Scope: This page tallies decisions our reporting has recorded about US automatic license plate reader (ALPR) and similar surveillance systems. It is not a national total. Rows appear here only when one of our published stories documents the decision. The "Our coverage" column links to that story, where the underlying sourcing is listed. We add rows as new reporting is published.
Last reviewed: 2026-10-01. The tally below is computed from the four tables on this page.
Tally
- Contracts gained, systems expanded, or newly deployed: 7
- Contracts canceled, terminated, or not renewed: 31
- Use restricted by law, ordinance, court ruling, or binding audit: 6
- Devices physically destroyed, as reported by named sources: 5
- Total decisions recorded on this page: 49
What Counts as a Decision
We only log events that one of our published stories documents. Four categories qualify:
- Contracts gained: a contract signed, renewed, or expanded, or a system approved or newly deployed by a named jurisdiction.
- Contracts lost: a contract canceled, not renewed, terminated, rejected, or voted down by a named jurisdiction.
- Restricted: a law, ordinance, warrant requirement, court ruling, moratorium, or binding audit that limits use.
- Destroyed: devices physically destroyed, disabled, or removed, as reported by a named outlet or agency.
Vendor explainers, product launches, daily briefings, investigations without an outcome, and opinion pieces do not count, even when they touch on ALPRs. We list those in our coverage without adding them here.
Contracts Gained, Systems Expanded, or Newly Deployed
| Date | Jurisdiction | Vendor | Decision | Our coverage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025-08-11 | Denver, CO | Flock Safety | Police signed a one-year free-trial Aerodome drone-as-first-responder contract. The program launched without City Council approval; Surveillance Technology Task Force members said they learned about it from reporters. | Link |
| 2025-10 | Denver, CO | Skydio | Two Skydio X10 drones and two docking stations were installed on the roof of the Denver Police Administration building on Cherokee Street. By February 2026 the two drones had flown 297 missions. | Link |
| 2026-04-09 | Oakland County, MI | Flock Safety | Board of Commissioners voted 13-4 to approve "Project Prove It," a 9-month free pilot of seven autonomous Flock Safety drones that launch automatically when 911 calls come in. Years two and three would cost $1.25 million each if continued. | Link |
| 2026-03-31 | Denver, CO | Axon | City Council approved a $150,000 one-year Axon contract for 50 ALPR cameras on a 7-6 vote, with 21-day retention, no federal access, and audited queries. ACLU of Colorado and 14 community organizations had asked the council to vote no. | Link |
| 2026-07-14 | Douglas County, CO | Axon | Board of County Commissioners approved a $22.8 million Axon package that replaces 50 Flock cameras with 100 Axon Outpost plate readers and adds a countywide first-responder drone network. Begins January 1, 2027. | Link |
| 2025-12 | San Diego, CA | Flock Safety | City Council voted to continue the existing Flock Safety camera program after six hours of public comment opposing it. | Link |
| Not stated | Kennesaw State University, GA | Flock Safety | University deployed at least 49 Flock ALPR cameras plus Raven AI microphone arrays across both campuses without public announcement or student input. | Link |
Contracts Canceled, Terminated, or Not Renewed
| Date | Jurisdiction | Vendor | Decision | Our coverage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025-11 | Woodburn, OR | Flock Safety | Suspended system for 60+ days after community members raised concerns the cameras could assist ICE. | Link |
| 2025-11 | Mountlake Terrace, WA | Flock Safety | Unanimously canceled. | Link |
| 2025-11 | Redmond, WA | Flock Safety | Deactivated cameras. | Link |
| 2025-11 | Lynwood, WA | Flock Safety | Deactivated cameras. | Link |
| 2025-12 | Eugene, OR | Flock Safety | Terminated contract after identifying vulnerabilities and limitations. A camera had been reactivated without authorization after the city paused its use. | Link |
| 2025-12 | Springfield, OR | Flock Safety | Ended agreement. Cameras never activated and will be removed. | Link |
| Not stated | Lane County, OR | Flock Safety | Sheriff ended contract without ever deploying the cameras. | Link |
| 2025-12 | Flagstaff, AZ | Flock Safety | Month-long resident pushback killed the contract. | Link |
| 2025-12 | Olympia, WA | Flock Safety | Uninstalled cameras and canceled pilot program. | Link |
| 2025 (late) | Cambridge, MA | Flock Safety | Canceled after Flock installed two cameras without authorization; city called it a material breach of our trust. | Link |
| 2025-08 | Evanston, IL | Flock Safety | Terminated over privacy concerns. Flock then attempted an unauthorized reinstallation after the cancellation. | Link |
| 2025-06 | Austin, TX | Flock Safety | Over 30 community groups pressured the council to cancel. An audit found 20%+ of searches lacked documentation. | Link |
| 2026-01 | Bend, OR | Flock Safety | Will not renew contract. Cameras suspended, uninstallation planned for May 2026, citing public concerns about data practices and privacy. | Link |
| 2026-01 | Staunton, VA | Flock Safety | City canceled contract after resident pushback; police chief called it democracy in action. | Link |
| 2026-02-03 | Mountain View, CA | Flock Safety | Police chief disabled all 30 cameras after an audit found outside agencies had been querying city data without the city knowing. | Link |
| 2026-02-24 | Mountain View, CA | Flock Safety | City Council voted unanimously to permanently terminate the contract after an audit confirmed federal agencies had searched city camera data without authorization. | Link |
| 2026-01 | Santa Cruz, CA | Flock Safety | Terminated contract over federal access concerns. | Link |
| 2026-01 | Los Altos Hills, CA | Flock Safety | Terminated contract. | Link |
| 2026-02-27 | Oxnard, CA | Flock Safety | Police Department suspended all Flock cameras after a vendor-based issue enabled a nationwide query feature despite California-only access settings. | Link |
| 2025-11 | Oakland, CA | Flock Safety | City Council voted down a proposed $2 million expansion of the Flock Safety program. | Link |
| 2026-03-19 | Seattle, WA | Not named (patrol-car ALPRs) | Mayor Wilson ordered all roughly 400 Automated License Plate Readers on Seattle patrol cars plus six on parking enforcement vehicles switched off, citing immigration enforcement and data security concerns. | Link |
| Not stated | South Pasadena, CA | Flock Safety | Council canceled contract for 14 cameras after reports that Southern California agencies illegally shared Flock data with federal immigration agents. | Link |
| 2026-02-15 | Foothill-De Anza Community College District, CA | Flock Safety | Discontinued contract; covered camera lenses and disabled all data sharing. | Link |
| 2026-03-31 | Denver, CO | Flock Safety (replaced with Axon) | Removed all 110 cameras when the city contract expired. Replaced with 50 Axon cameras under stricter data controls. Privately owned Flock cameras at HOAs and businesses were not covered by the city contract. | Link |
| 2026-04-23 | Oshkosh, WI | Flock Safety | Council voted 7-0 to rescind the contract less than 24 hours after approving it, after Police Chief Dean Smith reported Flock had made false statements about heat map tracking capabilities to the council. | Link |
| 2026-07-11 | Los Angeles, CA | Flock Safety | LAPD allowed its Flock Safety contract to expire over the weekend, two days before 404 Media reported the Office of the Inspector General audit BPC 26-184 counting 161 innocent drivers pulled over on false stolen-vehicle flags. LAPD said it would not enter new ALPR contracts until completing a full audit process. Roughly 2,000 ALPR cameras remain under Flock, Motorola static readers, and Axon in-car systems. | Link |
| Early 2026 | Verona, WI | Flock Safety | City Council voted to let the Flock contract lapse rather than renew it. Flock refused to remove three cameras on the city preferred timeline; city staff covered the lenses with black trash bags. Mayor Luke Diaz said in February 2026 he was "100% certain that they were still working." | Link |
| Not stated | Norman, OK | Flock Safety | City council voted 9-0 to reject the Flock Safety ALPR pitch, the second time in three years the entire nine-member council said no. Mayor Stephen Tyler Holman said the deciding concerns were 30-day data retention on every passing car and a private vendor holding the searchable plate database. | Link |
| 2026-02-12 | Amazon/Ring (private) | Flock Safety | Amazon cancelled its planned Ring-Flock Safety integration partnership three days after the Ring Super Bowl ad backlash; the integration was never activated. | Link |
| 2026-03-17 | Minnesota (state legislature) | Flock Safety and other ALPRs | House Judiciary Finance and Civil Law Committee voted 7-7 along party lines on HF 4205, killing for the 2026 session a bill that would have required warrants before out-of-state or federal agencies could access Minnesota license plate reader data. | Link |
| 2026-08-31 | Florida (state highways) | ALPRs on state highway right-of-way | Florida Department of Transportation ordered every automated license plate reader off state highway right-of-way within 30 days, revoked all previously approved installation permits, and barred transportation officials from issuing future ones. | Link |
Use Restricted by Law, Ordinance, Court Ruling, or Binding Audit
| Date | Jurisdiction | Vendor | Decision | Our coverage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-02-27 | San Jose, CA | Flock Safety | Police Chief Joseph issued a policy memo cutting ALPR data retention from one year to 30 days, disabling the Federal Sharing toggle in the Flock portal, banning cameras near houses of worship and reproductive health clinics, and requiring commander approval for new outside requesters. | Link |
| 2026-02-25 | Santa Clara County, CA | Flock Safety | Board of Supervisors voted 3-2 to ban Flock Safety from all county law enforcement operations. The sheriff's office cannot operate, manage, or access any Flock cameras or data, with mandatory quarterly compliance audits. | Link |
| Not stated | Richmond, CA | Flock Safety | Police Department blocked federal agency access to its Flock cameras after disclosures of widespread unauthorized out-of-state searches of California ALPR data. | Link |
| 2026-03-19 | Seattle, WA | Not named (CCTV pilot) | Mayor Wilson froze planned camera expansion in Capitol Hill, the Central District, and the Stadium District pending a NYU Policing Project data governance and privacy audit, and disabled one active camera with a view of a reproductive healthcare facility. | Link |
| 2026-04-23 | Austin, TX | Not named (broad surveillance ordinance) | City Council passed the Transparent and Responsible Use of Surveillance Technology (TRUST) Act, requiring council approval, a published privacy impact assessment, a surveillance use policy, a draft contract available a full month before the vote, and annual reporting before any city department deploys surveillance technology that collects resident data. | Link |
| 2026-08-28 | Texas (state agencies) | Flock Safety | Governor Abbott ordered state agencies to stop funding Flock Safety cameras after The Texas Tribune traced $30 million in Flock grants back to a $1 auto insurance fee. Local agencies remain free to use city, county, federal, and private funds. | Link |
Devices Physically Destroyed, as Reported by Named Sources
This section counts reported, sourced incidents of physical destruction of surveillance devices. It does not assert a verified national total. Attribution goes to the outlet or agency that reported each incident.
| Date | Jurisdiction | Vendor | Decision | Our coverage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025-04 to 2025-10 | Suffolk, VA | Flock Safety | 13 cameras systematically destroyed over six months by a single actor, who was later arrested. | Link |
| 2025-10 | Eugene and Springfield, OR | Flock Safety | Six cameras cut down from poles, at least one spray-painted, with a note left behind. | Link |
| 2026-02 | La Mesa, CA | Flock Safety | Two cameras on Fletcher Parkway smashed or stripped of key parts weeks after the city advanced the contract. | Link |
| 2026-02 | Greenview, IL | Flock Safety | Two cameras cut down; mounting poles severed at the base. | Link |
| 2026-02 | Lisbon, CT | Flock Safety | One camera smashed; police investigating. | Link |
How We Count
One row per decision event per our coverage. If two stories cover the same event, the row appears once and links to the first story we recorded it from. Dates are the date the event happened, when our reporting states one. Where only a month or year is given, we record the granularity the page supplies.
Empty sections are intentional. If we have not yet reported a qualifying decision in a category, the section says so. We do not fill rows from secondary sources or infer jurisdictions from vendor names.
Methodology and Limits
The tally counts decisions this site has covered, not a national total. ALPR procurement, deployment, cancellation, and destruction happen across thousands of US jurisdictions; we cover a self-selected subset. A row on this page means we published a story documenting the decision. The absence of a row means we have not reported it yet, not that it did not happen.
The scoreboard is maintained. As we add new reporting and revisit older stories, we add, correct, or remove rows. The page is reviewed against the four tables every time we run the tally.
Sources
This page aggregates findings from the State of Surveillance stories listed below. Each row in the tables above links to one of these stories; each story lists its own primary citations (council records, court filings, agency statements, named outlets).
- Denver Police Drones: Flock and Skydio Surveillance (State of Surveillance)
- Oakland County Flock Drones: Midnight Vote Surveillance (State of Surveillance)
- Axon License Plate Reader: Flock Replacement Surveillance (State of Surveillance)
- Flock Cameras San Diego: Activist Darth Vader at Ralphs (State of Surveillance)
- KSU Flock Safety Campus Surveillance (State of Surveillance)
- Oregon ALPR Flock Safety Regulation (State of Surveillance)
- Flock Safety Rebellion: Cities Canceling Federal Access (State of Surveillance)
- Silicon Valley Bans Flock: Mountain View and Santa Clara (State of Surveillance)
- Flock Safety Class Action Lawsuit California Federal Data Sharing (State of Surveillance)
- Seattle Mayor Wilson Police Surveillance Pause and ALPR Shutdown (State of Surveillance)
- Flock Safety Cancel Wave: 30 Cities Drop ALPR Surveillance Contracts (State of Surveillance)
- LAPD Flock: 161 Innocent Stops Audit (State of Surveillance)
- Verona Wisconsin Flock Cameras Bags Removal (State of Surveillance)
- Norman Oklahoma Council Rejected Flock Cameras Mayor Holman (State of Surveillance)
- Ring Flock Partnership Cancelled Victory Surveillance (State of Surveillance)
- Minnesota ALPR Privacy Bill HF 4205 Targets ICE and Metro Surge (State of Surveillance)
- Texas and Florida Flock Pullback: Abbott Funding and FDOT Highway Removal (State of Surveillance)
- San Jose ALPR Policy Changes Lawsuit Response (State of Surveillance)
- Austin TRUST Act: Surveillance, Shooting, and License Plate Readers (State of Surveillance)
- Flock Cameras Destroyed Nationwide ICE Backlash (State of Surveillance)