Three men were shooting video of anyone who happened to be in their paths on Tuesday afternoon at the United States Postal Service post office at the intersection of McBean Parkway and Creekside Road in Valencia.
None of the three individuals, who wore sunglasses, and either a beanie or a hat, mittens and long-sleeve shirts, would identify who they were or give their affiliations, though one of the men, who mostly posted up inside the post office, said he had his own media company and does this work full time. He added that the three of them worked independent of each other.
They shared what it was they were doing: First Amendment auditing.
“Press is open to everybody,” said the one who was recording video inside the post office. “And it’s important that we exercise and continue to have a free engagement of the press. Or what do we end up with?”
He said First Amendment auditing is a type of citizen journalism that usually involves photographing or recording video of people in public places. Auditors, he said, tend to shoot pictures or video in and around government buildings and locations to promote transparency and open government.
This particular man said he and the other two auditors with him had been at the location for about two hours shooting video.
One of the men at the location on Tuesday was on the sidewalk on Creekside Road in front of the post office, documenting motorists making a right turn onto McBean Parkway. He said he was auditing vehicle code violations, including illegal window tinting, missing front license plates and motorists making turns on “no right on red” lights.
Although he was intending to publicly report others for their behavior, he was unwilling to reveal his own identity, nor were either of his two fellow “auditors.”
“Since he’s been here,” said the man who was inside the post office, “I don’t know the number yet — because I have to talk with him — but about every single time this light stops — you see that red arrow — half the people run that red arrow. And then the people that don’t run it get honked at from the people behind them to run it.”
The man added that he’d previously been shooting traffic violations at another location. It was in a driveway to a medical building, and he was standing and shooting video on the median documenting what he saw.
“Every single light change, one or two cars — even in front of a sheriff,” he said, “ran a light that turned red before their wheels even left where they were. So, they were going through a whole intersection on red. Yeah, in front of a sheriff one time. It’s dangerous. You film people almost getting hit in crosswalks every single week.”
He also talked about a very dangerous crosswalk in another city that he’d once recorded and had seen multiple people, time and time again, almost get hit by motorists. He said the crosswalk had even been on the news several times, but the city still hadn’t done anything about it.
“There should be a stop sign, a speed bump, anything,” he said. “Someone needs to say, ‘Hey, slow down.’ So, any story that we find that we can report on, we try to do that. First Amendment auditing is an aspect of what we do, but it’s not the only thing that we do. We do everything, like, you know, today, he’s doing a story about this damn red light.”
He was referring to the man on Creekside shooting video of motorists. That man on the street said that he finds the drivers of the higher-end vehicles, particularly those driving Teslas, to be the biggest offenders in front of his lens. He collects the violations on camera and then he disseminates that video to content creators, who might use it on any platform, including YouTube and TikTok, to tell the story.
According to the man who was inside the post office, he’ll let others use his video if they’re going to “do something transformative with it.”
Asked if First Amendment auditing is dangerous, the man who was recording inside the post office said it can be. He said that people put their hands on him every day. About 15 minutes prior, someone in a vehicle shot water from a water bottle out at the man shooting video of vehicle violations on the Creekside. The man who was in the post office said he’s had people turn their vehicles at him.
Right about that time, someone who was inside the post office came out to video them. He turned the tables on the three men. But they told him it’s his right to do that and welcomed him to the movement.
“We shouldn’t be attacked for exercising our freedom,” said the main First Amendment auditor.
He did say he’s from Southern California but added that he shoots videos like this all over the country. He experiences the same kind of public reaction all over.
“Ninety-five percent of people are really chill, or they just pretend that we don’t exist,” he said. “Since I’ve been here, I’ve had almost all very pleasant conversations with people.”
He’ll actually monitor that. He has a clicker, and he keeps track of who’s friendly with him and who’s aggressive. He’s also aware that people will call the police or sheriff’s department about what they’re doing.
Dispatch in Santa Clarita, he said, has been good about educating people over the phone about the rights First Amendment auditors — or citizens, for that matter — have.
A number of people emailed The Signal Tuesday afternoon with complaints and concerns about the video recording. They wrote about cameras in their faces, guys shooting video of their license plates and feeling like their rights were being violated.
The guy who was recording inside the post office doesn’t see it as any kind of violation. He said he and the guys he was with are never aggressive with anyone and are only showing what citizens have the right to be doing.
“Auditors will get a really bad name,” he said. “But we’re not the one chasing people down, assaulting people with water. We’re not the one running this red light every five seconds. We’re not the ones attacking, screaming, yelling at people.”
