Florida ends permits for Flock cameras on state roads, halting future approvals

Our Take

Credit where it's due: KATV7's report on FDOT Assistant Secretary Will Watts' memo is a genuinely big deal. Revoking every existing license-plate-reader permit on state roads and refusing to approve new ones isn't a symbolic gesture — it's an agency with actual authority over the right-of-way telling police departments and Flock Safety that the default "just bolt it to a pole" arrangement is over. Thirty days to pull the hardware, or the state does it for you, is the kind of teeth most "regulation" of ALPR networks never has.

What makes this notable is how quietly these camera networks usually expand. Flock's whole pitch to small departments is frictionless deployment: no public vote, no real procurement fight, just a lease and a pole. A state DOT stepping in and saying "not on our infrastructure" cuts against that model in a way city councils rarely manage. It also raises an obvious question other states should be asking: how many of these cameras were ever properly permitted in the first place, versus just quietly installed and left running?

Florida drivers and privacy advocates should watch closely to see whether local agencies actually comply or just relocate cameras to county or city roads outside FDOT's jurisdiction — that's historically how these fights go. Check our map to see what's actually been deployed in your area, and if you want to push back on your own city or county's ALPR contract, our take-action page has a starting point.