The City of Boulder is behind schedule in selecting a vendor to operate its automatic license plate reader network. The decision could replace more than 40 cameras supplied by Flock, a company facing growing scrutiny over privacy and law enforcement access to its data.
The delay comes as surveillance and privacy are emerging as issues in Boulder’s November city election. Two mayoral candidates have already called for the city council to exercise more authority over the Flock contract.
Flock cameras record vehicles as they pass, capturing license plate numbers and identifying details such as vehicle color, bike racks and bumper stickers. In Boulder, 30 days of a vehicle’s location data are searchable by police departments across Colorado without a warrant.
The city has faced pushback over privacy concerns and ICE’s ability to access Flock data. In May, two Boulder residents sued the city over its Flock contract, alleging the cameras amount to warrantless mass surveillance. Dozens of cities across the country have canceled their contracts with the company.
In response to the criticism, the city opened a competitive bidding process in April, inviting other companies to provide automatic license plate reader cameras. The city’s request for proposals said the city would select a shortlist of vendors and test their cameras at an intersection between June and August, then choose a winner by Sept. 15.
That pilot never occurred, and the city will not select a vendor in September, according to City Manager Nuria Rivera-Vandermyde.
“We are still working through both our process and our path forward, and we expect to have more to share with you and the community later this month,” Rivera-Vandermyde told Boulder Reporting Lab, adding that staff understood license plate readers were of “significant and particular interest to our community.”
“Our process has slowed because we are considering how to balance operational efficiency and effectiveness with the community input, transparency, and Council oversight these important decisions deserve.”
Although the bidding process began in response to criticism of Flock, privacy advocates say their concerns extend to all automatic license plate reader systems, regardless of the company operating them.
“It doesn’t matter which company has its creepy cameras in your neighborhood; they all have the same problems: a lack of transparency, oversight, and regulation into how they collect, store, and use our data, and how to hold public and private actors accountable if they abuse it,” the ACLU wrote in a recent post.
Amid mounting backlash, Flock announced changes to its platform this week after The Washington Post documented at least 50 instances in which officers were accused of improperly using license plate reader systems to track romantic partners, relatives and others. The company will shorten its standard data-retention period from 30 days to seven and require law enforcement agencies to use audit tools designed to flag suspicious searches.
Several Flock cameras have also been vandalized in Boulder, as vandalism targeting automatic license plate cameras appears to be increasing in cities across the country. At Table Mesa Drive and Moorhead Avenue, for example, a Flock camera has been sawed off its pole.
Politics and Flock
The city manager’s office decided to renew the city’s contract with Flock in March, with a new provision allowing the city to exit the contract without penalty with 30 days’ notice. The office will also choose the winner of the new bidding process.
Deputy City Manager Chris Meschuk told the Boulder City Council in March that the city’s Flock contract is an administrative matter overseen by the city manager, meaning the council has no direct say over the contract. The city attorney added that the council could establish broader surveillance and privacy policies to guide future contracts. Rivera-Vandermyde said city staff “value and seek to include community voices and input from council members” so their decisions align with the expectations of residents and elected officials.
“City Council sets the overarching, citywide approach and high-level policy direction for how technology is used in Boulder,” Rivera-Vandermyde said. “We don’t make operational decisions in a vacuum.”
So far, the council has not taken up those policy questions.
But surveillance and privacy are expected to become issues in Boulder’s November city election. In announcing their campaigns for mayor, Aquiles La Grave, a political newcomer, and Councilmember Taishya Adams both said they want the city council to exercise more authority over the Flock contract.
State Sen. Judy Amabile, who represents Boulder, also said she plans to reintroduce legislation that would place guardrails on how much data collected by Flock and similar companies can be searched without a warrant. A similar bill failed last year following opposition from law enforcement.
