A #Wisconsin Police Chief Says He Secretly Took A Deal With #Flock To Keep His Community Safe
The short version: A Wisconsin police chief reportedly struck a quiet deal with Flock Safety, underscoring how ALPR contracts often dodge public scrutiny before residents ever get a say.
Our Take
Creator Dahmmy Hilfigger flags a story that should sound familiar to anyone tracking Flock Safety's expansion: a local police chief in Wisconsin allegedly entered into an agreement with the company without the kind of public debate these surveillance deals deserve. Whether it was a closed-door briefing, a quiet line item, or a handshake framed as 'just keeping the community safe,' the pattern is the same one we've documented across the country — decisions about blanket license plate tracking getting made before residents even know the cameras are going up.
That secrecy is the real story here, more than any single device. Flock's pitch to departments is always about safety, but the public rarely gets equal billing in the conversation about trade-offs: who can access the data, how long it's kept, and whether it can be shared with ICE, out-of-state agencies, or private actors. When deals happen behind closed doors, none of those questions get answered until after the hardware is already reading plates.
If you want to know whether your own town has quietly joined this network, check our camera map, and if you'd rather not wait for your city council to fill you in after the fact, our take-action resources can help you push for transparency before the next secret deal gets signed.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of Dahmmy Hilfigger, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.