Residents urge strict limits on cloud-based license-plate readers; county commissioner, councilmembers weigh benefits

Bridal Paulson, a New Prague resident, told the City Council on Jan. 20 that the proposed Flock Safety cameras and their searchable, cloud‑stored database raise privacy and security concerns for ordinary residents.

“Camera can be used and installed, and tape can be reviewed without the flock tracking and cloud database,” Paulson said, warning that the system’s commercial features can be used to “find out who’s friends with who” and citing an instance in Sedgwick, Kansas, in which a police chief used Flock Safety license‑plate reader data to track an individual repeatedly.

The comments came during the council’s public‑comment period and followed earlier council discussion that the city has received a grant to implement cameras intended for vandalism and park safety. The council said staff will draft a camera‑use policy that addresses data access, retention and permitted uses.

Why it matters: Residents pressed the council for clear limits on how long data will be retained, who may search it remotely, and how the city will measure whether the cameras improve public safety. City officials said those implementation details will be handled in a forthcoming policy and that the council will revisit the issue after the system is in place.

Paulson recommended local recording with review only on request and opposed a searchable national database. “I do not like to flock cameras in particular,” she said, and suggested a 72‑hour retention period used by other communities as a compromise that still allows retrieval for active investigations such as amber alerts or reports of stolen property.

Laurie Greenbush, another resident, voiced similar privacy concerns and asked where collected data would go and who could access it. “I didn’t move out here to have to be surveilled,” Greenbush said. She described personal unease about routine movements being recorded and asked how the information could be used in the future.

County Commissioner Dennis Streets told the council he supports the cameras as “a great toolbox,” noting that investigators already consult private video sources such as doorbell cameras during investigations. “If we had an incident, we'd be knocking on people's doors looking at their ring doorbell for an incident that happened that would help us solve a crime or locate a person,” Streets said.

Council members acknowledged both privacy concerns and potential investigative value. Councilman Bruce Wolf said he is “very leery” of cameras that could be moved or used to track people on Main Street, while other council members said they had received both positive and negative feedback from residents and businesses.

City staff told the council they will prepare a written camera‑use policy addressing permitted uses, data storage, retention limits, access by outside agencies, and legal constraints. Council members agreed to revisit implementation and enforcement questions and to review the policy after the system is operational.

Residents also raised security concerns about known vulnerabilities in camera systems: Paulson cited a Wired Magazine report alleging a security flaw in a major vendor’s LPR product and argued that “the more data that you save, the higher the risk.”

The council did not take formal action on the cameras at the meeting. Council members said a policy will be drafted and brought back to the council; one councilmember said the issue would be reviewed again in about six months or earlier if problems emerge.

The discussion included no formal vote, but it established a public record of concerns the council plans to address in the forthcoming camera policy.

Ending: The council’s next substantive step on the topic will be the staff‑prepared camera‑use policy; councilmembers said they expect to revisit the matter after the system has been implemented and data‑handling practices can be observed.