A northern Utah city has said no to Flock
The short version: Washington Terrace, Utah pulled back from a Flock Safety contract, showing local pushback on ALPR surveillance can actually work.
Our Take
Credit to KUER 90.1 and reporter Macy Lipkin for getting boots on the ground at the Washington Terrace council meeting instead of just running a press release. This is exactly the kind of local accountability journalism that mass surveillance expansion depends on us not having. When a small Utah city council votes no on a Flock contract, it's proof these deals aren't inevitable — they get sold as a done deal until residents and elected officials actually ask hard questions.
Every city that walks away from a blanket ALPR contract is one less town feeding a private company's growing database of everyone's daily movements. Flock's pitch is always the same: crime is scary, cameras are cheap, just sign here. What often gets left out is the retention policies, the data-sharing agreements with other agencies, and the fact that once a network like this goes up, it rarely comes down. Washington Terrace apparently had enough council members willing to slow down and say not yet, and that's worth highlighting as a model for other communities weighing the same pitch.
If your town is being courted by Flock or another ALPR vendor, don't wait for a vote night surprise. Check our camera map to see what's already deployed near you, and hit our take-action page for tools to push back before the contract ink dries.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of KUER 90.1, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.