City of Umatilla uses flock cameras to combat crime while privacy concerns continue

Our Take

Another day, another local news segment that leads with the police department's talking points and tucks privacy concerns into a single throwaway line near the end. Apple Valley News Now's report on Umatilla's Flock Safety cameras follows a script we've seen in dozens of towns: officials tout a handful of cases where ALPR data helped make an arrest, and that's presented as the whole story. What's missing is any real scrutiny of who else gets access to that data, how long it's retained, or whether a camera network cataloging every car that passes through town is proportionate to the crime it's supposedly solving.

This is exactly why local coverage matters so much — and why it so often falls short. Flock's pitch to small city councils is seductive: low upfront cost, promises of solved crimes, minimal public debate. But once that infrastructure is in place, it rarely gets rolled back, and the public rarely gets a say in how the data is shared with other agencies, including federal ones. Umatilla is just the latest town added to a map that now stretches across thousands of communities nationwide.

Credit to Apple Valley News Now for at least naming privacy as a concern, even briefly — that's more than a lot of local segments manage. But a mention isn't the same as an investigation. If you want to see how far this network has spread in your own backyard, check our camera map, and if Umatilla's story sounds like your town's next council agenda item, our take-action resources walk through how to push back before the cameras go up.