[smalltorch]

Yeah it's kinda crazy you can't legally take them down even if they are banned/contract expires. IKE Skelton, a county commissioner took it into his own hands and they were pressing felony charges on him. Not sure what ended up happening. Basically flock wouldn't respond to take them down, he felt it was his duty to remove them, he brought them back to his office, and then the state hunted him down.

Here is a podcast about it. https://internationalflavor.podbean.com/e/the-surveillance-s...

[glaslong]

I'm curious how they could prevent taking them down if the local gov doesn't renew the contract? Presumably they're installed under some works dept land/pole/utility access permits that allow them the space and electrical, which all goes away and requires their removal.

Sorry if this is answered in the pod, don't have time for it immediately.

[smalltorch]

Id have to re-listen as well for all the details. But I think this is slightly different than the headline here.

In this case, the county voted for an ordinance banning them. Ike was threatened saying your going to be charged this is potentially state property, he did a sunshine request to see that they were privately owned by flock. Then he requested flock take them down but they didn't. After a few months he decided he will enforce the ordinance as the sheriff refused too.

He took them down brought them to his office. Then later 5 state officers (4 in plain clothing, one in uniform) were looking for him at his house. He brought them to the cameras and said here have them back.

Still got charged with theft somehow...

Moral of the story, that doesn't really sound like democracy to me. That sounds like kinda the opposite of democracy.

Anyway it's worth a listen if you have time. This isn't how these things should go and shows there is a little more than meets the eye here. Even if citizens perfectly execute democracy, these things may not budge. And there is a larger net of protection keeping these in place.

[alhirzel]

Didn't know about sunshine request - the website[1] - until I searched for this term!

[1]: https://www.sunshinerequest.com/

[tptacek]

This is just FOIA. You don't need any special website or process; just Google [(your state) FOIA] or [(your municipality) FOIA officer]. In Illinois, you can simply email free-form requests for documents and start a 10-day clock on the public body's side.

[alright2565]

The problem is following up. It's hard to understand the process, and what to do when the public body doesn't respond.

If nothing else, the Sunshine Request site is a good place to get form emails for these requests from.

[chaps]

What you do is: you sue. On my 13th FOIA lawsuit and I have a couple more in the works ;)

Depending on where you're from, it's pretty easy to find a pro bono attorney. In Illinois, the plaintiff's attorneys recoup their costs on a successful win.

[smalltorch]

Im not sure if there is a way to verify that the one he is talking about, but for public records request muckrock is great.

https://www.muckrock.com

[toomuchtodo]

MuckRock is the gold standard for systematizing FOIA requests imho.

[alhirzel]

Thank you for sharing this!

[moron4hire]

Moral of the story: never talk to the police. Even if you yourself are police.

[chasd00]

> he did a sunshine request to see that they were privately owned by flock. Then he requested flock take them down but they didn't. After a few months he decided he will enforce the ordinance as the sheriff refused too.

yeah that's basically theft then. The cameras are probably a lot of money and so the dollar number put it in felony territory.

[cucumber3732842]

>Still got charged with theft somehow...

More equal animal acting in his official capacity gets treated like less equal animal.... basically.

[adolph]

> installed under some works dept land/pole/utility access permits

Another option might be right of way or easement permitting, similar to how utility poles and such are regulated as private property with an allowance to be in a public space. If the provider got a permit to use the right of way separate from the contract, then the provider would retain the same right to be there as any other infrastructure.

[ryukoposting]

> I'm curious how they could prevent taking them down if the local gov doesn't renew the contract?

IANAL but based on the facts available to me, they can't. It's a sham held up by intimidating local officials. The cameras were installed on public property, that's that.

If they somehow keep this nonsense running for very long, I'd anticipate a Meigs Field-esque incident at some point.

[chasd00]

If the cameras and poles are private property then, contract or not, taking them is theft is it not? You'll get in trouble taking lime scooters and throwing them in the lake regardless of whatever contract exists or doesn't exist.

[ryukoposting]

The cameras and poles are private equipment installed on public property. If the city terminates the contract and says "get rid of it" and the contractor says "no," well someone has to deal with it.

Imagine if a power company got cleared to bury a bunch of power lines, but they left all the unused poles in the ground, on land they no longer have rights to. That's closer to the situation we're dealing with here.

Wireless and solar make some of the more visceral approaches to this problem ineffective. In the past, the city could have strongarmed Flock by severing power or data service somewhere on the public side.

I'd bet there are still tons of tricks LA can pull, though. These 1000 9-square foot patches of land have been rezoned as green space, we're clearing it for native plant life.

Or, like I said, just pull a Daley and remove them. The city owns the land. Flock can complain, they can sue, and they might even win. But once the city removes the cameras, Flock can't put them back. The city owns the land, and Flock has no rights to it.

[tptacek]

You can definitely take the cameras down. We did, there was zero drama.

On the other hand, it wouldn't be surprising if a single county commissioner got in trouble for just deciding by fiat to take civic infrastructure down himself. That's not a power county commissioners have. Was there a county board vote authorizing that action?

[smalltorch]

In this case, law enforcement selectively enforced local laws. So the commissioner exhausted his options. And flock didn't seem to be bothered by breaking the local laws and their action was inaction.

So what else are you suppose to do? I think it's reasonable to decide that if no one is enforcing the new local law, that it may be the commissioners purview and authority to enforce after exhausting all his options.

Charging the commissioner with felony theft is clearly just bullying at that point.

[kevin_thibedeau]

> So what else are you suppose to do?

File a civil suit and get a court order for their removal.

[smalltorch]

Silliness. Who enforces it then? The local law banning it was already equally as valid as a court order would have been. Would the county need to ask the judge to take it down?

Someone has to physically take it down and I'm guessing flock didn't put that in the budget.

[dragonwriter]

Ultimately, as a member of a legislative body, if you don’t like the way the executive bodies charged with inplementing a law are doing so, your choices are:

(1) Work with other members of the legislative body to hold the executive accountable for failures, via hearings, sanctions (often, if at the same level, including removal), etc., or

(2) Work with the same body to file a lawsuit as a body to compel compliance, which has additional enforcement provisions (including contempt orders by the court for noncompliance) not available with the bare law and no court case,

(3) Taking any avenue open to the public at large (including individual lawsuits, public advocacy including including electoral advocacy against any elected executive officers involved, etc.).

What is not generally an option is unilaterally assuming the role legally assigned to the executive in inplementing the law, or simply assuming whatever other powers you imagine are best to realize the intent of the law even if they are outside of its letter.

[fc417fc802]

I agree in general but on the other hand, isn't removal of unauthorized private property from public lands a routine duty of local government employees? So if anything I feel like flock is lucky the cameras weren't physically destroyed upon removal.

For example, if a maintenance worker had been instructed to remove them how would this have played out?

[kevin_thibedeau]

> Who enforces it then?

The executive can enforce judicial orders. This is civics 101.

> The local law banning it was already equally as valid as a court order

The ban is an ex post facto law. Rights holders to property have a legitimate reason to defend those rights across policy changes.

[tptacek]

An ordinance banning ALPRs that impacts previously-installed Flock cameras is not an ex post facto law. But a municipal ban on private Flock cameras poses constitutional problems --- and not because of post facto or takings. Generally, the ballgame here is over publicly-owned cameras, so none of this is really apposite.

[tptacek]

The court enforces it. We're getting into movie plot politics here. The sheriff's department will not in fact ignore a district court ruling. These scenarios rapidly reach the point where the sheriff is removed from office and imprisoned for some amount of time. This is what happened to Joe Arpaio.

This is much simpler in a municipality: the board simply fires the village manager and the chief. A sheriff is usually an elected though.

Before you reach the point of suing, you cancel contracts, payments, IT infrastructure, and have public works remove the cameras from any county-owned infrastructure.

I mean, all this is pretty silly, though, because what you really do is just turn the cameras off.

[beart]

Joe Arpaio was not removed from office. He was charged with contempt but was never incarcerated. He was pardoned and then lost his next election.

[chasd00]

or just start fining Flock per camera per day for a brazillion dollars. Sheriff compliance or not, that's still in their power.

[dragonwriter]

> So what else are you suppose to do? I think it's reasonable to decide that if no one is enforcing the new local law, that it may be the commissioners purview and authority to enforce after exhausting all his options.

County commissioners are generally legislative officers. While the legislative body is smaller, this really no different than a member of Congress deciding that the they don’t like the way DOJ is enforcing federal law and deciding that gives them arbitrary power to take whatever action they feel is appropriate to manifest the intent of the law.

[tptacek]

Again: if it's one commissioner, he doesn't have any options. The only power a county commissioner has that you don't is voting on motions.

[mistercheph]

re: the commisioner:

> In January of 2024, the Camden County Commission passed a county ordinance banning the use of all automated license plate readers in the county (a 2023 ordinance had banned all static license plate readers, but the 2024 ordinance expanded that to include all automated license plate readers). In that ordinance, commissioners cited "numerous complaints" about the cameras "and the potential of unwarranted/inappropriate monitoring of its citizens [sic] freedom of movement and travel in violation of their right of privacy, unreasonable search and seizure and other constitutionally protected rights[.]"

> The ordinance also stated, "Any Automated License Plate Readers currently in violation of this Ordinance shall be immediately removed. If identification of ownership is listed on any such device, the listed owner shall be notified to remove said device. Any device not removed within 30 days of notification to remove said device may be removed by Order of the Camden County Commission."

My understanding of this case was that the commissioner was charged with theft because even though the county had an ordinance requiring flock to take the cameras down, and they had failed to do so, it was not lawful for him to remove them himself and then take possession of them because they were the property of Flock.

https://www.lakeexpo.com/news/politics/felony-charges-droppe...

Re: zero drama taking down cameras, there has been quite a bit of drama:

https://www.wmtv15news.com/2026/06/05/dane-county-covers-flo...

https://www.cnet.com/news/privacy/cities-covering-flock-surv...

https://dailynorthwestern.com/2025/09/28/top-stories/flock-c...

https://www.newsfromthestates.com/article/verona-has-waited-...

And final re: in many if not most of these cases the jurisdictions don't actually want to take the cameras down, they just want public pressure to let up a bit, and agencies are known to share flock data between each other, so law enforcement, the public, and lobbyists are all made happy by terminating the contract without removing the cameras, it is the smart thing to do politically.

[tptacek]

I don't know much of anything about any other jurisdictions. I'm saying that my municipality took the cameras down with zero drama. I'm on one of its commissions with oversight on this.

(More precisely: there was drama, but it was all public drama from residents who didn't want the cameras taken down.)

[remarkEon]

Curious. Why didn’t they want them taken down?

[Spooky23]

They do have a legitimate purpose and help to solve crimes. The network effect, funded by federal grants to make a surveillance infrastructure nationally is the biggest issue.

[lokar]

This is the part that upsets me. They really could help solve crimes without sacrificing privacy.

[tptacek]

Everybody is filter-bubbled and people on HN are profoundly filter-bubbled. Wait'll you find what a huge number of ordinary people think about NSA surveillance.

The cameras apprehend criminals. I can show with evidence that the juice isn't worth the squeeze, and in fact that the cameras had the effect of tasking our police force with doing municipal debt collection for Melrose Park and Maywood, at the cost of 5-7 hours of sworn officer time per "failure to appear warrant" arrest. But supporters of the cameras will point to multiple stolen car interdictions and recovered firearms.

If you go into these kinds of things assuming that the median resident of a municipality is anti-policing, you're already way, way off. And I find when I talk to anti-Flock advocates (that is: people who have "anti-Flock" as part of their personal identity, not just a person chosen at random who would happen to answer "no" to "should we ALPR") that many of them are operating from anti-policing premises, and so these kinds of responses are very surprising to them.

(Totally reasonable for your reaction to this to be "whoah, that was a lot more than I asked for", I just feel like I've been in these kinds of conversations a lot. It's not personal.)

[alistairSH]

Sounds like his only recourse was to sue the county as a private citizen for failing to enforce their laws? Or something like that. Going vigilante, as much as I like it in this case, is still illegal.

[tptacek]

My thing with this story is that no part of it has anything to do with him being a county commissioner; it's just added to the narrative because it makes it sound like he should have been authorized to do this.

[amlozano]

I share the same thing. In fact, being a commissioner he was probably explicitly warned against taking any action into his own hands.

A commissioner can easily mess things up and get sued trying do work on their own. Say they try to “repair a playground” by replacing a missing bolt. Well, were they qualified to do that? Do they have insurance? Was the action approved by a properly filed motion? Etc etc etc

I learned this is why it costs my town egregious sums to do simple maintenance work; the only companies willing to put up with all the red tape of working with the government have to charge a premium.

The part about him being a commissioner smells like a simple publicity stunt.

[smalltorch]

I think the interview goes in good depth in all the details of the scenario it doesn't sound like you listened..

Publicity for what?

The publicity comes from a elected government official getting charged with felonys for stealing when he didn't steal anything.

The playground analogy doesn't really hold up here I don't see the connection between the two.

[bmau5]

If Flock can put them up, can I/my city just decide to put signs or lasers in front of the cameras?

[butlike]

There's instagram stories of people riding around destroying them, so yes, it's possible.

[drdaeman]

Or just cut the power?

[nerdsniper]

They have little solar panels.

[rconti]

plastic bag!

[drdaeman]

Eww, plastic. A bird feeder right above the camera would do the trick just fine. Flock doesn’t own the pole, right?