There are over several dozen federal fusion centers in the U.S. The one used to police Los Angeles is named the Joint Regional Intelligence Center (JRIC) and located on Imperial Highway – a fitting name – in Norwalk. Fusion centers were part of police efforts to neutralize the Occupy Movement including through infiltration, monitoring political activity, and tracking social media. In 2012, the U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs released a highly critical report warning about “waste at state and local intelligence fusion centers.”

Another key part of the infrastructure that data-driven policing is built on are so-called “fusion centers,” the data analytic centers police use for real-time processing, analysis, and sharing of surveillance data. These spy garrisons received heavy investment in the post-9/11 expansion of local policing to encompass mass suspicion, data-gathering, and surveillance. These tactics relied on collecting and integrating law enforcement data into what federal spy agencies have called the Information Sharing Environment (ISE). There are over several dozen federal fusion centers in the U.S. The one used to police Los Angeles is named the Joint Regional Intelligence Center (JRIC) and located on Imperial Highway – a fitting name – in Norwalk. Fusion centers were part of police efforts to neutralize the Occupy Movement including through infiltration, monitoring political activity, and tracking social media.

Technology isn’t the only way LAPD gathers mass surveillance data. Some of the most critical and dangerous surveillance occurs face to face. Every time police stop or question people, they can fill out Field Interview (FI) cards that generate data for LAPD’s records systems. A person does not have to be suspected of any crime to have an FI card filled out. A large number of these cards are filled out by LAPD’s proactive policing Metro units as well as the HOPE (Homeless Outreach Proactive Engagement) and RESET (Resources Enhancement Services Enforcement Team) units that target unhoused communities. In the first half of 2018, HOPE and RESET completed over 7,800 FI cards on unhoused people.

Another camera technology tested in Skid Row was Body-Worn Video (BWV or body-cams). In 2014, LAPD launched a BWV pilot run with officers assigned to the Safer Cities Initiative (SCI) “broken windows” policing program. These officers were chosen because their policing includes foot beats and constant enforcement contacts with people in the community.

in 2011, the L.A. Police Foundation “donated” $210,173 worth of Automatic License Plate Readers (ALPR) for LAPD to use in Skid Row. These systems, which scan license plates to track people’s movements, were previously tested around MacArthur Park along with facial recognition and “intelligent’ video capabilities. LAPD also tested phone surveillance technology in Skid Row, including Stingrays and Digital Receiver Technology (aka “Dirt Box”). These devices mimic cell phone towers to connect and monitor mobile devices. In 2011, the Los Angeles Police Foundation gave almost $25,000 to upgrade “Stingray” devices placed in Skid Row.

The objective if "community policing" was to strengthen cooperation, communication, and partnership between police, city officials, and private “stakeholders” like real estate developers and businesses. In fact, the U.S. Department of Justice’s Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) office used data collected in part from the LAPD to promote the "co-implementation" of Compstat and community policing, calling them both "powerful engines of police reform."

Compstat is a data system that generates regular summaries of what a police department is doing. These summaries are reviewed at meetings where police leadership determine policing strategies and priorities. Compstat helped organize “broken windows” policing. George Kelling, who popularized “broken windows” policing, once called Compstat “the most important administrative policing development of the past 100 years.” Compstat also furthered the collection and legitimization of crime data, treating it as scientific fact rather than a reflection of racist and subjective enforcement choices of police. LAPD police chief Bill Bratton’s confederation of Compstat and “broken windows” policing also laid the groundwork for expansion of behavioral surveillance, which refers to police practices of speculatively monitoring behaviors that may be indicative of future crime. This kind of intelligence-gathering, according to Bratton, is “what police have always done, to observe and identify changing patterns of behavior.”

As many of us remember, the 1990s featured both extreme police brutality and a presidential administration that accelerated mass incarceration through the infamous 1994 Crime Bill, written by then Senator Joe Biden. As L.A. watched LAPD’s violent beating of Rodney King and the Christopher Commission attempted to lay a path for “reform,” LAPD became engulfed in the Rampart Scandal, exposing further police brutality and corruption. This and other LAPD scandals culminated in a 2001 consent decree with the U.S. Department of Justice, placing LAPD under federal oversight due to patterns of false arrests, extreme violence, and other illegalities.