Kenton County Fiscal Court holds off on license plate reader vote… again

Community members filled the Kenton County Historic Courthouse in Independence Tuesday night to speak out against the prospect of automatic license plate readers, or ALPRs, in the unincorporated portions of the county.

“I want humans watching over us, not AI,” said resident Tim Grothaus.

Kenton County Judge/Executive Kris Knochelmann announced early in the meeting —before public comments — that no vote on the issue would take place, in spite of a request from Kenton County police to begin the bidding process appearing on the agenda. This was the second time the fiscal court postponed a vote on the matter.

Kenton County Police Chief Michael “Spike” Jones requested to start the bidding process for ALPRs in late June. The vote to begin the bidding process was on the agenda for the fiscal court’s meeting on June 30, which saw a large turnout form local residents hoping to speak about the Site Readiness Initiative, but the bidding vote was postponed at that meeting.

ALPRs are mounted at fixed angles and capture a vehicle’s license plate number, make, model and color as it passes by. The state passed Kentucky House Bill 58 earlier this year, which regulates the technology. Northern Kentucky Reps Kim Banta, Marianne Proctor and TJ Roberts, all of whom are Republicans, sponsored the bill, and it went through multiple amendments before reaching the governor’s desk.

The bill established database retention limits, limits on what sort of information an ALPR can capture and the purposes agencies can use them for. It also made the locations of ALPRs subject to open records laws. Gov. Andy Beshear, a Democrat, signed the bill into law in April.

ALPRs have gotten a lot of public attention recently. Newport announced Tuesday afternoon just before the Kenton County Fiscal Court meeting it would be ending its program using Flock ALPRs. Last week, residents turned out to a meeting in Newport to speak out against a city proposal to contract with Flock Safety, the most well-known makers of the technology and the focus of much of the criticism. Disapproval ran the gamut from concerns about unwarranted search and seizure, data ownership and sharing, as well as the security of the technology itself. Several departments throughout Northern Kentucky, including the Boone County Sheriff, already have contracts with Flock.

Deflock, an advocacy initiative that uses crowd-sourced information to track the locations of ALPRs around the country, puts the number of ALPRs around the NKY region at over 100. Most are produced and owned by Flock Safety. Use the interactive map below to see where they are.

NOTE: You may need to click the ‘RETRY’ button or refresh the page to get the map to load properly.

Jones stated his department, which operates separately from the Kenton County Sheriff, wanted to mount six cameras throughout the county, none of which were on thoroughfares. He proposed one for the jail parking lot and five at the entrances to various county-owned parks.

“We see this as a way of preventing potential predators from coming into our parks and preying on our children,” Jones said.

Speakers at the meeting included community members, as well as several candidates for office. At least two people had signs, one of which said “f*** flock.” The comments, regardless of the speakers’ political backgrounds, were universally against the ALPRs, especially those produced by Flock Safety.

Even though the chief’s bidding request was meant to solicit bids from multiple companies, Flock Safety representative Kerry McCormick, who spoke last week in Newport, was in attendance at the meeting. He did not speak.

U.S. House Kentucky District 4 candidate Jeremy Todd, a member of the Libertarian Party, said opposition to the devices, which he described as “tools of mass compliance,” was “not a partisan issue.” Ben Bach, a Democrat and candidate for Kenton County Commissioner, agreed. Other local candidates across the political spectrum expressed similar concerns about mass surveillance or expressed criticism about the company Flock Safety itself.

“I can think of no better way to deter families from using our great parks than for them to know every time they bring their children to the park, they’re being tracked,” Michael Staverman, who’s a frequent attendee at public meetings in all three counties.

Knochelmann was comparatively quiet on the issue during the course of the meeting, beyond informing attendees no vote was going to take place. The other commissioners had thoughts. Commissioner Jon Draud said he wouldn’t be in favor of the devices on main roads but seemed more open to having them at the parks.

“I struggle with it…,” said Commissioner Joe Nienaber. “I want our kids to be safe at parks, but I also worry about privacy rights.”

Commissioner Beth Sewell shared she had concerns about privacy and constitutional rights. She added the products carried the risks of lawsuits.

“It might be best for us to take this slowly,” Sewell said.

The fiscal court will take up the matter at a future meeting.