Universal opposition to Flock cameras expressed at Independence meeting

It was standing room only Monday night in Independence at a special public meeting about the city’s use of Flock Safety automatic license plate readers, or ALPRs.

No official action took place at the meeting, but it marked the latest in a series of public outcries against the technology in Northern Kentucky. Much like a public meeting in Newport last month, none of the residents who came out to speak were in favor of the technology’s use. 

“We don’t need to subject thousands of residents to automated surveillance to keep this town safe,” said resident Greg Beck. 

ALPRs are mounted at fixed angles on poles and use a combination of computer software and cameras to read a vehicle’s license plate, make, model and color as it passes by. The software then converts that information into searchable data that law enforcement agencies — and sometimes private customers — can use to track vehicles. Flock Safety isn’t the only company that makes the devices, but it’s the only one active in Northern Kentucky, according to public records. 

Independence was one of the first cities in the Northern Kentucky region to employ Flock Safety products, trialing them for the first time in 2023. The police department contracted with Flock Safety for 10 devices in 2024 and then added five more in 2025, according to contracts LINK nky obtained through a public records request. The city contracted for another five in June of this year. Independence Police Chief Brian Ferayorni said that 17 were in use at the time of Monday’s meeting.

In spite of the city’s use of the devices for about two years, Flock Safety products especially have come under scrutiny both locally and nationally as questions about the technology’s constitutionality, Flock Safety’s track record as a company and documented cases of law enforcement misusing the devices have come to light, although no cases of police abusing the devices have been reported in Independence. That backlash was on full display at a Newport meeting earlier this summer, which served as one of first times the region’s residents had publicly expressed concern about the technology. Newport later decided not to take up a contract with the company after the outcry. 

Ferayorni and Mayor Chris Reinersman expressed they found devices useful as an investigative tool. 

“We have a lot of great successes,” Reinersman said at a city council meeting in early August. 

“When the chief came to me in 2023 interested in Flock cameras, I had similar concerns [as residents],” Reinersman said. “I researched it myself. I was satisfied with data security. I was satisfied with how the information is used, who has access to it.” 

“I would never knowingly introduce a technology that I feel is immoral or illegal,” said Ferayorni.

Ferayorni compared the devices to a “virtual gate around the city to alert law enforcement of vehicles associated with specific crimes,” a comment that was brought up later in the meeting. 

“Our chief said it puts up a virtual gate,” said resident Terry Kloentrip. “Since when do we check in and out of the city of Independence?”

Ferayorni had previously shared records for two cases involving Independence PD using the devices in a positive way. One from June of 2025 involved a 91-year-old man who had been reported missing. The police used Flock cameras to track the man’s vehicle and perform a wellness check. The man turned out to be “in his right mind,” according to police. “No issues were observed.”

The second case, this one in January 2026, involved an Independence resident who was reportedly suicidal. A combination of Flock and cell phone pings indicated he had driven into Dearborn County, Ind., where he was threatening to drive his car off a bridge. Independence PD used this information to contact Dearborn police, who successfully located the individual.

Flock’s system pulls data from the National Crime Information Center, or NCIC, a legacy federal database managed by the FBI and the Criminal Justice Information Services Division, along with other databases used to track federal crimes. If a vehicle that’s been logged into the NCIC passes a Flock ALPR, it sends an alert, called a “hit,” to the contracted department, notifying the officers in the area. Officers can also use Flock’s database to conduct searches for vehicles logged in its history during the legally allowed retention period to generate leads for further investigation. 

Data captured by the devices in Independence is stored in Flock’s database for 30 days. State law prohibits the data from being stored for longer than 90 days, unless a particular log is used in a criminal investigation or another exception allowed by House Bill 58, a bill regulating the technology passed this year. In Independence’s case, hits that were later employed in a criminal investigation are manually logged and stored by officers. The police chief can audit activities by officers who use the system. 

You can read the city’s full ALPR policy here. 

Phil Arnold, a public relations specialist with Flock Safety and former law enforcement professional, gave a presentation via Zoom about the devices.

Arnold was not popular with the crowd. At one point in the midst of tech problems with Arnold’s Zoom call, a resident asked “can we just skip this part of the presentation?” 

Many of the residents didn’t take personal issue with Ferayorni or the Independence PD but worried the uses of the devices could expand in the event of a contract change, a new slate of city council members or if Flock Safety gets bought out. Others expressed worries about the security of the collected data itself. 

Several brought up a recent U.S. Supreme Court case Chartie v. United States, which ruled that so-called geofencing warrants that instruct tech companies to provide location information on cell phone users within a particular area to law enforcement constituted a search under the Fourth Amendment. The court decision came down at the end of June, so it’s yet not clear if that precedent could eventually apply to ALPRs in the future, but the possibility of a lawsuit against the city in the future concerned many residents. 

At one point people within the crowd asked the council members where they stood. Council Member Tom Brinker was the only one who answered directly on the spot: “I can tell you right now I’m opposed to it.” 

Other council members discussed their views at the end of the meeting. Council Members Carol Franzen and Greg Steffen came out against the devices, even though they had both voted in favor of them in 2023 (Brinker had also voted for them). Steffen and Franzen are both running for mayor in November. 

Council Members Chris Vogelpohl and Brian Fehler were less committal, saying that they served at the behest of the residents. Fehler was not on the council in 2023 when the initial vote for the cameras took place. 

“We work for you,” Vogelpohl said. “That’s it.” 

“I’ve heard what I heard,” Fehler said. “Everybody’s spoken, so as soon as we’re able to put it on the agenda and get it through, you’ll hear our decisions.” 

Council Member Greg Waite did not attend the meeting.