Cleveland is extending its contract with the investigative camera company Flock Safety, but only for six months and after adding several privacy protections.
The vote at Tuesday night’s meeting was 9-6 with council largely split between East Side members approving and West Side members voting no.
“We cannot have the license plate readers go dark,” said Councilmember Michael Polensek, whose ward includes the Collinwood neighborhood. “I never want to have to explain to a parent or a wife or a daughter who lost their father, police officer, or mother — we couldn't track who did it. I never want to be in that situation.”
Cleveland’s contract with Flock began in 2023 and includes about 100 cameras at locations around the city. Each camera takes a photo of every vehicle that passes by.
The photos are stored for at least 30 days, longer if the vehicle is part of an investigation, and law enforcement can search the images based on license plate numbers or more common characteristics like vehicle type, color and accessories like bumper stickers or roof racks without getting a warrant.
Law enforcement agencies can allow any agency around the country to search for vehicles on its cameras, raising concerns about use by immigration authorities or out of state agencies enforcing laws against interstate travel to seek an abortion.
In response to those concerns, and reporting on the number of immigration-related searches conducted on Cleveland’s cameras, the city shut off access to its cameras by any outside agency, according to Public Safety Director Wayne Drummond.
“We are no longer involved in a national lookup,” Drummond told council Wednesday. “They cannot check for immigration status, as well as reproductive rights. We have accountability measures in place for this particular product and all products. We hold our officers and civilian employees accountable for usage of this system.”
The ordinance includes language that prohibits outside access without a warrant to the data collected by Cleveland’s Flock cameras. The contract extension was also shortened from one year to six months.
“We see this as a transition opportunity,” said Council President Blaine Griffin, whose ward is also on the East Side. “To look at best practices as well as do further research to see if there’s more guardrails, further things we need to do, as well as if there are other companies or products that will compete for this tool.”
The extension was never a sure thing. In its first hearing at council's safety committee in June, three of four members present voted no. At a later hearing in July, the committee voted 5-2 in favor of the extension, with amendments shortening the extension and limiting data sharing outside Cleveland.
Some members during Wednesday’s committee of the whole, before the final vote in the evening, questioned whether Flock could be trusted to follow the city’s rules and disputed whether public safety would be served by keeping Flock cameras.
Council member Tanmay Shah, who represents a ward on the West Side, pushed back on the idea that opponents of ALPR were threatening public safety, pointing to the use of the cameras by immigration authorities.
“Immigrants are everywhere," Shah said. "We're not just on the East or the West Side. And for me, it's just difficult to hear about this as some sort of a thing where protecting immigrants is going to come at the cost of our black residents when we know that's just not true. If anything, we know that we have to stand in solidarity.”
Five of the six votes against– Nikki Hudson, Shah, Jasmin Santana, Kris Harsh, Stephanie Howse-Jones and Austin Davis – represent wards on the West Side.
The lone East Side council member, Howse-Jones, said her no vote was based on her long-held view that the city needs to invest in crime prevention and a better understanding of reasons that crime happens in Cleveland.
