Mayor Mike Johnston announced Wednesday that the city will again extend its agreement to keep Flock Safety license plate cameras operating in Denver, despite pushback from the Denver City Council.
The technology, which police say is helpful in stopping auto theft and other crimes, has drawn fierce criticism about potential privacy violations and the threat the data could be shared with federal immigration enforcement and other external agencies.
City officials say the extended contract will come with new conditions meant to protect Denver’s data.
The city put up 111 solar-powered Flock cameras at 70 sites citywide in May 2024. Since then, the system has photographed roughly 2 million license plates per month, allowing police to track and locate vehicles. The captured images led to 352 arrests, 250 recovered vehicles and 39 recovered firearms, according to the city.
This May, Denver City Council voted against a proposal to extend the Flock contract by $666,000 and two years. Facing rising opposition, Johnston asked the council to vote down the contract until a task force could address concerns surrounding the technology.
Now, the Johnston administration has another temporary solution. The mayor’s office announced that it would again extend its contract with Flock by another five months — this time at no cost, meaning council still doesn’t have to approve it.
The new agreement runs through March 31, 2026 — more than a year after the contract originally was set to expire — and comes with changes.
“I’ve made clear to Flock’s leadership that I expect total transparency and that anything less will result in an end to our relationship,” Johnston said in a press release. “To their credit, they have agreed to our terms and will build a Denver-specific package that will lead the way in using this technology for the public good.”
At the end of the extension the city plans to present a long-term contract to council, which will require a vote.
The extended contract comes with safeguards, the city says.
Flock has faced national controversy over how its data is used. It includes functions that allow individual law-enforcement agencies to search a national network of cities that use Flock cameras.
In a University of Washington report, researchers found law enforcement agencies across Washington conducted searches on behalf of immigration enforcement agencies. In Colorado, the city of Loveland allowed immigration enforcement access to its data, as did many other agencies across the country through a sanctioned Flock program that was disclosed to 9News.
The city says there is no evidence that Denver’s Flock data has been used for immigration enforcement. But thousands of agencies around the nation had access to Denver data through the “national search” function — a fact that DPD officials said they weren’t aware of until April, when they deactivated the function.
Johnston’s office said from now on, it won’t be possible for external agencies to search Denver’s Flock data without coming to an agreement with the city.
“Agencies will need to negotiate an [memorandum of understanding] with Denver, which will state that any data sharing with the federal government regarding civil immigration enforcement will result in an immediate loss of access to data sharing and referral to the Colorado Attorney General’s Office for prosecution,” a city press release said. “Additionally, no federal agents will be allowed to search Denver’s data, even if they are assigned to a Denver task force.”
The mayor’s office added that Flock has agreed to only allow search terms for a select number of crimes and will not permit searches related to immigration or reproductive healthcare.
If data is improperly released to external parties, the city said Flock has agreed to pay Denver $100,000 in damages. Flock has verbally agreed to those changes, city officials said, but they haven’t been written into a signed contract.
Some of Flock’s critics are still skeptical.
Councilmember Kevin Flynn praised the new contract, saying it adds “strong guardrails”.
“The system has already proved its worth in solving crimes around the city. We can boost safety while ensuring the data is restricted,” he said. Numerous local cities use Flock, and police have cited the cameras as providing key evidence in cases. Aurora police this week said they used Flock to identify a suspect’s vehicle in a deadly hit-and-run, later arresting him.
But at-large Councilmember Sarah Parady said she was “stunned” to learn that Johnston had been negotiating with Flock.
“As the ACLU; members of Congress; reproductive and First Amendment rights watchdogs; multiple other local governments including Austin, Texas; and a growing chorus of voices nationwide have recognized, this company is dishonest, motivated primarily by the profit potential that comes with aggregation of data, and has no place in our city,” she wrote in a statement to Denverite.
Before Johnston had announced the contract extension, organizers had been planning a Wednesday evening town hall to discuss concerns with Flock cameras. The town hall will take place at Geotech Environmental at 2650 E. 40th Avenue at 6:00 p.m.
Flock did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
