Flagstaff’s City Council wants to hear more from residents and law enforcement about its license plate reader system and whether the system can be used against city residents in federal dragnets.
The council heard from petitioners who are opposed to the city’s contract with Flock Safety, the automated license plate reader company currently selling its technology to northern Arizona governments.
Residents and councilmembers questioned how collected data gets used. Federal agencies like ICE obtaining license plate reader data has been a concern.
"Flagstaff owns Flagstaff’s data, not Flock. Flock contractually cannot sell and cannot share your data," company spokesperson Trevor Chandler told the council.
The company ended a pilot program with Department of Homeland Security agencies that had had access to other cities’ Flock data.
Jill Stevenson was just one of many residents who shared their worries with the council.
"The idea of surveillance cameras in Flagstaff recording our locations and activities feels like an invasion of our rights to privacy," she told the council.
Flagstaff Police Chief Sean Connolly has been an advocate of the technology.
"I clearly understand our community’s concern about access by the federal government and the federal administration currently related to this data," he said.
He said he has no intention of sharing the collected data with the U.S. government.
At issue is a renewal of the city’s contract with Flock for the new fiscal year. The city hired the company last year with no discussion on the matter.
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Leo Diven Legay is a senior at Northern Arizona University and the editor-in-chief of the Lumberjack, the student newspaper. Normally, he writes about environmental issues or things that are happening in Flagstaff. But, recently he felt the need to write something much more personal.
