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Privacy concerns and grant questions raised as Glenarden considers Flock Safety camera system
Summary
Residents and leaders debated a proposed Flock Safety camera grant at a Glenarden meeting. Supporters said license‑plate alerts help recover stolen vehicles and missing children; opponents raised recurring costs, data sharing and privacy concerns.
Residents and officials debated whether to accept a grant to install Flock Safety cameras — a license‑plate and vehicle‑tracking system — after several citizens raised privacy and recurring‑cost concerns at a Glenarden City Council citizens‑comment meeting.
Miss Wilson, a longtime resident, said she opposed installing additional cameras and flagged recurring costs she had read in the proposal: an annual fee she described as $16,500 per year under a two‑year subscription term. “People need to have some freedom,” she said. “I don’t want anybody seeing me go home.” Council members and public‑safety leaders responded with examples of how the system is used by other local jurisdictions.
Chief Bridal, Glenarden’s police chief, said the Flock system integrates with regional dispatch and real‑time centers used in Prince George’s County, and that license‑plate alerts can generate timely notifications when a stolen car or an Amber Alert target passes through the city. “Once the flock cameras get tied into that system, it allows … an Amber Alert … if that car comes into the vicinity of Glenarden, the dispatcher automatically gets the hit real time,” the chief said, adding that the county’s communications center is the primary aggregator for those feeds.
City staff clarified that the initial installation was being pursued as a grant and that the two‑year software subscription has recurring costs if not covered by future grants. City Manager Simpson said the grant would “help with the cost” now but acknowledged the city could face subscription expenses in future budget cycles if additional grant funding is not secured.
Residents asked about data retention, whether the system performs face recognition and whether captured data is shared beyond regional police partners. Council members and the chief said the system captures plate reads (not facial recognition) and that access is controlled; they pointed to audit tools and cross‑jurisdictional alerts with Prince George’s County, Washington, D.C. and neighboring jurisdictions. Several residents asked staff to provide detailed privacy and data‑retention policies in writing before any contract is approved.
No final vote to accept a grant or sign a subscription was recorded at the citizens‑comment session. Council members asked staff to provide details on the grant terms, recurring costs and data‑use safeguards for review before any council vote.
