Opponents of Flock automatic license plate reader technology in Riverside notched a win at Thursday’s village board meeting.
Riverside’s two Flock cameras — one located at the intersection of Longcommon Road and Byrd Road and the other on Burlington Street just west of Harlem Avenue — were turned off Thursday, Nov. 5, following a 4-2 vote from the village board to immediately cease the use of the hardware.
Trustees Cristin Evans, Joseph Fitzgerald, Jill Mateo and Aberdeen Marsh-Ozga voted to turn the cameras off while trustees Alex Gallegos and Elizabeth Kos voted to keep them on.
The vote was one of three at Thursday’s meeting related to Riverside’s use of Flock hardware and software and the growing public sentiment to move away from the dragnet surveillance technology.
The board authorized the installation of three replacement Verkada remote mobile cameras by Griffon Systems Inc. in an earlier 4-2 vote. Fitzgerald, Gallegos, Mateo and Kos voted in favor of installing the new cameras while Evans and Marsh-Ozga voted against the proposal.
Later, the board voted 4-2 to direct the Riverside Police Department to terminate its use of Flock’s data-sharing software upon the installation of the three Verkada cameras.
The board was split along the same lines as in the vote to turn off the cameras — Evans, Fitzgerald, Mateo and Marsh-Ozga for, Gallegos and Kos against — in a final revote.
In an initial vote that was struck from the record, Gallegos voted for the termination of using Flock upon the installation of the new cameras before saying he misunderstood the motion. Evans voted against it, saying she felt it went against the wishes of the public, but changed her stance in the revote.
Two of the new cameras will replace the existing Flock cameras, Public Safety Director Matthew Buckley said. The third will offer additional police surveillance at the intersection of Des Plaines Avenue and 31st Street.
The Verkada cameras, which will collect data accessible only to Riverside police, are expected to be delivered and installed by Jan. 1, 2027, “if everything goes according to plan,” Buckley said.
Marsh-Ozga said she disagreed with the inclusion of a third camera in the purchase order.
“I have an issue with replacing two cameras with three cameras, one at a new location,” Marsh-Ozga said. “Given the concerns that have been raised by some of the members of the public, I don’t feel that this is an expenditure of taxpayer dollars that makes sense right now.”
Each camera will cost $6,593 for the hardware, power supplies, installation and a one-year license, with a total cost to the village of $19,779 for all three cameras.
Trustees debated whether the village should have immediately ceased the use of the Flock system altogether, but Buckley and Police Commander James Lazansky said doing so would interfere with about 30 ongoing investigations and prosecutions that rely on data stored in the Flock database.
“If we terminated it now, those investigations and that data would be gone. We would have to start at ground zero,” Lazansky said. “If we were able to go a few months knowing that the system is going away, I think that would give us some time to prepare to get these cases resolved.”
The meeting featured much back and forth between the six members of the often-unified board and Buckley, Village President Doug Pollock, Village Manager Jessica Frances and Village Attorney Robert Pickrell as they worked to clarify the intent of some of the motions and the ensuing directions they would give the police department.
Before the board voted to end the use of the greater Flock system upon the installation of the Verkada replacements, Marsh-Ozga introduced a similar motion that would have directed Riverside police to move away from the Flock database by Jan. 1, 2027, even if the new cameras were not installed by then.
“It is providing incentive for the installation of the cameras that the majority just voted for,” Marsh-Ozga said of the hard end date.
Evans voiced support for an end date, citing concerns that the Verkada cameras could be installed later than planned due to potential shipping delays, leading to an extension of Riverside’s use of the Flock system.
That motion earned a tied vote from the board, with approval from Evans, Fitzgerald and Marsh-Ozga and opposition from Gallegos, Mateo and Kos. Pollock broke the tie with a vote to reject the motion.
In October, the village board voted 4-2, with Kos and Gallegos in opposition to their colleagues, not to renew Riverside’s contract with Flock, opting to let it expire on its own terms on May 31, 2027. Trustees who voted to let the contract die out cited distrust of Flock as a vendor and other police agencies that had been granted access to Riverside’s data.
Those agencies included many in Illinois and some in Indiana, Wisconsin, Tennessee and Alabama, including six out-of-state agencies that had 287(g) agreements to share data, including Riverside’s, directly with Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Riverside police have never shared data directly with ICE in accordance with the Illinois TRUST Act, Buckley said.
Records of searches by outside agencies, obtained through a public records request by Riverside resident Brian Lester and shared with the Landmark, revealed searches that included no case number or stated reason for the search as well as those with the reason given of “LMAO,” an abbreviation for “laughing my ass off,” or “MYOC,” a term used in policing short for “make your own case,” which is a directive to find a reason to justify police action after the fact.
Lester’s records request also revealed that Riverside’s data had been searched in the case of a Texas sheriff’s office that sought information on a woman who it was believed had fled the state following a self-administered abortion. According to Snopes, a medical examiner later determined the aborted fetus was actually a blood clot following an alleged assault on the woman by her partner. Abortion is illegal in almost all cases in Texas.
