New Castle County police defend use of Flock ALPR cameras, cite 30‑day retention and limited access

Colonel Leonard of the New Castle County Police Department told the county Public Safety Committee on Feb. 10 that the department uses Flock automatic license‑plate readers (ALPRs) primarily to help solve stolen‑vehicle cases, burglaries, Amber Alerts and other major investigations.

"It does not identify people. It doesn't do any type of facial recognition," Leonard said, describing ALPRs as devices that photograph license plates and log the time, location and vehicle details before checking plates against law‑enforcement hot lists.

Leonard and Lieutenant Cumberbatch outlined operational limits intended to protect privacy. Searches must cite a legitimate law‑enforcement purpose and — in many cases — a case or incident number; the department stores captured plate data in the Flock cloud and retains it for 30 days. "Takeaway is that Flock is not a free search system. You must justify, document, and limit your search to a single license plate," Leonard said.

Lieutenant Cumberbatch described how the system works in practice: agencies upload a hot list of plates tied to stolen vehicles, suspects or other criteria, and cameras generate alerts only when a plate on that hot list passes a camera. "If the tag goes by that camera and hits that hot list, then we get an alert," Cumberbatch said, adding that officers do not see a stream of all passing plates unless they perform a justified, audited search.

Council members pressed officers on access, retention and sharing. Leonard said searches are currently limited to Delaware unless a supervisor at the rank of lieutenant authorizes expansion and that the department has sharing agreements with the Delaware State Police and the Newark Police Department; he said he would confirm whether any federal agreements exist. The department emphasized that access is restricted to a small number of users and that searches create an audit trail that supervisors review.

Council members also raised installation and permitting questions. Leonard said most county units are fixed; two are relocatable and placement on some utility poles requires permitting. He said Delmarva Power recently has sought court‑order approvals for attachments to its poles, which the department found impractical, while DelDOT has been more cooperative. Solar power options, he said, reduce reliance on external utilities.

On cost, Leonard said finance staff calculate annual expenses of roughly $18,000 to $21,000 for the county’s 14 cameras. He said the department paused expansion during recent litigation and legislative scrutiny in other states but currently has no immediate FY27 plan to add cameras.

Privacy advocates and some councils in other states have moved to limit or terminate Flock contracts; committee co‑chair Councilman Toole noted that jurisdictions such as Colorado, Illinois and Washington have placed restrictions. Leonard said that the department adjusted policy in recent months in response to questions from the council and public records inquiries to better document searches and narrow search scopes.

The presentation closed with Leonard asking for questions from council members and a commitment to provide follow‑up information on specific contracts, audit procedures and any federal sharing agreements. The committee did not vote on equipment procurement; the briefing was presented for information and discussion.