http://www.FairfaxCountyPrivacyCouncil.org

 

FCPC ALERT #2004-2

FAIRFAX COUNTY PRIVACY COUNCIL

Originally Published on 19 February 2004

 

Greetings! This message is intended for members of the Fairfax County Privacy Council, and anyone else who might be interested in advancing privacy in Virginia.  Maximum dissemination of this message is encouraged!

 

Privacy Notice: All communication from the Fairfax Privacy Council is sent using blind carbon copy ("BCC") format for your security and privacy.

 

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ALERT ITEM SUMMARY:

***URGENT ACTION ITEM:  Proposed VA Law (SB634) to Establish Teacher/Worker/Volunteer Fingerprint Database with State Police!

***League of Woman Voters Sponsor USAPATRIOT Act Event

***Re: Sept. 11th, Senator Bob Kerrey Says "What Other Politicians Won't"

***CAPPS II Scandal Uncovered

***Retired US Army Chief of Staff Says USAPATRIOT Act Went "Too Far"

 

1.  URGENT ACTION ITEM:  Proposed VA Law (SB634) to Establish Teacher/Worker/Volunteer Fingerprint Database with State Police:

 

Teachers/government employees/community volunteers/etc., forward this alert as soon as possible…Your unions are asleep!

 

There is a bill in the Virginia General Assembly called SB634 that would require that Virginia teachers, government workers, and most community volunteers submit their fingerprints and other data to a new VA State Police database so that they could be tracked by the state like common criminals.  This bill (see http://leg1.state.va.us/cgi-bin/legp504.exe?041+sum+SB634) already snuck thru the state Senate and is now in the House of Delegates Committee on Militia, Police and Public Safety.  We may even be eventually charged a fee for this!

 

But it's not to late to stop this bill -  some delegates on this committee have already been getting feedback from irate teachers and other government employees and community volunteers, so it's not too late to stop this bill - support is wavering.  Please send an email to the committee opposing SB634.  All the committee member email addresses are listed below for pasting, and you can either just cut and paste the message in, or you can modify the message.  To look up the email address of "your" delegate, go to http://legis.state.va.us and click on "Who's my legislator."

 

This is urgent - please forward to all teachers, governmental employees, volunteers, families, and concerned citizens/families that you know.

------------------------Sample Message:

To: Del_Sherwood@house.state.va.us, Del_Weatherholtz@house.state.va.us, del_Griffith@House.state.va.us, del_ kilgore@house.state.va.us, Del_Louderback@house.state.va.us, del_wright@house.state.va.us, Del_Carrico@house.state.va.us, Del_Lingamfelter@house.state.va.us, del_Athey@house.state.va.us, Del_Nutter@house.state.va.us, Del_Hurt@house.state.va.us, Del_Hogan@house.state.va.us, Del_Janis@House.state.va.us, Del_Cline@House.state.va.us, Del_Scott@house.state.va.us, Del_Pollard@house.state.va.us, Del_VanLandingham@house.state.va.us, del_Barlow@house.state.va.us, Del_Shuler@house.state.va.us, Del_Petersen@house.state.va.us, Del_Miles@house.state.va.us, del_lewis@house.state.va.us

 

CC: Del_Morgan@house.state.va.us, Del_Howell@House.state.va.us, SOE-CS@governor.virginia.gov, sarah.finley@governor.virginia.gov, peter.blake@governor.virginia.gov, jbankos@veanea.org, princess@ns.gemlink.com, "Your Delegate"

 

SUBJECT:  Please Oppose SB634!

 

ATTN:  House Committee on Militia, Police and Public Safety

 

Dear Delegate:

 

I am a Virginia teacher/public servant/volunteer/concerned citizen [choose one] and I will choose to never work again in Virginia if I am forced by SB634 to be fingerprinted and surveilled like a common criminal by the State Police.

 

Please vote against SB634 to protect the fundamental right to privacy and dignity of state and locality employees.  SB634 is the most invasive piece of legislation introduced in the General Assembly this session.

 

Our hard working state and locality employees already go through fingerprint enabled criminal background checks with the FBI.  Adding insult to injury, most state agencies and localities fail to warn employees that disclosure of their Social Security Number ("SSN"), if any, in conjunction with fingerprinting and criminal background checks is NOT required (see Section 7 of PL 93-579 [the Federal Privacy Act of 1974, 5 USC 552a note] at http://www.fairfaxcountyprivacycouncil.org/Section7oftheFederalPrivacyAct.html.htm.  This scofflaw behavior by state agencies and localities takes place despite a written instruction from the FBI (on the fingerprinting form) to state agencies and localities that the SSN warning is REQUIRED under Section 7 of PL 93-579.

 

SB634's aim to retain these fingerprints and other biographical data with the VA State Police in order to build digital dossiers on Americans living or working in Virginia is simply unacceptable.

 

One of largest groups to be affected by SB634 are Virginia teachers, already reeling from unfunded federal mandates to re-certify themselves under the federal No Child Left Behind Act.  SB634 adds insult to injury by essentially telling teachers that "not only do we feel that you are not qualified to teach, we don't trust you either."  SB634 will add to the difficulty in attracting and retaining qualified government employees, especially teachers.

 

Although SB634 calls for the employing agency or entity to pay an annual digital fingerprint dossier maintenance fee to the State Police of $10, please note that under SB90, localities would be authorized to make employees pay fingerprinting fees, and either SB90 or a similar future bill could be used to justify making employees like teachers pay for their own surveillance by the State Police.

 

If the committee really feels that fingerprinting and surveillance of Virginia State teachers, employees, and volunteers makes Virginia a better place, then please set a good example and amend SB634 to require all members of the General Assembly and their staff to submit to fingerprinting, cataloguing, and surveillance by the State Police as well.

 

Please let me know how you are going to vote on SB634. 

 

Sincerely,

 

YOUR NAME

YOUR ADDRESS

YOUR PHONE NUMBER

 

cc:  VEA, House Leadership, VA Secretary of Education, Delegate ______[fill in]

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2.  League of Woman Voters Sponsor USAPATRIOT Act Event:  Come attend a free public meeting on Saturday, February 21, 10:30 AM at the Westpark Hotel, 8401 Westpark Drive in Tyson's Corner, VA regarding the USA PATRIOT Act and other new post September 11th laws and regulations on civil liberties in America.  The event is sponsored by the League of Woman Voters of the Fairfax area ("LWVFA").  Leading speakers from the ACLU, federal DOJ, and other experts will be former FBI Director William Sessions.  An optional $20 luncheon will follow the formal session.

 

The PATRIOT Act was passed in a rush and went too far.  But you can Take Action!:  Tell your Members of Congress to cosponsor the SAFE Act to reform the USAPATRIOT Act.  Click here for more information and to send a free fax to your Members of Congress:  http://www.aclu.org/NationalSecurity/NationalSecurity.cfm?ID=13907&c=24

 

3.  Re: Sept. 11th, Senator Bob Kerrey Says "What Other Politicians Won't":  Here is an interesting admission of US complicity in lax airline security pre-9/11 from Senator Bob Kerrey.  "Still, judgment should play a role, and judgment says Sept. 11-style hijacking plots have been removed from the terrorist arsenal." Speaking with the New York Sun recently, former Sen. Bob Kerrey, a member of the federal commission investigating the attacks, made the key observation: "The hijackers recognized we had the wrong rules on the airline. We could have taken that means of delivery of a weapon off the table, had we merely said, lock the pilot up front and resist. We never made that confession of that mistake."  Mr. Kerrey, no longer in office, can say what other politicians won't (all material from "Air Security Lies In Deterrence, Not Nuggets," The Wall Street Journal, by Holman W. Jenkins Jr., 7 January 2004, page A13).

 

FCPC hopes that this federal commission's report makes pointed judgments on this subject such as Kerrey's, and including criticism about how effective the FAA "photo-ID" protocol was on 9/11.  Fast food security schemes like demanding photo-IDs ought to get their fair share of blame for 9/11 because they diverted managerial attention from confronting a real threat.  See How We Are Fighting the War on Terrorism: IDs and the illusion of security," The San Francisco Chronicle, by Bruce Schneier, 3 February 2004, http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2004/02/03/EDGSI4M3171.DTL&type=printable.

 

4.  CAPPS II Scandal Uncovered:  Speaking of fast food security, it looks like the Department of Homeland Security has been caught red-handed "strong arming" Jet Blue Airlines into secretly providing the US Army confidential passenger data for "testing" of the proposed Computer Assisted Passenger Prescreening Program ("CAPPS") II, and then trying to hide their role!  A coalition of Congressman and Privacy Groups have called for hearings into the entire CAPPS II debacle and urge that the new airline passenger screening system should be "suspended indefinitely" (see "Senators question TSA role in transfer of passenger records," Technology Daily, 17 February 2004, http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/0204/021704tdpm1.htm and "Lawmakers call for suspension of new passenger screening system, Government Executive, by Chris Strohm, 13 February 2004, http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/0204/021304c1.htm).

 

Take Action!:  Tell your Congressional delegation that your want federal hearings into the CAPPS II scandal with just a few clicks at http://action.eff.org/action/index.asp?step=2&item=2854.  

 

5. Privacy Quote"The American people need to be better educated on what's happening with the Patriot Act…I think in some cases we might have gone too far, and I don't think we can afford to go too far. . . . We don't want to wake up 10 years from now and say, 'How did we lose these rights, how did we get to this a particular point'?" - Former US Army Chief of Staff General (Ret.) Dennis J. Reimer (see “Focusing on Anti-Terrorism: Retired General Leads Okla. Institute Aimed at Prevention,” The Washington Post, by Lois Romano, 7 January 2004, Page A19, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60199-2004Jan6.html).

 

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Questions, or to be added/deleted from future Alerts?  Contact Mike Stollenwerk at Chairman@FairfaxCountyPrivacyCouncil.org.