Knox County Mayor Glenn Jacobs on Flock
The short version: Knox County Mayor Glenn Jacobs says he's moving to terminate the county's Flock Safety contract, a rare instance of an elected official walking back ALPR surveillance.
Our Take
When a sitting mayor sends a termination letter to Flock Safety, it's worth paying attention. WATE 6 On Your Side reports that Knox County Mayor Glenn Jacobs has notified the company of his intent to end its contract, putting Tennessee in the small but growing club of jurisdictions pumping the brakes on blanket license plate surveillance. We don't have the full text of his reasoning yet, but the fact that a mayor is publicly distancing himself from Flock says something about how toxic this technology's reputation has become even among officials who once signed off on it.
These cameras don't just catch speeders — they build a searchable, often shareable log of everywhere your car goes, retained far longer than most residents realize and accessible to agencies well outside the county that installed them. Walking away from a contract is one of the few concrete ways a local government can actually claw back some privacy for its residents, rather than just promising 'safeguards' on a system that was built to have none.
We'll be watching to see if Knox County actually follows through, and whether other Tennessee counties take the hint. If you want to see whether Flock gear is already watching your own neighborhood, check our camera map, and if you'd rather not wait for your elected officials to catch up, our take-action page has tools to push back now. Credit to WATE 6 On Your Side for breaking this story.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of WATE 6 On Your Side, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.