GET THE FLOCK OFF MY BLOCK
LAWRENCE COUNTY, PA
A local community organization opposing Flock Safety license plate cameras and unaccountable surveillance in Lawrence County — and we're building toward doing the same for communities across Pennsylvania.
Get The Flock Off My Block formed because residents of Lawrence County deserve to move through their own community without being tracked, logged, and profiled by a private surveillance network with no warrant, no consent, and no opt-out. We support real public safety. We oppose systems that don't work as advertised, make dangerous errors, and quietly share our data with agencies our own city never approved.
An independent Forbes investigation found Flock's own headline burglary-reduction statistic didn't hold up under scrutiny. Independent testers have found real-world error rates far above what the company advertises.
Documented cases nationwide of innocent drivers held at gunpoint over misread plates — including families with small children in the car — after a bad camera read was treated as fact instead of a lead.
One city found over 7,100 searches of its own camera data for immigration enforcement — a direct violation of its stated policy. Once the infrastructure exists, no one fully controls where it ends up.
This isn't just about the errors. Even when a Flock system works exactly as designed, it raises serious questions about mass surveillance — questions any community should ask before signing a contract.
One camera only records a vehicle at one location. But a network of cameras can show where someone travels repeatedly: their home, workplace, doctor, church, political meeting, romantic partner, or attorney. Critics argue this becomes location tracking without a warrant or any suspicion of a crime.
There are also reports of cameras aimed beyond roadways — toward parks, playgrounds, and other public gathering spaces nearby. That widens the concern beyond vehicle tracking: these cameras can capture anyone in view, not just drivers.
That's why "Our streets aren't a database" captures the objection well. The concern is the conversion of normal public movement into a searchable history.
A town may believe it's buying cameras only for its own police department, but agencies can share access with selected departments, statewide partners, or a broader national network. Critics worry local residents and elected officials may not fully understand who can search the data or what outside investigations it could support.
A camera may misread a character, an officer may enter the wrong plate, or a hot-list record may not be removed promptly. Because stolen-vehicle alerts can cause officers to treat a stop as high risk, an innocent person can be ordered from a vehicle at gunpoint before the error is discovered.
The Institute for Justice documented at least 26 reported cases involving erroneous ALPR-related stops or arrests since 2018, including cases attributed to Flock cameras and cases involving both machine and human error. The issue isn't simply that technology sometimes makes mistakes — it's that the consequence of a one-character mistake may be an armed encounter.
Any database powerful enough to find suspected criminals can also be misused to look up former partners, romantic interests, political opponents, immigrants, abortion patients, journalists, or other people who are not legitimate investigative targets. Audit logs can help discover misuse after the fact, but they don't prevent the initial search.
A community may initially approve a limited number of cameras for stolen cars. Later, the system can gain more cameras, longer retention periods, broader sharing, descriptive vehicle searches, or new integrations — sometimes called "mission creep": a narrowly presented tool gradually becomes a much larger surveillance network.
In some places, camera agreements are approved with little public discussion, vague policies, or limited disclosure of camera locations, search rules, sharing partners, audit results, and effectiveness statistics.
The clearest form of accountability is simple: don't sign the contract. No Flock cameras in your community is the safest, cheapest, and most effective way to avoid every risk described above — no errors to make, no data to misuse, no mission creep to police.
If your community is facing a contract that can't be stopped outright, these are the minimum safeguards that should be demanded before it's signed:
DeFlock is a crowdsourced, independent map tracking known ALPR camera locations across the country — including Flock cameras. Zoom in on Lawrence County, PA or anywhere else to see what's already been documented nearby.
Map not loading? View it directly at maps.deflock.org ↗
A sample of documented incidents from across the country. These aren't edge cases — they're the predictable result of treating an unverified algorithmic alert as probable cause.
A misread plate led officers to detain an innocent couple at gunpoint while their six-week-old baby sat alone in the back seat.
A false stolen-vehicle alert led to a K-9 attack and wrongful arrest. The city settled for $35,000; a federal judge called the error what it was.
The town's own oversight board found 40% of Flock-triggered stops in a recent reporting period were mistakes — and no evidence the system had meaningfully helped solve a crime since installation.
An audit revealed local camera data was searched over 7,100 times for immigration enforcement — explicitly prohibited by city policy. Officials called it "egregious." Workers covered the cameras with trash bags rather than wait for a contract exit.
Sources: Institute for Justice, Forbes, ACLU, TechTimes, local news reporting. Full citations available on request.
Here are a few real cases, with real footage. This is what a Flock error actually looks like when it happens to someone.
Automotive journalist Joel Feder was swarmed by police in Plymouth, Minnesota after a Flock camera misread his license plate and flagged his car as stolen. It was a mistake — the plate had been entered incorrectly into a national database. Body camera footage below shows the actual interaction. (Audio starts 31 seconds into the video)
On September 27, a Columbine Valley police officer showed up at Chrisanna Elser's door and issued her a summons to appear in court, accusing her of stealing a $25 package in the nearby town of Bow Mar. She spoke with FOX31's Anna Coon about what happened.
File public records requests with your local PD or city council to find out if Flock is installed, proposed, or under discussion — and on what terms.
Public comment is where these proposals get won or lost. Know meeting dates, talking points and show up to your council meetings.
If outright cancellation of the Flock contract isn't possible, push for full local data ownership and a hard block on sharing with federal agencies — a model other PA towns have already adopted.
This isn't a partisan issue — it's a due process issue. Reach out to neighbors, local press, and civil liberties groups across the political spectrum.
This isn't a one-city fight. We've got verified individual links for every Lawrence County municipality, plus a direct link to every county government in Pennsylvania. Search your county or town below — if it's not listed, we'll search for it.