For the second time in recent weeks, San Diego Police Chief Scott Wahl cited an emergency exception to fast-track the installation of surveillance cameras, this time around downtown for Comic-Con. The chief first used the legal provision earlier this month to get up streetlight cameras in Hillcrest ahead of the Pride Parade, citing an increase in hate crimes against the LGBTQ+ community. This week, Wahl said in a memo that he again needed to circumvent the city’s usual approval process because San Diego Comic-Con International, an annual convention that attracts tens of thousands of people, “may serve as a potential target of opportunity for individuals or groups interested in committing violent or criminal acts.” He added in a statement that he would not “allow public safety to be compromised on my watch without knowing I’ve taken the necessary steps to protect the thousands of residents and visitors attending this event.” Wahl also said that while the department doesn’t have knowledge of any credible threats, “that can change at any moment.” According to the memo, nine cameras were installed on eight downtown thoroughfares: West Broadway Street, Broadway Street, East Harbor Drive, F Street, Sixth Avenue, Market Street, E Street and G Street. They were activated Wednesday, police officials said. The move again prompted criticism from privacy advocates who argued Wahl’s use of the legal exception — in both cases — amounted to an abuse of his emergency powers. In a statement, the TRUST SD Coalition, the consortium of groups that helped craft the city’s surveillance law which governs how technologies like smart streetlights are used, said emergency powers are granted to city departments so they can “quickly respond to active, life-threatening incidents, or specific threats that departments become aware of on short notice. SDPD has confirmed that neither of those circumstances exist in San Diego.” Last year, the City Council approved the Police Department’s proposal to install 500 streetlight cameras equipped with license plate readers at specific locations across San Diego. Although those vetted spots included streetlights in downtown San Diego, the most recent locations were not among them. The department has since installed 440 so-called smart streetlight cameras that have been used to aid about 120 investigations, police officials said. A few dozen cameras have not been installed because of a variety of infrastructural issues, such as light poles not having power or buildings blocking camera views. The struggle has led to a new proposal that would give the department greater flexibility in choosing where it puts its cameras, but that change has not been considered by the City Council yet. San Diego’s surveillance ordinance says that if city departments want to use a previously approved technology in a new location, the Council needs to sign off on the shift — unless exigent circumstances are involved. Exigent circumstances have been defined by California courts as “an emergency situation requiring swift action to prevent imminent danger to life or serious damage to property, or to forestall the imminent escape of a suspect or destruction of evidence.” It’s a legal exception that sometimes allows officers to make warrantless entries, searches and seizures, which are generally prohibited under the Fourth Amendment. A streetlight camera installed in Hillcrest. (Alejandro Tamayo / U-T file) The city’s surveillance ordinance provides a similar definition, describing exigent circumstances as “an emergency involving danger of death or serious physical injury to any individual, or imminent danger of significant property damage, that requires the use of surveillance technology, as determined by City staff acting in good faith upon known facts.” The exigent circumstances clause included in the surveillance ordinance has long been a source of concern among advocates who helped put together the oversight law. An early draft of the ordinance didn’t even include the emergency clause, partly out of concern that it would be used to tunnel under the ordinance’s requirements. “This is an alarming signal that our city’s police department does not consider themselves accountable to our laws or our communities,” TRUST SD said. “Our city’s surveillance ordinance invites our city departments to collaborate with the community, experts, and the City Council in open and public proceedings when they want to use invasive mass surveillance technology. “Only through this transparent and responsible approach can city leaders hope to maintain the trust of communities while simultaneously surveilling and recording our daily lives,” the statement added. Although the department isn’t waiting for approval before putting up the cameras, the City Council will have the opportunity to weigh in on the additional placements in the coming weeks. Wahl said previously that if the Council rejects the proposal, department officials will take down the newly placed cameras.