The City of Berkeley Lake respects the privacy of visitors to our site. This Privacy Policy governs the use and collection of information from you by the City of Berkeley Lake ("we" or "us") through your use of this web site. This Privacy Policy does not apply to any information you may provide to us through other means; for example, via mail, e-mail, or telephone. Please read this Privacy Policy carefully so that you understand our on-line privacy practices. By visiting this web site, you agree that your visit, and any dispute over our on-line privacy practices, is governed by this Privacy Policy and our Visitor Agreement.
Children's Privacy
Children should always get permission from their parents before sending any information about themselves (such as their names, e-mail addresses, and phone numbers) over the Internet, to us or to anyone else. We will not knowingly allow anyone under 13 to register with our site or to provide any other personally identifying information. If you are under 13, please do not provide us with any personally identifying information about yourself.
Types of Information We Collect
The information we gather falls into two categories: (1) information (for example, your name and address) that you voluntarily supply when you register or initiate transactions, and (2) information gathered on usage patterns and preferences as visitors navigate through out web site, use our services such as e-mail, or read our e-mail newsletters. In some cases, it is an agent or affiliate of ours that collects the information on our behalf. Third-party providers featured on or linked to by our site, such as agencies with which we cooperate, may be gathering the same kinds of information.
Registration Information
To make use of certain features on our site (such as to receive e-mail newsletters), visitors need to register and to provide certain information as part of the registration process.
Cookies
To help make our web site more responsive to the needs of our visitors, we use a standard feature of browser software, called a “cookie”, to assign each visitor an unique, random number, a sort of User ID, that resides on your computer. The cookie doesn't actually identify the visitor, just the computer that a visitor uses to access our web site. Unless you voluntarily identify yourself, we won't know who you are, even if we assign a cookie to your computer. The only personal information a cookie can contain is information you supply. A cookie cannot read unrelated data off your hard drive. We use cookies to help us tailor our site to your needs, to deliver a better, more personalized service. For example, we use cookies to track the pages on our web site visited by our users. We can build a better web site if we know which pages our users are visiting and how often. Of course, you can set your Internet browser not to accept cookies.
Other Methods of Collecting Information
Our web pages may contain electronic images (called “single-pixel GIFs” or “web beacons”) that allow us to count users who have visited particular pages or to access certain cookies. We may use these tools and other technologies to recognize which pages users visit, and which links on which they click. These features may also be included in our e-mail newsletters so that we can learn which messages have been opened and acted upon.
Browser Level Information and IP Addresses
Our web server automatically collects limited information about your computer configuration when you visit our web site, including the type of browser software you use, the operating system you are running, the resolution of your computer monitor, the web site that referred you, and your IP address. Your IP address is a numerical address that is used by computers connected to the Internet to identify your computer so that data such as the web pages you want to view can be transmitted to you. We also use IP address information for systems administration and trouble-shooting purposes. Your IP address does not tell us who you are. We use this information to deliver our web pages to you upon request, to tailor our web site to the interests of our users, and to measure traffic within our site.
Third Party Advertising
We do not allow third-party advertising on our web site. If a for-profit business or organization is mentioned on our web site, it is in a context other than advertising that business or organization.
Disclosure of Information
Advertisers
We do not allow third-party advertising on our web site, and we do not provide information we collect to advertisers or other for-profit organizations for their use.
Statistical Information
Much of the information we collect is in the form of aggregated statistics, such as the traffic that visits various pages within our sites, and the habits and preference of our audience. Such aggregated information does not include any information that would identify you personally. We may use such aggregated information and disclose it to third parties as we see fit.
Sites to Which We Link
Our web site includes links to other web sites, and provides access to services, and possibly products, offered by third parties whose privacy policies we don’t control. When you access another site or purchase products or receive services or conduct other transactions via these links, use of any information you provide is governed by the privacy policy of the operator of the linked web site you are visiting or the provider of such products or services, even if it appears that you are still on the City of Berkeley Lake’s web site.
Other Disclosures
We may occasionally release information about our visitors when release is appropriate to comply with law, to enforce our Visitor Agreement, or to protect the rights, property or safety of visitors to our sites, the public, our customers, or our government and its employees, agents, partners and affiliates. The City of Berkeley Lake, as a governmental entity, is bound by the Freedom of Information Act, and, upon proper request under this Act, may be required to release information not normally available to the Public.
Storage of Information
All information gathered on our site is stored within a database operated by us or by a contractor on our behalf. Sensitive information, such as your password, is encoded for storage. Encryption scrambles your personal information. However, as effective as encryption technology is, no security system is impenetrable. We cannot guarantee the security of our database, nor can we guarantee that information you supply won’t be intercepted while being transmitted to us over the Internet.
Changes to this Agreement and Policies and Posting
The City of Berkeley Lake reserves the right to change this Agreement and Policies at will, with or without advance notification to web site users. This Agreement and Policies, and any subsequent changes or additions, will be posted on the City of Berkeley Lake’s web site at all times.