Lakeville council approves agreement for 20 license-plate reader cameras after privacy debate

The Lakeville City Council approved a master services agreement with Flock Group Incorporated on Dec. 15 to install 20 fixed license-plate reader (LPR) cameras on major ingress and egress routes, following a lengthy presentation and council questions about privacy, data retention and oversight.

Chief Paulson told the council the cameras would sit on poles along high-traffic corridors such as Interstate 35 exit ramps, Cedar Avenue and County Road 46 and would capture vehicle-related data only. He said the system is intended to support real-time alerts — for example matching plates against a missing-person database — and to aid post-incident investigations by searching recent LPR data.

"These are fixed license plate reader cameras on various poles throughout our community," Paulson said. "They capture vehicle related data only. Nothing involving people or persons inside of those vehicles." He also described vendor features including a public dashboard that shows notification types, cooperating agencies and camera hit and search counts.

Public comment at the meeting included resident Phil Wilson, who urged the council to reject Flock cameras, arguing they create detailed movement records "regardless of whether they are suspected of any wrongdoing" and noting a proposed cost of about $127,000 over two years. "This level of surveillance erodes privacy and creates detailed movement records of ordinary law-abiding citizens," Wilson said.

In response, Paulson described legal and policy guardrails. He told the council that state law governs LPR use and reporting, requires agencies to maintain policies, and mandates certain auditing. Paulson said state statute allows a 60-day retention window but that the city intends to limit retention to 30 days and to delete data automatically after that period unless it is tied to an active investigation. He said the system will not employ facial recognition and that the city would control data sharing and release.

Council members asked about supervisory and audit controls; Paulson said the department would appoint an internal gatekeeper (a lieutenant) to oversee data-sharing agreements and training, and that both internal supervisory reviews and external biennial audits would be used to check compliance. "The data trail remains there forever. The data itself is gone after 30 days. The audit trail remains indefinitely," he said.

Councilmember Walter moved to approve the agreement; the motion was seconded and the council recorded affirmative roll-call votes from Walter, Lee, Hellyer and Bermel. No no votes were recorded in the public transcript and the motion passed.

The council's approval authorizes the city to enter the master services agreement with Flock and to proceed with placement of the cameras, subject to the reporting and policy requirements described by the police chief. The police department said it would publish transparency materials and follow the state-mandated reporting and audit processes.