Flock camera apparently cut down at Cosmo Park; police confirm camera vandalism in Columbia

Our Take

Columbia's Flock cameras keep getting cut down, and that's not nothing. KOMU 8 News reports this is now at least the second time a unit has gone missing from Cosmo Park under circumstances police are calling vandalism. One incident is a data point. A pattern is a message.

We don't endorse property destruction, and we're not going to pretend we know who's behind it or why. But we also don't need a crystal ball to read the room: when a city keeps installing automated license plate readers without clear public buy-in, some residents are going to vote with their own two hands instead of waiting for a city council agenda item. That's a predictable outcome of deploying blanket surveillance infrastructure with minimal transparency about retention, access logs, or who else gets to query the data — including other agencies and, in some documented cases, immigration enforcement.

Columbia isn't unique. Flock units are getting challenged, questioned, and in some cities outright removed through legal and political channels — the slower, more durable path. If you want to see what's watching your own commutes, check our camera map, and if you'd rather fight this with public records requests and city council pressure than bolt cutters, our take-action page has a place to start. Credit to KOMU 8 News for staying on this story as it develops.