Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Surveillance Privacy topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Residents press Mount Vernon to end Flock Safety contract and invest in social services
Summary
Multiple residents urged the Mount Vernon City Council to halt its Flock Safety camera subscription, citing privacy, third-party data control and immigration-era access concerns, and asked the city to prioritize social services, youth programs and PIT-count outreach to improve public safety.
Several residents used the council’s public-comment period on Jan. 14 to call on Mount Vernon leaders to end the city’s contract with Flock Safety and to redirect resources toward social services and community-based safety programs.
Gavin Birch described findings from public records and the company's transparency portal, saying he received inconsistent accounts about the number and cost of cameras. Birch told council he had requested public records and that the city’s response identified only six Flock cameras with an estimated $38,000 initial purchase and installation cost and a roughly $68,000 two-year service-and-maintenance contract, while a public portal listed many more devices. He said officers’ access procedures were not produced in his records response and urged the city to move infrastructure ownership and data control in-house.
A separate commenter, Harrison, warned about the broader risks of outsourcing vehicle-tracking infrastructure to a private company, citing reports of cross-jurisdictional access and saying the corporate data repository is vulnerable to misuse. Andrea Mestle and Kelly Lowenstein echoed privacy concerns and argued for a broader definition of public safety — recommending investment in social services, staffing the IOS crisis-response program around the clock before expanding armed patrols, and improving infrastructure for pedestrians and youth.
County coordinated-entry manager Chuck Messenger used public comment to urge volunteer and community participation in the federally required point-in-time (PIT) count scheduled for Jan. 29; he outlined resource-center events planned Jan. 29–31 (Skagit Station, Recovery Cafe on Bridal, and Triumph Team Life Center) and said this year's counts will have longer-term implications for federal funding because Washington changed the unsheltered-count cadence.
Speakers asked the council to review records, clarify who has access to Flock data, and consider alternatives such as a city-owned CCTV system with an independently maintained license-plate recognition algorithm. The council did not take formal action on the Flock contract during the meeting; comments were recorded for consideration.
