u/QTippus

The city of Mountain View, CA conducted an audit of their Flock cameras and found that, in violation of their contract with Flock, Flock was sharing data with Federal agencies.

As a result, the Chief of police apologized and suspended the use of cameras, and the city council canceled the Flock contract.

How can Mayor Smiley support Flock surveillance while knowing it could be used by ICE to identify and detain members of our community?

Has Providence even bothered to conduct an audit of Flock, to see which agencies are accessing the videos?

https://abc7news.com/amp/post/city-mountain-view-alleges-federal-state-agencies-accessed-flock-safety-camera-data-consent/18518963/

https://www.mountainview.gov/Home/Components/News/News/1205/284

https://www.mountainview.gov/Home/Components/News/News/1211/284

Washington court rules Flock videos are subject to public records requests, and Walla Walla police end their Flock contract in response. Wonder why they didn’t want the public to see the data?

https://www.applevalleynewsnow.com/news/walla-walla-police-end-flock-license-plate-cameras-over-safety-and-legal-concerns/article\_ec96e8f8-a14e-43b3-b6b2-7d53846dd659.html

Mountainview CA police suspend Flock contract after an audit showed Flock violated their contract and shared data with Federal agencies.

https://www.cbsnews.com/sanfrancisco/news/mountain-view-alpr-cameras-use-suspended-automated-license-plate-reader/

We’ve had Flock cameras for years, who knows where the data is going.

Have Grebien or Goncalves even done an audit to check?

Suppose I’m 55, maxing 401k and backdoor Roth IRA. I’m also contributing monthly to a taxable brokerage account.

I recently started paying attention and learned I can do Mega Backdoor Roth at work.

I think I should stop contributing to my brokerage account and contribute to MBR instead.

The reasons I can think of to prefer brokerage account don’t apply to me:

1. Access to funds if needed before 59 1/2 [my emergency fund is in place, only 5 years to wait]

2. Flexibility in investment choices [can buy VT in my MBR]

3. Will need access to cash to pay taxes for Roth conversions starting at age 60 [can pay for them out of the converted funds if I don’t have the cash on hand]

4. Tax-loss harvesting [I’m basically all VT/BND]

5. Want the thrill of paying taxes on investment returns [I don’t]

Am I missing a reason I should contribute to brokerage account before maxing MBR?

Age 55, hoping to retire at 60, can live with 65, still in accumulation stage.

Struggling to decide how much BND to hold in a VT/BND portfolio.  Depending on the time of day, I can imagine 100/0, 80/20, or 60/40.

Any recommendations on posts or books that discuss how to *think* about bond allocation?

If I think of BND as a cushion to decrease portfolio volatility, if markets drop by 50% I feel like 80/20 isn’t much cushion.  So that suggests 60/40, but I’m not willing to give up that much potential return from VT.

If I think about BND as a bucket I can rely on to avoid SORR, then I shouldn’t think about it as a percentage of my portfolio.  I should think of it in terms of holding say 5 years of expenses in BND.  And with a 4% SWR, 5 years of expenses actually gets me back to 80/20. That feels reasonable.  But that also makes me think I don’t need protection from SORR yet, so maybe I stay 100/0 until I’m 60, and see how the portfolio looks.  Then if the portfolio is up and I retire at 60 I would sell some VT and fill my bond bucket immediately.  If I can’t retire at 60, I would keep working, hope the market recovers in the next 5 years, and start filling the bond bucket with new contributions between age 60 and 65.

But looking for thoughts/recommendations, because I’ve been thinking in circles about this for a while now.

Employer has 401k set up with Voya. I'm planning to open Schwab self directed brokerage account so I can keep life simple and invest in VT/VTWAX.

It looks like I can't actually automate contributions to the SDBA. Has anyone figured out if this can be automated in Voya?

I think the workflow I'll end up with is something like:

\- Contributions go to Voya S&P 500 index fund

\- Once a month, log in to Voya and transfer to Schwab SDBA

\- After the transfer clears, log in to Schwab and buy VT/VTWAX

I guess it's not a bad thing to be logging into the accounts once a month. But I'd be happier if this could be automated as a big benefit of VT is set-and-forget. I guess if I get lazy I could just leave the money sitting in S&P 500 index fund and transfer it once a quarter instead of monthly. Or even annually. I mostly want to avoid the mistake of transferring the money to Schwab and then forgetting to actually buy the funds, so the money just sits in my sweep account too long.

Would be thankful for any advice on automation, or general advice on SDBA within a 401k.

Employer has 401k set up with Voya. I'm planning to open Schwab self directed brokerage account so I can keep life simple and invest in VT/VTWAX.

It looks like I can't actually automate contributions to the SDBA. Has anyone figured out if this can be automated in Voya?

I think the workflow I'll end up with is something like:

- Contributions go to Voya S&P 500 index fund

- Once a month, log in to Voya and transfer to Schwab SDBA

- After the transfer clears, log in to Schwab and buy VT/VTWAX

I guess it's not a bad thing to be logging into the accounts once a month. But I'd be happier if this could be automated as a big benefit of VT is set-and-forget. I guess if I get lazy I could just leave the money sitting in S&P 500 index fund and transfer it once a quarter instead of monthly. Or even annually. I mostly want to avoid the mistake of transferring the money to Schwab and then forgetting to actually buy the funds, so the money just sits in my sweep account too long.

Would be thankful for any advice on automation, or general advice on SDBA within a 401k.

Is there a social map feature or similar that would allow me to see birds spotted on Bird Buddies near me?

Looking for suggestions for allocation. 55 years old, hoping to retire in 5 years. Hoping my portfolio will grow 50% in those 5 years. If it doesn’t, retirement will wait.

Looking for thoughts on set-it-forget-it allocation.

Thinking VT/BND 80/20.

Or maybe VT/BND/VGSH 80/10/10

Most of my money is in trad 401k, a bit in Roth IRA and small brokerage account. Will plan on Roth conversions if I retire at 60.

Also looking for thoughts on allocation during retirement. I see lots of posts about keeping 3-5 years cash in a CD ladder or bond ladder or treasury ladder. If I don’t want to manage that complexity, could I just put 3-5 years in SGOV? So maybe when I retire at 60 I’m VT/BND/SGOV 70/20/10?

I've got a 403(b), Roth IRA, and brokerage account at TIAA CREF.

Yes, I know everyone hates TIAA CREF, but so far for the most part I've found them to be helpful in reorganizing my accounts, back door Roth contributions, etc.

That said, my allocation looks like something that a financial advisor would put together. I would like to move to something like VTI/VXUS/BND.

All this time I thought my investment options were limited to those chosen by my employer. But in reading here, I realized all I need to do is open a "Brokerage Window" in my account and suddenly I'll be able to invest in a broad range of mutual funds in my 403(b), and my Roth can invest in mutual funds and ETFs.

For those who are using TIAA, is there any downside to using their "brokerage window" sub-accounts for retirement accounts?

I know in theory I could move the Roth and brokerage account to Fidelity/Vanguard/Schwab, but it's been helpful having everything with TIAA CREF, we have a no-fee advisor I like who can review the data, run projections etc. (Yes, I recognize that avisor didn't tell me about the brokerage window option. They're not fiduciaries. : )

Recently there has been lots of -uhm- user feedback about YNAB changes.

These changes are pushed automatically, and roll out in waves.

Which makes me wonder if there is an actual public change log for YNAB changes. So I could look at the version of YNAB I’m running, and see a list of the changes added in that version.

I see pages like:

https://support.ynab.com/updates-to-ynab-S1f4aRLeC

https://www.ynab.com/category/features

But neither feels like a real change log. For example, I don’t see discussion of the new feature being rolled out that will automatically clear imported transactions that match to a manual entry.

I know websites and apps do A/B testing and beta feature testing as a matter of course. But for an app that manages my money, I’d really like to be aware of the changes.

Other than recurring transactions with a known amount, I don’t enter many future transactions.

What’s the main benefit of entering future transactions?

And what are the logistics?

When you don’t know the exact amount of a future bill, do you enter an estimate? And flag it for needing a future revision? Since I auto import from linked accounts, seems like that would make the transactions mismatch so I’d have to delete the estimates when reconciling.

I started off with shuffle but stopped pretty quickly because you lose too much information. Current strategy which has helped a lot is to start by reading the tiles “backwards” starting from the end (bottom right).

Wyna puts a lot of red herrings and other things to throw you off in rows 1 and 2. Starting at the end I avoid a lot of those traps (not all!)

My son had a learner’s permit that expired when he turned 18. It’s been less than a year, so he can still renew it without needing to take the written test again.

Does that mean he can just walk into any RI DMV office with the L1 form, proof of identity, and a check without making an appointment?

From the DMV website, looks like you need an appointment for any visit.

https://dmv.ri.gov/locations-hours