals from the 1960s and ‘70s.

“Without robust oversight, we risk a resurgence of COINTELPRO-like tactics, where surveillance was used to suppress political dissent and target minority groups, including Dr. Martin Luther King Jr,” the letter states. “At a minimum, people who live, work, visit, or attend school in Milwaukee deserve to know if and how they’re being surveilled and who has access to that surveillance data.”