Israeli company had a contract with Kent County to gather information on the public after the GRPD killed Patrick Lyoya

“The survey results will serve as a baseline for service improvement, organizational improvement and communication. The first of two community surveys has been completed. 772 respondents were digitally recruited (e.g. over social media, mobile apps, local websites, and survey panels) between May – June, 2022. An additional 399 responses were collected through the county’s distribution efforts, which were used to supplement the Zencity-recruited responses for free-text questions. Zencity built a representative sample by matching respondent data to the U.S. Census Bureau’s race, ethnicity, age, and gender distributions in Kent County.”

The narrative above comes from the Kent County 2022 performance report. What the report does not tell you is that Kent County entered into a contract with the Israeli company known as Zencity to gather information and attitudes about the Kent County government one month after the GRPD shot and killed Patrick Lyoya. 

Zencity provides a much more detailed account of their contract with Kent County, stating:

In anticipation of the increased public attention and protests, the Kent County leadership was tasked with deciding the level of risk posed to the County’s buildings and staff during the protests and allocating resources for security accordingly. Increasing security across all County buildings would cost money, and also could send a message that there was an expectation of escalation. On the other hand, not allocating sufficient resources could potentially result in harm to County staff and property resulting in injury to persons, thousands of dollars in repair costs and additional negative press. 

As public tensions rose, Kent County leadership had to do two things quickly and in real-time:

• Understand and assess the volume of criticism, specifically towards the County.
• Assess the risk to the County buildings and allocate resources accordingly.

Zencity began tracking online conversations about Kent County government to determine what people were saying in regards to the GRPD killing of Patrick Lyoya. Here Zencity says: 

Using Zencity Organic, the County was able to set up a customized project dashboard collecting all resident online-interactions regarding the shooting. Then, using Zencity’s advanced search capabilities, narrow down the discourse to focus specifically on mentions of “Kent County”. 

Based on the data gather, here is what the Israeli company Zencity recommended to Kent County, along with the County’s response: 

With Zencity data indicating that the protesters were directing their criticism at the City rather than the County, the County made an informed, data-based decision as to how much to invest and spend on protecting County buildings: “Instead of barricading all five buildings completely by putting giant construction barriers with fencing on top, I only put fencing around the courthouse, and I didn’t even armor up the other buildings”, says Al Vanderberg, the Kent County Administrator. 

Kent County Administrator Al Vandenberg was also quoted as saying, “Zencity provides information that can help in critical decision making, not just in a crisis, but definitely in a crisis. It’s a great tool to help make those decisions that can impact people’s lives and save money.”

Al Vandenberg’s response is instructive in that he focuses on how the County saved money. Vandenberg also suggests that the Zencity data helped impact people’s lives, but the question is always, which people’s lives? Certainly not the life of Patrick Lyoya, the lives of Black and Latino residents of Kent County, nor the immigrant residents, like Lyoya, that are constantly living in fear of cops and immigration enforcement officials that seek to arrest, detain and deport them.

I came across another article, which claimed that Kent County was one of 8 contracts that Zencity had with Michigan governmental bodies in 2022.

Beyond the fact that Kent County hired a company that was data mining the public about opinions and attitudes regarding the GRPD shooting of Patrick Lyoya, they had a contract with an Israeli company that continues to work with cops and governments throughout the US. The US support and complicity in the genocide that Israel is committing against the Palestinians is certainly connected to yet another Israeli tech company that is being used in the ongoing repression of BIPOC communities by cops in the US.