We, the undersigned, petition the Bremen Town Council to end Bremen’s use of Flock Safety automated license plate readers, terminate its agreement at the earliest lawful opportunity, and decline renewal. We also ask the town to reject automated license plate readers and equivalent technology from any company that systematically collects and stores identifiable records of the public’s movements for later search. This includes purchases, replacements, expansions, and access through another agency’s cameras or subscriptions.
We believe residents should be able to travel through their community without their everyday movements becoming part of a nationwide surveillance database.
What residents should know
These cameras collect information about ordinary drivers. Flock cameras photograph passing vehicles and record license plates, vehicle characteristics, locations, and times. This collection happens regardless of whether the driver is suspected of wrongdoing. Records from multiple cameras can be searched together to piece together a vehicle’s movements.
Nationwide sharing is central to Flock’s system. Flock encourages broad sharing among law enforcement agencies and offers a National Lookup network where participating agencies share access to their camera data in exchange for access to others’ data. This creates an incentive to expand sharing across the country. Information collected on a small-town street can become searchable by agencies far outside that community.
Local ownership does not mean exclusive local control. Section 4.2 of the Flock Service Agreement released by Bremen grants Flock a “perpetual, irrevocable” license to use, reproduce, modify, and distribute agency data as part of aggregated data. Section 4.4 permits specified uses of that aggregated information, including marketing and development, during and after the service term. The deletion of original photographs does not necessarily mean all information derived from them is deleted.
These concerns reach beyond whether an individual officer uses the system responsibly. They concern the power of the system itself: collecting information about people who have done nothing wrong, making it searchable across jurisdictions, and granting a private company continuing rights to use information collected through publicly funded cameras. Changing vendors would leave the underlying concern about routine tracking unresolved.
We ask the Town Council to:
- End Bremen’s participation in Flock, pursue termination at the earliest lawful opportunity, and prevent automatic renewal.
- Reject automated license plate readers and equivalent systems from any vendor that systematically collect and store identifiable travel records of the general public for later search.
- Prevent continuation through other arrangements, including equipment transfers, free trials, subscriptions, or access to another agency’s or private organization’s surveillance network.
- Publicly account for retained and shared data, seek deletion wherever legally permitted, and preserve records necessary for evidence and public accountability.
Public safety must include respect for privacy, civil liberties, and the public’s ability to hold government accountable. Residents should not have to surrender those principles simply to use public roads.
By signing, I support these requests and ask that this petition be entered into the Bremen Town Council’s public record.