Resident urges Lebanon to end AI license-plate reader contract, cites privacy rulings

A Lebanon resident told the City Council on Monday that the city should end its contract with Flock Safety and stop using AI-powered license-plate reader cameras, describing the system as a searchable database that tracks residents’ movements.

"We must stop pretending this is just a digital witness to crimes. It is a searchable, AI driven dragnet search that tracks the movement of every citizen in Lebanon," Michael Qualls said during the public-comment period, and he cited Supreme Court privacy decisions, including Carpenter v. United States and United States v. Jones, to argue the practice raises Fourth Amendment concerns.

Qualls said the police chief’s public policy indicates location and plate-read data are held for at least 30 days locally and up to a year in neighboring municipalities, and he said residents cannot obtain copies of their own Flock data under state practice he described as illegal in Tennessee. An assistant interjected agreement that such data should be subject to public records requests.

Why it matters: License-plate reader networks generate law-enforcement utility but also raise privacy and civil-liberties concerns. The comment highlights a topic other U.S. cities have debated—the tradeoff between investigative value and the potential for broad location-tracking of lawful activity.

Council did not vote on the matter during the meeting; the comment was recorded in public comment and staff did not present an immediate recommendation.

What was said: "This is exactly what the Supreme Court warned us about," Qualls said, referencing the Court's language about location tracking and privacy. He concluded by urging the council to "dissolve the flock safety contract and cease the use of the AI powered surveillance cameras."

Status: The matter remains a public-comment issue for council consideration; no formal direction or motion to change the contract was recorded in the meeting minutes.