REPORT
Department of Public Health: Temporary Visitor Registration, ID, and Tracking System Surveillance Impact Report
Committee on Information Technology (COIT)Surveillance Oversight Review Dates PSAB Review: 2-27-2025
As required by San Francisco Administrative Code, Section 19B, departments must submit a Surveillance Impact Report for each surveillance technology to the Committee on Information Technology ("COIT") and the Board of Supervisors.
The Surveillance Impact Report details the benefits, costs, and potential impacts associated with the Department's use of Temporary Visitor Registration, ID, and Tracking System (hereinafter referred to as "surveillance technology").
PURPOSE OF THE TECHNOLOGY
The Department's mission is to protect and promote the health of all San Franciscans. The surveillance technology supports the Department's mission and provides important operational value in the following ways: This technology provides employee and patient privacy and security at DPH healthcare facilities. The Department shall use the surveillance technology only for the following authorized purposes:
Authorized Use(s):
1) To provide temporary identification and services for visitors at DPH medical facilities. 2) To provide contract tracking for all visitors.
Surveillance technology may be deployed in the following locations, based on use case:
The surveillance technology is deployed in the lobby of DPH clinical facilities including San Francisco General Hospital, Laguna Honda Long Term Care Facility, and 50 Behavioral Healthcare Clinics throughout San Francisco.
Description of Technology
This is a product description of the technology:
The Lobbytrack system is a visitor management system that Signs in visitors, notify hosts, and provides alerting security, tracking and evacuation management services.
This is a description of how the technology works:
The technology provides for the temporary issuance of a visitor identification card, visitor registration and tracking. The technology is a visitor management system.
Third-Party Vendor Access to Data
Data collected or processed by the surveillance technology will not be handled or stored by an outside provider or third-party vendor on an ongoing basis. The Department will remain the sole Custodian of Record.
IMPACT ASSESSMENT
The impact assessment addresses the conditions for surveillance technology approval, as outlined by the Standards of Approval in San Francisco Administrative Code, Section 19B:
- The benefits of the surveillance technology outweigh the costs.
- The Department's Policy safeguards civil liberties and civil rights.
- The uses and deployments of the surveillance technology are not based upon discriminatory or viewpoint-based factors and do not have a disparate impact on any community or Protected Class.
The Department's use of the surveillance technology is intended to support and benefit the residents of San Francisco while minimizing and mitigating all costs and potential civil rights and liberties impacts of residents.
A. Benefits
| Yes or No | Benefit | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Education | |
| Community Development | |
X | Health | This technology provides disease exposure prevention and notification. |
| Environment | |
| Criminal Justice | |
| Jobs | |
| Housing | |
| Public Safety |
B. Civil Rights Impacts and Safeguards
The Department has considered the potential impacts and has identified the technical, administrative, and physical protections as mitigating measures:
The technology solution is designed for a very specific use. To register visitors/patients at a facility. To identify the visitor and document the purpose of their visit and the locations in the facility that the visitor will be accessing. The registration process includes the issuance of a temporary id badge that includes the visitor's photograph. The sole purpose is the ensure that the identify of the visitor/patient, their appointment, who they will be seeing, when, and where within the facility. The data is deleted after the visitor's exits the facility. Exposer of visitor information poses no impact or risk to the visitor's civil rights or liberties. The data does not include any personal health information on the visitor identity and contact information.
The administrative safeguards are: The users and administrators of the system receive application training as well as annual DPH security, ethics, and privacy & compliance training.
The technical safeguards are: The application provides industry standard administrative safeguards such as password requirements and role based access.
The physical safeguards are: Access to the facility and the system are protected by locked doors.
C. Fiscal Analysis of Costs and Benefits
The Department’s use of the surveillance technology yields the following business and operations benefits:
| Yes or No | Benefit | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Financial Savings | |
| Time Savings | |
| Staff Safety | |
| Data Quality | |
X | Other | The temporary visitor identification and tracking technology provides safety for employees, patients, and visitors. For employees and patients is clearly identifies and labels a visitor as well as the classification of the visitor/purpose. For the visitor there is assurance of notification should the visitor be exposed to any contagion. |
The fiscal cost, such as initial purchase, personnel and other ongoing costs, include:
Number of Budgeted FTE (new & existing) & Classification | The visitor tracking technology solution requires 0.5 FTE of a 1424-Clerk Typist per site. The technology is used at San Francisco General Hospital, Laguna Honda Long Term care facility, and 50 Behavioral Healthcare Clinics. |
| Expense Category | Annual Cost | One-Time Cost |
Total Salary & Fringe | $85,000.00 | $85,000.00 |
Software | $8,000.00 | $125,000.00 |
Hardware/Equipment | $5,000.00 | $75,000.00 |
Professional Services | $1,000.00 | $10,000.00 |
Training | $5,000.00 | $5,000.00 |
Other | $0.00 | $0.00 |
Total Cost | $104,000.00 | $300,000.00 |
The Department funds its use and maintenance of the surveillance technology through: General Fund.
COMPARISON TO OTHER JURISDICTIONS
The surveillance technology is currently utilized by other governmental entities for similar purposes.
Other government entities have used the surveillance technology in the following way: A wide range of State, Local, and Federal organizations that require user registration and tracking use this type of technology. Standard technology use cases include; the acceleration of investigations and incident response times, improve employee feeling of safety, safeguard newborns, patients, and seniors, and enhanced building security.
The effectiveness of the surveillance technology while used by government entities is determined to be the following: Accelerate investigations and response times from locating missing patients to investigating altercations, quickly search across your entire camera fleet in just minutes. Use face search, motion search, or simply describe people or vehicles using everyday language in a search bar. Enable staff and security teams to rapidly respond to incidents by accessing footage from any device, anywhere, and auto-generating incident reports. Protect bystanders' privacy by blurring their faces in video evidence before sharing with police via SMS or a direct link. Safeguard newborns, patients, and seniors The technology includes, automatically sync real-time location system (RTLS) data with video footage to gain visual context and quickly locate missing children, patients, and costly medical equipment. Automatically lock down doors to deter unauthorized removal of newborns by pairing Verkada controlled doors with your infant abduction prevention system. AI-enabled cameras can alert you in seconds when at-risk patients or seniors are detected outside their rooms or the facility. Increase visitor security instead of paper logbooks, impress visitors and outpatients with a seamless check-in experience that safeguards PHI - featuring built-in photo ID capture, badge printing, screening forms, e-signing, and native EMR and EHR integrations. Automatically check visitors against patient-specific and sitewide watchlists, as well as optional known offender databases. Real-time visibility allows front desk staff to enforce visitor limits and verify authorized visitors at checkpoints like ICUs.
There have not been adverse effects of the surveillance technology while it has been used by other government entities.