Flock Cameras in Northern New York: Controversy over surveillance concerns
The short version: A North Country lawmaker is pushing back on Flock cameras in Plattsburgh, adding New York to the growing list of states where elected officials are questioning ALPR surveillance.
Our Take
Credit to WPTZ for putting a spotlight on Plattsburgh, where Assemblyman Michael Cashman is apparently doing what far too few elected officials bother to do: ask hard questions before a surveillance network becomes permanent furniture. Flock's pitch to small and mid-size cities is always the same — public safety, instant results, no downside. The part that rarely makes the sales deck is who gets access to the data, how long it's retained, and whether any city council actually debated it in the open before the cameras went up.
North Country towns are exactly the kind of place Flock has been expanding into aggressively: limited local press scrutiny, small budgets that make 'free trial' deals attractive, and city councils that may not have staff dedicated to vetting surveillance contracts. When a sitting assemblyman starts raising concerns publicly, that's usually a sign residents asked questions nobody at city hall could answer. That's a good instinct — mass license plate tracking shouldn't be approved on vibes.
If you're in Plattsburgh or anywhere nearby, check our map to see what's already been deployed around you, and head to our take-action page if you want to push your own council to actually debate this instead of rubber-stamping it.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of MyNBC5-WPTZ, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.