Automated License Plate Readers may be on the way to Santee
The short version: Santee is weighing a Flock-style ALPR pilot despite resident pushback, and CBS 8 San Diego's report shows the fight playing out in real time before a single camera goes up.
Our Take
Credit to CBS 8 San Diego for catching this one at the pilot-program stage, before Santee has committed to anything permanent. This is exactly the moment when public pressure actually works — once a city council votes yes and signs a Flock contract, the cameras tend to multiply quietly year after year with little public debate. The residents pushing back in this story understand that a 'trial run' is often just the soft launch of a permanent surveillance network.
What rarely gets asked in these council meetings is who else gets access to the data once it's collected. Flock's license plate reader networks don't just serve the department that installs them — data can be pooled, shared, and searched across hundreds of agencies nationwide, including by federal immigration authorities and out-of-state police investigating things that aren't even crimes in California. A 'pilot' framed as a local safety tool can quietly become part of a national tracking grid with zero local oversight.
If you're in Santee or anywhere nearby, now's the time to show up to council meetings and ask hard questions about retention periods, data-sharing agreements, and audit access before any vote happens. Check our camera map to see what's already deployed near you, and visit our take-action page for tools to push back before the pilot becomes permanent.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of CBS 8 San Diego, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.