In 1938, Verman Kimbrough, the mayor of Sarasota, announced that city officials had figured out how to harness the marvels of the machine age. Grinning, he claimed it wouldn’t be long before rolling sidewalks would usher beachgoers from the cushy sand to their cars, and electric shuffleboard games would take the “hard work” out of play, transforming our humble town into a “utopia for lazy people.”
When the 21st century rolled around, the sidewalks stayed put, and the flying cars we were promised never arrived. But the machines did show up. Our watches remind us when we’ve been sitting too long, driverless cars share our streets and Alexa can teach our children a second language while we’re cooking. Futurist Alvin Toffler got it right in 1999 when he said we were “moving into a future where information will flow as freely as air, and the boundaries of the public and private will be redefined.”
That future is perhaps nowhere more visible—or invisible—than in the cameras capturing our comings and goings. Automatic license plate readers (ALPRs) have existed since the 1970s, but recently they’ve become flashpoints for debates over civil liberties and data security—in large part due to Flock Safety, a company that leases ALPRs and other surveillance technologies to law enforcement, homeowners associations and businesses. Sarasota has 57 ALPRs within city limits…