2026 08 17 27 Public Comment

Our Take

Credit where it's due: the DeFlockILM channel is doing exactly what local accountability journalism should look like — showing up to the New Hanover County Commissioners meeting and getting public comment on the record about the county's Flock ALPR cameras. We don't have the full transcript, but the fact that a resident felt compelled to stand up at a commissioners meeting in August 2026 and raise concerns tells you this isn't a fringe issue anymore. It's a kitchen-table one.

This is how the fight against mass surveillance actually gets won or lost — not in Silicon Valley boardrooms, but in county commission chambers where nobody's watching except the people who showed up. Flock's pitch to local governments is always the same: convenience, crime-solving, 'it's just plates.' What rarely gets mentioned in the sales deck is the permanent, searchable record of everywhere your car has been, shared across a growing network of agencies with little independent oversight. One public comment won't change a contract, but it puts commissioners on notice that residents are watching the watchers.

If you live in New Hanover County or anywhere near a Flock deployment, check our camera map to see what's already tracking you, and hit take action for templates on how to raise this with your own local officials before the next vote happens quietly without you.