Cervantes’ Requested State Audit Approved by Joint Legislative Audit Committee – Essential First Step in Safeguarding Privacy for All Californians
(SACRAMENTO) – The Joint Legislative Audit Committee (JLAC) this week approved an audit of the operations and status of the fusion centers in California that was requested by Senator Sabrina Cervantes (D-Riverside). The audit will be performed by the California State Auditor.
“This audit will examine fusion centers’ legal authority, funding sources, personnel vetting, data systems access, training, information security, and management oversight. It will assess compliance with California law — including SB 54 — and determine whether taxpayer resources are being used lawfully and effectively,” said Senator Cervantes, a champion of the right to privacy for all Californians. “It has been 13 years since the last federal audit. There has never been a successful state audit anywhere in the country.”
Five known fusion centers are in California at the direction of the State Threat Assessment Center: The Northern California Regional Intelligence Center in San Francisco; the Central California Intelligence Center in Sacramento; the Joint Regional Intelligence Center in Los Angeles; the San Diego Law Enforcement Coordination Center; and the Orange County Intelligence Assessment Center. These centers are among the 80 Department of Homeland Security (DHS)-designated fusion centers within the National Fusion Center Association that bring together federal, state, and local law enforcement, public agencies, private contractors, and first responders to collect, analyze, and distribute intelligence.
No single law established this network, defined its mission, or authorized it to operate as a domestic intelligence collection mechanism.
Hearing witness George Parampathu, a legislative attorney with the ACLU California Action, spoke in favor of the audit and said that fusion centers are “black box information gathering sites between local governments, state governments, and the federal government.” He noted that the centers do not exist in the California Code and have murky funding. “Without real oversight, we have no way of knowing who has their hands on our data. They are spying on all of us.”
Mike German, a former FBI agent and member of the Brennan Center for Justice, provided support remarks at the Hearing. “An audit is an essential first step,” noting that fusion centers regularly produce unreliable and inaccurate information. “Spreading unreliable information does not improve security…at a time of heightened national security risk is exactly the time you want accuracy and oversight at Fusion Centers.” He also added, “The approval of the fusion center audit is great news for anyone who cares about privacy, democracy, and security. Ensuring that state domestic intelligence operations are operating within the law and using resources efficiently and effectively against genuine threats is essential to Californians’ safety. It will be the first opportunity for Californians, and all Americans, to get an independent review of the largest domestic intelligence enterprise this country has seen, 20 years after the federal government developed it.”
Senator Cervantes noted, “Forty million Californians deserve to know whether these centers are serving their intended counterterrorism purpose — or whether they have become unaccountable surveillance infrastructure operating in the shadows of our democracy.”
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