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Rangely resident urges council to review, end Flock Safety camera contract over privacy concerns
Summary
Mark Stamos told the Rangely Town Council the recently installed Flock Safety license-plate cameras were put in without public input and risks creating "vehicle fingerprints" that could be aggregated and abused; council members asked for documentary evidence and discussed cloud-security and public-safety tradeoffs.
Mark Stamos, a resident who addressed the council during petitions and public input, urged the town to review or end its contract with Flock Safety, the vendor that installed automated license-plate readers.
"These flock license plate readers are more than license plate readers," Stamos said, contending the system creates a "vehicle fingerprint" stored in a cloud database and can be aggregated with other sources to track individuals. He asked the council to review materials he provided and to hold public hearings or pass a resolution ending the contract.
Council members responded with a mix of skepticism and concern. The chair said the cloud storage used by the provider is, in his view, "more secure than what our servers are," and emphasized the town's interest in tools that help locate stolen plates and wanted individuals. A different council member asked for tangible evidence, citing an audit-related report out of Evanston as the type of documentation that would persuade him.
The exchange included a clarification over whether the system performs facial recognition: Stamos denied claiming the cameras perform facial recognition, and council members sought clarity on the technical limits of plate-capture systems versus face identification. Several council members encouraged Stamos to meet with the police chief and to bring documentary evidence back to a future meeting.
Why it matters: The discussion centered on balancing privacy concerns and civil-liberty risks against law-enforcement benefits in a small community. Stamos asked the council to ensure any continued use of the system is supported by public input and transparent data-handling practices.
What happens next: Council members invited the resident to provide documentation and suggested further conversation with the police chief; the council did not take immediate formal action to alter the contract at this meeting.
