Wednesday, December 11, 2024
A resolution that was initially approved as a promising solution for crime prevention Oct. 8 was reconsidered last week, as the Hood County Commissioners Court revisited the discussion due to privacy concerns.
INITIAL APPROVAL
During a regularly scheduled meeting Oct. 8, the county approved a resolution to apply for a grant that will ultimately fund the installation of surveillance cameras along key highways and intersections.
The resolution — issued by the Motor Vehicle Crime Prevention Authority — was required to be signed by Hood County Judge Ron Massingill in order to apply for the Senate Bill 224 Catalytic Converter Grant Program.
According to the resolution, entities are eligible to receive grants from MVCPA to provide financial support to law enforcement task forces and agencies for economic motor vehicle theft, including catalytic converter theft.
Last court, Emergency Management Coordinator Margaret Campbell explained that after talking with the Hood County Sheriff’s Office, she believed the most effective approach in tackling auto theft is to install cameras along U.S Highway 377.
Using the company Flock Safety, cameras would be installed along several key roads, like Weatherford Highway, Temple Hall Highway, Lipan Highway, Massey Road and Cleburne Road. License plate recognition cameras would also be placed at major intersections on U.S 377, including locations at Overstreet Boulevard, Water’s Edge Drive and Farm-to-Market Road 4, as those areas have a history of serious accidents.
RECONSIDERATION
While the agenda item initially passed last court, however, Precinct 4 Commissioner Dave Eagle placed it back on the agenda for reconsideration, citing the need for transparency and a thorough discussion on the potential implications for privacy and civil liberties.
He explained that the agenda item initially focused on the catalytic converter grant program, and that it lacked clarity regarding costs and the involvement of surveillance cameras.
“There's nowhere in there that says anything about Flock, there's nowhere in there that says anything about the cost, so I was concerned,” he explained. “So, I didn't really pay that much attention to that agenda, until it came to the podium, but when we got to the agenda item, it became a lot more, so I had some issues with transparency.”
Eagle cited Texas Government Code 551.041, which states, “A governmental body shall give written notice of the date, hour, place, and subject of each meeting held by the governmental body.” He also referenced the Open Meetings Act Handbook of 2024, which states, “The notice must be sufficient to apprise the general public of the subjects to be considered during the meeting.”
"It's already been voted on, but I felt like this needed to be a subject of discussion, because most people that can read the agenda in the way that was written wouldn't know exactly what it was about,” Eagle said. “There's a whole lot of controversy out there about these Flock camera systems, and I felt like this needed to be a discussion where if somebody wanted to come up and discuss it or voice their opinions, I think we should be afforded to listen to that."
Eagle also highlighted a significant issue surrounding the reasonable expectation of privacy, referencing a 2012 Supreme Court case, United States v. Jones, which addressed the legality of extensive surveillance. By using a GPS device on a vehicle, law enforcement successfully arrested several suspects, but Eagle pointed out that Justice Antonin Scalia ruled the surveillance as an “unreasonable search and seizure."
He also noted the decline in catalytic converter thefts in Hood County, stating that while the county has had 59 occurrences total, only one incident occurred this year and only six in 2023.
“It's an upside-down pyramid,” Eagle said. “We're down to one this year so far, so we're headed to zero for catalytic converter thefts, so I have to question: Is that really what we're doing here?”
Eagle also noted that he believes there will be a case developing out of the Flock software, due to concerns about its implications for privacy.
"We shouldn't do anything without having a reasonable, fact-based discussion about it, and listen to all viewpoints,” he said. “Then, if the decision is made with both eyes open to go forward with something like this, then that's fine.”
COMMUNITY RESPONSE
Hood County Republican Party Chair Greg Harrell echoed Eagle’s sentiments as he expressed serious concerns about deploying Flock cameras.
“We have had a number of items presented before this court talking about the deployment of Flock cameras, and on the surface, it seems good ... but we have to be concerned about the practical and the principles when we talk about the deployment of Flock cameras,” he said. “Number one, in terms of practical is, ‘OK, who owns that data?’ and number two, ‘Where is the data stored, and who has access to the data?’ These are concerns that ought to really be in the forefront of each and every citizen, especially here in free Hood County and free Texas."
As for the principal perspective, Harrell explained that an invasion of privacy is a huge issue, as he referenced Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis, who noted that we must safeguard our freedoms even when government actions seem beneficial.
"On the surface, it seems like these are good things that we are doing, but they do lead to something that can be really, very badly abused. We have to be concerned about that,” he said. “When we talk about the Flock cameras, we talk about the issue of deploying at large this type of surveillance against the public. I think we need to stop, take a deep breath and really consider what we're doing here in the long run.”
Resident and Precinct 409 Chair Bradley Yarborough expressed similar concerns as Harrell regarding access to data from Flock cameras. He suggested limiting access to the Hood County Sheriff's Office or just allow access for a few authorized employees to prevent misuse.
Yarborough also criticized Eagle for not paying attention to agenda items and for bringing the matter back for discussion after a vote had already been calculated.
“On this agenda item in Eagle's own words, he said, ‘It was on the agenda and I didn't pay attention to it.’ A commissioner, not paying attention to an item that was on the agenda? That's your job, so that kind of concerns me a little bit,” Yarborough said. “And then another area of concern is he said he's putting it back on the agenda because y'all didn't get a chance to discuss it ... You had all the opportunity in the world to discuss this, but what I'm hearing is, ‘I didn't like the way the vote went so I’m going to put it back on here.’”
SECURITY SAFEGUARDS
As discussion from county officials began, Shawn McGuire, the emergency communications manager for the Hood County Sheriff's dispatch center, emphasized the importance of oversight in the use of surveillance tools. He explained that mechanisms such as audits and data retention policies are in place to maintain accountability, while data that’s collected would be retained for only 30 days and then deleted.
"The data is ours. We said that last time. It's retained for 30 days, and then it's gone,” McGuire said. “The transparency portal will be set up today, on the Hood County Sheriff's Office web page, and it will show how many vehicles have been looked at through the Flock camera.”
According to McGuire, the portal would provide public access to information about vehicle searches conducted through the cameras and would also include data on recoveries of stolen vehicles and other items. He clarified that the system is designated as a Criminal Justice Information System, which means the data is not accessible through public records requests.
"That is our data at the sheriff's office,” he said. “Nobody else is going to be entitled to it."
"You said that they've certified that the public cannot get their hands on this data via an open records request, but has that been tested in court?" Eagle asked.
In response, McGuire referenced an Attorney General opinion from July 1999, which established that certain medical information within CJIS could not be released. The ruling indicated that the National Crime Information Center is a nationwide database that protects sensitive criminal justice information from public access, thus affirming that similar data collected by its system would also remain confidential.
McGuire noted that the cameras would only be looking for crime, as it’s for “law enforcement purposes only.”
"The Flock Safety license plate reader images are just taking the image of the back of a vehicle and storing that for law enforcement to be able to use for criminal investigative purposes," Flock Safety representative Blaine Parsons said. “There's no personal identifiable information associated with that image. It's just an image of a vehicle. It doesn't tell law enforcement who drives the vehicle, who owns it, who's in it, or what they're doing.”
Flock Safety Community Affairs Manager Kristen MacLeod addressed the commissioners to clarify the handling of public records related to their data. She emphasized that all data collected is fully owned by Hood County and will never be accessed or sold without the county's explicit consent.
"Many jurisdictions have interpreted that if there is a broad public records request, where someone is wanting all of the license of the information on this date from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., many times that is looked at and viewed as going against the department's policy, because it's not for a criminal investigator," she said.
MacLeod added that all of Flock Safety’s data is held in the Amazon Web Services government cloud, which is “encrypted end-to-end,” and “held in the highest security.”
"Your data is defaulted to a 30-day retention, and each image is given a ‘time to live’ stamp, if you will,” she explained. “At that 30-day mark, the image is hard deleted and unrecoverable ... The agency is not stockpiling information over long periods of time, nor is it concerned with just motorists that are just passing by the cameras — and that's why we implemented our audit feature, which is one of our accountability measures, so that the department can ensure that the system is being utilized for the purposes outlined in department policy.”
MacLeod also acknowledged the benefits of Hood County sharing alerts about wanted vehicles across jurisdictions but reiterated that the decision to share data rests entirely with the county, not Flock.
Precinct 2 Commissioner Nannette Samuelson expressed concern about the security of the data within the Flock system, questioning how it is audited beyond just access control.
MacLeod responded by explaining that Flock has never experienced a data breach, but added that if one were to occur, it would notify customers immediately. She added that the system contains no sensitive or biometric data and that the devices do not have public-facing IP addresses, which reduces the risk of hacking.
Samuelson also brought up the point of “bad actors” obtaining more than just license plates, including the make and model of someone’s vehicle.
McGuire reassured Samuelson that the surveillance system operates differently than what many people might imagine from movies. He explained that the data is not monitored live; instead, alerts appear on their screens when a stolen vehicle is detected. He explained that the information provided includes only a photo of the license plate and basic details about the vehicle, without any additional context or surveillance footage.
Rather than recording video like several surveillance cameras, McGuire noted that the Flock cameras only capture still photographs, adding that one Flock camera takes 1,035 snapshots in one hour — similar to toll cameras.
With Johnson County and the city of Granbury already utilizing the Flock cameras, McGuire stressed how beneficial they are, especially when it comes to Silver or Amber Alerts.
“I know we talk about criminal, criminal, criminal, but it’s way more than just getting vehicles back and catalytic converters,” he said. “There’s way more to this than just that.”
"I appreciate y'all having the ability to uncover crime and Amber Alerts,” Eagle said. “You know, somebody with dementia driving around. We don't know what happened to grandpa, but he took the car ... I get all that.”
Eagle then made a motion to nullify the last vote to allow the court more time for research on the SB224 Catalytic Converter Grant Program and to place the item on the agenda for a future meeting. However, the motion failed for lack of a second, meaning the original 4:1 approval from Oct. 8 still stands.
