If anyone wants an example of camera technology abuse that isn't across the country:

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1CPdAtk8ne/

Blinn Police chief hires a friend who had surrendered his peace officer license. Said friend acts in a quasi-police role with badge+gun. Blinn Police assistant chief blows the whistle. TCOLE investigates the potential crime of impersonating a police officer/acting as a peace officer without a license. TCOLE goes to look at bodycam footage... and the last four years of Blinn PD bodycam footage had been purged. Oops.

b0ridi said:

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If anyone wants an example of camera technology abuse that isn't across the country:

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1CPdAtk8ne/

Blinn Police chief hires a friend who had surrendered his peace officer license. Said friend acts in a quasi-police role with badge+gun. Blinn Police assistant chief blows the whistle. TCOLE investigates the potential crime of impersonating a police officer/acting as a peace officer without a license. TCOLE goes to look at bodycam footage... and the last four years of Blinn PD bodycam footage had been purged. Oops.

---

Wouldn't that support the fact that all the footage should be saved somewhere, preferably to a central server where the local cops can't touch it?

PS3D said:

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b0ridi said:

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If anyone wants an example of camera technology abuse that isn't across the country:

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1CPdAtk8ne/

Blinn Police chief hires a friend who had surrendered his peace officer license. Said friend acts in a quasi-police role with badge+gun. Blinn Police assistant chief blows the whistle. TCOLE investigates the potential crime of impersonating a police officer/acting as a peace officer without a license. TCOLE goes to look at bodycam footage... and the last four years of Blinn PD bodycam footage had been purged. Oops.

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Wouldn't that support the fact that all the footage should be saved somewhere, preferably to a central server where the local cops can't touch it?

---

In the narrowest of instance yes. The broader implication is that these officers held positions of authority way above a level that they should be trusted.

Any checks and balances on Flock access that doesn't include independent citizens is worthless. While College Station requiring two police officers to sign off is nice, it's not enough. That's why you frequently see multiple cops busted for abusing the system.

It doesn't have to be at the time of checking Flock's data. But maybe once a week, the use of Flock's data could be reviewed by outside agent. Since everybody is behaving, this is a simple request that police department should instantly agree to.

When the Chief of Police gave examples and numbers, that's nice. I don't remember his actual numbers, so I'm using hypothetical example. Retrieving 10 stolen cars in the 1Q of 2026 is great. There is a real value in that. How many stolen cars did you retrieve during 1Q of 2025 without Flock's data? If you found 9 of them, then Flock provides little value for the money. You have to compare apples to apples. I'm a little disappointed that none of the City Council asked for proper data.

birdman said:

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Any checks and balances on Flock access that doesn't include independent citizens is worthless. While College Station requiring two police officers to sign off is nice, it's not enough. That's why you frequently see multiple cops busted for abusing the system.

It doesn't have to be at the time of checking Flock's data. But maybe once a week, the use of Flock's data could be reviewed by outside agent. Since everybody is behaving, this is a simple request that police department should instantly agree to.

When the Chief of Police gave examples and numbers, that's nice. I don't remember his actual numbers, so I'm using hypothetical example. Retrieving 10 stolen cars in the 1Q of 2026 is great. There is a real value in that. How many stolen cars did you retrieve during 1Q of 2025 without Flock's data? If you found 9 of them, then Flock provides little value for the money. You have to compare apples to apples. I'm a little disappointed that none of the City Council asked for proper data.

---

Wouldn't that create more issues? If private citizens can access it, it would open up opportunities for everything feared. Selling information to foreign agents or corporations. Spying on people you want to keep an eye on. Outright intimidation.

A country saturated with these cameras will create this situation:

The panopticon is a circular prison design created in the 18th century by Jeremy Bentham. It features a central guard tower surrounded by cells. Because guards can see into cells while inmates cannot see into the tower, prisoners never know if they are being watched, forcing them to always behave as if they are.

PS3D said:

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birdman said:

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Any checks and balances on Flock access that doesn't include independent citizens is worthless. While College Station requiring two police officers to sign off is nice, it's not enough. That's why you frequently see multiple cops busted for abusing the system.

It doesn't have to be at the time of checking Flock's data. But maybe once a week, the use of Flock's data could be reviewed by outside agent. Since everybody is behaving, this is a simple request that police department should instantly agree to.

When the Chief of Police gave examples and numbers, that's nice. I don't remember his actual numbers, so I'm using hypothetical example. Retrieving 10 stolen cars in the 1Q of 2026 is great. There is a real value in that. How many stolen cars did you retrieve during 1Q of 2025 without Flock's data? If you found 9 of them, then Flock provides little value for the money. You have to compare apples to apples. I'm a little disappointed that none of the City Council asked for proper data.

---

Wouldn't that create more issues? If private citizens can access it, it would open up opportunities for everything feared. Selling information to foreign agents or corporations. Spying on people you want to keep an eye on. Outright intimidation.

---

You missed the point by a mile.

Bob Yancy said:

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I think we're passed the time deadline to get it on the ballot in November.

Philosophically,

Yancy '95

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Looks like Conroe still has time to get it on the November ballot. Is something different here?

It looks like Conroe is putting it on the ballot via council getting it added. I think Mr'. Yancy was saying it was too late to do via petition.

Yeah.

CoCS doesn't want to.

maroon barchetta said:

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Yeah.

CoCS doesn't want to.

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Bob Yancy says he supports the citizens voting to decide. Was hoping he might ask council to vote on placing it on the ballot? And if not, why not?

if the cops can willy nilly access this information, then everyone else should be able to do the same. How can I get the data?

None of the "points" and arguments in this thread have any consistency, and most of those are just platitudes about freedom and "what if" scenarios.

The most compelling argument is to why these cameras aren't instantly flagging stolen vehicles.

PS3D said:

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None of the "points" and arguments in this thread have any consistency,

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So if we only have one or two good "points", that's a good thing. But if we have a dozen blaring problems, that's just inconsistent?

How's this for consistency? Three more yesterday. And you know with the way they cover for each other, we're only hearing about a very very small percentage of the abuses.

3 Coweta sheriff's employees resign amid Flock review | FOX 5 Atlanta

PS3D said:

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None of the "points" and arguments in this thread have any consistency, and most of those are just platitudes about freedom and "what if" scenarios.

The most compelling argument is to why these cameras aren't instantly flagging stolen vehicles.

---

Just so I understand, you're saying privacy isn't something we should ever be concerned with?

CS78 said:

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maroon barchetta said:

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Yeah.

CoCS doesn't want to.

---

Bob Yancy says he supports the citizens voting to decide. Was hoping he might ask council to vote on placing it on the ballot? And if not, why not?

---

Because Texas election code gives us a hard deadline of no less than 78 days before an election to get something on the ballot- that's August 17th. We meet on August 13th, meaning we'd have to direct staff to draw up the language at that meeting, giving them 3 business days to do it, and it's currently not even on the agenda so we can't deliberate it. As one member of Council, it is not in my authority to direct staff unilaterally outside a meeting. It would have to be a council decision- and we haven't even discussed this in a workshop, much less a regular agenda item.

Citizen bosses are inside the same window. You'd have to get thousands of signatures for petition and you don't have the time, either- not to make it on the November ballot, anyway.

But you do have recourse. Sometime between September 25th and Election Day the Flock contract will come before us for an up or down vote. We could also decide to renew subject to conditions- such as staff's negotiation of contract revisions to the terms.

You'll have a substantive bite at the apple at that meeting.

I will tell you that a substantial and growing number of citizen bosses are reaching out on the other side of this issue- in support of the tool itself- less so of Flock. Right now Flock opposition outnumbers supporters and that is a fact. But there are many that see the law enforcement successes- particularly in life or death emergencies, using this tool and they are increasingly vocal.

A mother contacted me this morning. She's on Texags. She's reading yalls exchange. Perhaps she'll read this and corroborate her statement to me which was, "If my child is abducted I'll be the first to demand law enforcement use Flock to save my child."

So with all due respect to the bosses and your passion on this- please please don't presume this one is easy and a no brainer. It is not.

Very respectfully and transparently,

Yancy '95 Place 5

MidRatsAg said:

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PS3D said:

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None of the "points" and arguments in this thread have any consistency, and most of those are just platitudes about freedom and "what if" scenarios.

The most compelling argument is to why these cameras aren't instantly flagging stolen vehicles.

---

Just so I understand, you're saying privacy isn't something we should ever be concerned with?

---

Now you're missing my point. I'll direct you to a post I made upthread.

Bob Yancy said:

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CS78 said:

---

maroon barchetta said:

---

Yeah.

CoCS doesn't want to.

---

Bob Yancy says he supports the citizens voting to decide. Was hoping he might ask council to vote on placing it on the ballot? And if not, why not?

---

Because Texas election code gives us a hard deadline of no less than 78 days before an election to get something on the ballot- that's August 17th. We meet on August 13th, meaning we'd have to direct staff to draw up the language at that meeting, giving them 3 business days to do it, and it's currently not even on the agenda so we can't deliberate it. As one member of Council, it is not in my authority to direct staff unilaterally outside a meeting. It would have to be a council decision- and we haven't even discussed this in a workshop, much less a regular agenda item.

---

To be honest, it wasn't clear what the signatures were for. The Conroe example had signatures so that the city could vote on it to go on the ballot on November, the wording here sounded like they wanted it to go straight to the voters and bypass the City.

CS78 said:

---

PS3D said:

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None of the "points" and arguments in this thread have any consistency,

---

So if we only have one or two good "points", that's a good thing. But if we have a dozen blaring problems, that's just inconsistent?
How's this for consistency? Three more yesterday. And you know with the way they cover for each other, we're only hearing about a very very small percentage of the abuses.
3 Coweta sheriff's employees resign amid Flock review | FOX 5 Atlanta

---

The examples early on in this thread (that is, a week ago or so) were worrying about third parties that weren't the CSPD accessing data, then it became CSPD abusing data. Those tend to contradict each other.

I don't think "they cover for each other, so there are way more of them" is a good argument either. If someone said that in a thread about some recent abuse case at CSISD, it wouldn't matter if it was actually true or not, that post would be nuked into orbit.

Oh, look here. A police officer uses Flock info to check on her boyfriend's ex-wife.

https://abc13.com/post/what-is-controversy-flock-cameras-north-carolina-police-officer-elizabeth-snowman-accused-tracking-woman/19636549/

Bob Yancy said:

---

CS78 said:

---

maroon barchetta said:

---

Yeah.

CoCS doesn't want to.

---

Bob Yancy says he supports the citizens voting to decide. Was hoping he might ask council to vote on placing it on the ballot? And if not, why not?

---

Because Texas election code gives us a hard deadline of no less than 78 days before an election to get something on the ballot- that's August 17th. We meet on August 13th, meaning we'd have to direct staff to draw up the language at that meeting, giving them 3 business days to do it, and it's currently not even on the agenda so we can't deliberate it. As one member of Council, it is not in my authority to direct staff unilaterally outside a meeting. It would have to be a council decision- and we haven't even discussed this in a workshop, much less a regular agenda item.

Citizen bosses are inside the same window. You'd have to get thousands of signatures for petition and you don't have the time, either- not to make it on the November ballot, anyway.

But you do have recourse. Sometime between September 25th and Election Day the Flock contract will come before us for an up or down vote. We could also decide to renew subject to conditions- such as staff's negotiation of contract revisions to the terms.

You'll have a substantive bite at the apple at that meeting.

I will tell you that a substantial and growing number of citizen bosses are reaching out on the other side of this issue- in support of the tool itself- less so of Flock. Right now Flock opposition outnumbers supporters and that is a fact. But there are many that see the law enforcement successes- particularly in life or death emergencies, using this tool and they are increasingly vocal.

A mother contacted me this morning. She's on Texags. She's reading yalls exchange. Perhaps she'll read this and corroborate her statement to me which was, "If my child is abducted I'll be the first to demand law enforcement use Flock to save my child."

So with all due respect to the bosses and your passion on this- please please don't presume this one is easy and a no brainer. It is not.

Very respectfully and transparently,

Yancy '95 Place 5

---

Moms have been using hypothetical safety concerns to infringe on the constitutional rights of others since five minutes after women's suffrage was ratified.

Let's not forget that the COVID train wreck was all in the name of safety.

maroon barchetta said:

---

Oh, look here. A police officer uses Flock info to check on her boyfriend's ex-wife.

https://abc13.com/post/what-is-controversy-flock-cameras-north-carolina-police-officer-elizabeth-snowman-accused-tracking-woman/19636549/

---

And she was arrested for misusing it. Almost everyone of the police officers that misuses the Flock camera system is either arrested or fired.

You can be arrested for misusing your car, phone, internet.

Based on everything I have heard so far, it still sounds like a lot more good is being done with removing real criminals off the street, and the BAD police offiers just keep getting themselves fired! BOTH OF THESE SOUND LIKE A WIN TO ME

Except for the ones that don't get caught. Like any criminal.

Aggie_Fire said:

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maroon barchetta said:

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Oh, look here. A police officer uses Flock info to check on her boyfriend's ex-wife.

https://abc13.com/post/what-is-controversy-flock-cameras-north-carolina-police-officer-elizabeth-snowman-accused-tracking-woman/19636549/

---

And she was arrested for misusing it. Almost everyone of the police officers that misuses the Flock camera system is either arrested or fired.

You can be arrested for misusing your car, phone, internet.

Based on everything I have heard so far, it still sounds like a lot more good is being done with removing real criminals off the street, and the BAD police offiers just keep getting themselves fired! BOTH OF THESE SOUND LIKE A WIN TO ME

---

Almost all murderers get arrested too. But they still killed someone.

Then again, only Siths deal in absolutes.

It's a complicated issue.

As we approach hunting season.

came here to post that lol

Bob,
I guess my problem with the whole system is three fold -

1) The data is actually owned by a third party company. Which, in my mind gets them around public transparency that the same data owned by the city would have.

2) The company *could* sell that data for marketing purposes, if they so choose. An example is if I'm talking to my wife about living room furniture, within earshot of Siri or Alexa, and for the next week, my Facebook feed is inundated with ads from Star Furniture, Ashley, Rooms to Go, and La-Z-Boy.... I don't want tire ads and oil change ads triggered by these things, or ads for restaurants along my daily commute. You might laugh, but it's not that far fetched.

3) The company claims there are safeguards against officers abusing the system. I find that somewhat dubious. Officer gets caught stalking ex-wife's best-friends cousin, officer maybe gets reprimand, maybe gets terminated, etc. I'm sorry, but that doesn't give me a warm fuzzy at all. Guy doing that should be brought up on criminal charges. I know that is above your pay grade, but a "aww shucks, we'll do better" is not encouraging to me in the least bit that it deters such behavior. If it was a one off, that's one thing. We are seeing many, many cases of this.

Personally, I'm not for them. I think it's an invasion of privacy. Personal liberty should not be something we take lightly.

Hornbeck said:

---

Bob,
I guess my problem with the whole system is three fold -

1) The data is actually owned by a third party company. Which, in my mind gets them around public transparency that the same data owned by the city would have.

2) The company *could* sell that data for marketing purposes, if they so choose. An example is if I'm talking to my wife about living room furniture, within earshot of Siri or Alexa, and for the next week, my Facebook feed is inundated with ads from Star Furniture, Ashley, Rooms to Go, and La-Z-Boy.... I don't want tire ads and oil change ads triggered by these things, or ads for restaurants along my daily commute. You might laugh, but it's not that far fetched.

3) The company claims there are safeguards against officers abusing the system. I find that somewhat dubious. Officer gets caught staling ex-wife's best-friends cousin, officer maybe gets reprimand, maybe gets terminated, etc. I'm sorry, but that doesn't give me a warm fuzzy at all. Guy doing that should be brought up on criminal charges. I know that is above your pay grade, but a "aww shucks, we'll do better" is not encouraging to me in the least bit that it deters such behavior. If it was a one off, that's one thing. We are seeing many, many cases of this.

Personally, I'm not for them. I think it's an invasion of privacy. Personal liberty should not be something we take lightly.

---

I appreciate the quality feedback and straight talk, my friend. As always-

Respectfully

Yancy '95

Correct me if I'm wrong, posters of the Aggieland Board:

When the red light cameras were put in place way back when, wasn't it found that the city shortened the length of time a yellow light stayed illuminated?

It was something small, like 3.8 seconds down to 3.1 seconds or something like that, but it was gaming of an existing system to help make the red light cameras catch more runners.

Why would we trust the city to do the right thing 100% of the time with new camera technology for a different purpose? Especially without asking the citizens first?

This is yet another decision in a long line of "we know best what is best for you people".

Red light cameras
Flock cameras
Chimney Hill
Macy's
Midtown ball fields
Almost a data center

How much is Flock costing the taxpayer?

maroon barchetta said:

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Correct me if I'm wrong, posters of the Aggieland Board:

When the red light cameras were put in place way back when, wasn't it found that the city shortened the length of time a yellow light stayed illuminated?

It was something small, like 3.8 seconds down to 3.1 seconds or something like that, but it was gaming of an existing system to help make the red light cameras catch more runners.

Why would we trust the city to do the right thing 100% of the time with new camera technology for a different purpose? Especially without asking the citizens first?

This is yet another decision in a long line of "we know best what is best for you people".

Red light cameras
Flock cameras
Chimney Hill
Macy's
Midtown ball fields
Almost a data center

How much is Flock costing the taxpayer?

---

$300,000~ funded about 80% through a grant with $60k approximate to the taxpayer.


***Edited for specificity not memory = $370,452 total project cost. Taxpayers' 20% match on grant =$61,742

Respectfully

Yancy '95

Thanks Bob

maroon barchetta said:

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Thanks Bob

---

Yessir of course.

Respectfully

Yancy '95

Bob Yancy said:

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$300,000~ funded about 80% through a grant with $60k approximate to the taxpayer.


Respectfully

Yancy '95

---

Trick question, who paid for the grant?

Serious question, what will the cost be going forward?

CS78 said:

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Bob Yancy said:

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$300,000~ funded about 80% through a grant with $60k approximate to the taxpayer.


Respectfully

Yancy '95

---

Trick question, who paid for the grant?

Serious question, what will the cost be going forward?

---

Taxpayers pay for everything. They even "grant" grants.

And a lot less going forward- like $160k as I recall. Sorry I'm on the zero turn or I'd find it to the penny.

Respect

Yancy

Bob Yancy said:

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And a lot less going forward- like $160k as I recall. Sorry I'm on the zero turn or I'd find it to the penny.

Respect

Yancy

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Thanks. Easy to see why the cost alone looks tempting.

Out of curiosity, I did a quick search for "flock grant sources". The first link was from Flock itself, listing 7 suggested sources of funds.

Their number 1 suggestion? Asset Forfeiture! Use the funds seized from citizens so you can buy our system to be able to seize even more funds. No conflict of interest there. Just when you think the whole thing cant get any more slimy and un-American.

"The 7 Funding Sources Agencies are Using:

1. Asset Forfeiture Funds

Asset forfeiture funds are specifically designed to be reinvested into law enforcement operations, equipment, and technology. License plate readers are naturally a good fit. Better vehicle intelligence leads to more successful investigations, which can result in more seized assets, which replenish the fund."

https://www.flocksafety.com/blog/how-to-fund-a-license-plate-reader-lpr-program-in-2026-7-funding-sources-police-agencies-are-using