The City of Grand Rapids is taking a look at its use of license plate reader cameras
The short version: WOOD TV8 reports Grand Rapids officials are finally scrutinizing GRPD's Flock Safety camera network after letting the vendor help pitch its own oversight.
Our Take
Credit to WOOD TV8 for covering a moment that too many city councils skip entirely: an actual public hearing on license plate reader use. But notice who got equal billing at that podium — GRPD and Flock Safety itself. When the company selling the surveillance tech is also the one framing the 'public safety' case for keeping it, that's not oversight, that's a sales pitch with a government seal on it.
Grand Rapids residents deserve more than a presentation. They deserve hard numbers: how many plate scans happen daily, how long the data sits in Flock's servers, who else can query it, and whether any of those searches have ever been abused or shared with federal agencies without a warrant. Cities from Michigan to Texas have been bitten by exactly these questions after the fact, once it's too late to undo the network of cameras already bolted to utility poles.
If you're in Grand Rapids or anywhere else wondering how many of these cameras are already watching your commute, check our camera map. And if your city council is about to have its own 'public safety committee' moment, our take-action guide has the questions worth asking before the vendor finishes their slideshow.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of WOOD TV8, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.