Montgomery County Sheriff defends use of plate readers
The short version: WFXR News reports Montgomery County's sheriff publicly defended Flock ALPR use after resident pushback, a familiar pattern when surveillance programs face scrutiny.
Our Take
When a sheriff feels compelled to write a letter defending a license plate reader program, that's usually a sign residents are asking the right questions. Credit to WFXR News for covering Sheriff Robert Page's defense of Flock cameras in Montgomery County — these local stories are often the only public record of how these systems get justified, since most ALPR deployments happen with zero county commission vote or public hearing.
'Trust us, it's for public safety' is the standard line from law enforcement every time a Flock network gets scrutinized. What's almost never in that letter: retention policies, audit logs showing who accessed the data and why, whether other agencies or ICE can query the system, or any independent data on crime reduction. A sheriff defending a technology after the fact is not the same as a community consenting to it beforehand.
Montgomery County residents deserve the receipts, not just reassurance. Check our camera map to see what's already watching you locally, and visit take action for tools to push your own county toward real transparency and oversight.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of WFXR NEWS, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.