Mt. Juliet Police Are Getting a Major Upgrade
The short version: Unlocking Nashville reports Mt. Juliet PD is adding a third K-9 and expanding its Drone as a First Responder program, another sign of local police leaning harder into automated surveillance tools.
Our Take
Credit to Unlocking Nashville for flagging this one early. A new K-9 is a routine budget line, but "Drone as a First Responder" is not — it means a camera in the sky can be dispatched to a scene before an officer ever knocks on a door, capturing footage of homes, yards, and people who never called 911 or consented to being filmed.
Mt. Juliet isn't alone. Departments across the country are stacking drones on top of existing ALPR networks like Flock Safety, building a layered surveillance system where cars are tracked at intersections and now airspace is tracked block by block. Each piece gets sold separately as a narrow public-safety tool, but together they add up to persistent monitoring with little public input on retention, data sharing, or who else gets access to the footage.
If you live in or near Mt. Juliet, it's worth asking your city council what policies govern this drone footage — how long it's kept, who can request it, and whether it's shared with other agencies or federal databases. Check our camera map to see what's already deployed near you, and hit up take action for tools to push your local officials for transparency before the next 'upgrade' rolls out.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of Unlocking Nashville, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.