Amid resident concerns, Skokie to conduct ‘comprehensive review’ of its Flock cameras

Standing before the Village Board Tuesday evening, Skokie’s Deputy Chief of Police John Oakley provided some examples of how the police department has “successfully” utilized Flock automatic license plate readers.

In one instance, Flock cameras reportedly helped locate a missing woman who had become confused and driven hours away from Skokie. In another, the cameras tracked a stolen car entering Old Orchard Mall and police arrested four subjects, two of whom illegally possessed firearms, he said.

At least 27 Flock cameras are fixed to utility poles overlooking roads in Skokie, Oakley said. The cameras continuously log snapshots of passing vehicles into a database that, depending on set permissions, can be shared with other users of that system all over the country. 

Skokie Police Chief Jesse Barnes said the cameras have been used in “every major investigation we assigned for follow-up” since the village signed a contract with Flock Safety, a leading ALPR company, in 2022. The technology also, Barnes said, enabled Skokie detectives to recover cars in other jurisdictions that were tied to the two homicides that took place this summer.

But Trustee Lissa Levy questioned why Skokie police were offering anecdotes instead of data on the effectiveness of the village’s Flock cameras and echoed concerns expressed by residents over how the tracked information may be abused, hacked and exploited by other organizations.

“Even though we support, we fully support, the work that the Skokie police do to keep us safe and where we have a wonderful safe community in the area, we don’t give them unlimited authority. We can solve crimes without tracking everyone in public,” said Elliot Nieman, a Skokie resident.

The discussion in Skokie Village Hall on Tuesday reflected a larger conversation playing out across the nation as groups debate whether ALPRs’ public safety benefits outweigh a loss of privacy and risk of misuse. 

Incidents of officers in other law enforcement agencies reportedly misusing Flock cameras to stalk ex-girlfriends, pull over innocent drivers, conduct federal immigration enforcement and search for people by physical appearance has also heightened scrutiny over the technology. 

The Village Board took no action on Tuesday concerning ALPRs, but Village Manager John Lockerby said Skokie’s Public Safety Commission and Technology Advisory Commission will complete “a comprehensive review of the public safety need met by this technology and potential solutions” to ensure “best practices for safeguards.”

The internal study, which Lockerby said will likely finish by March 2027, will also “see if there are alternative approaches” to address the public safety needs for which the village currently uses Flock cameras.

The Skokie Police Department’s contract with Flock is set to expire in December of 2028, village documents show.

Flock in Skokie

In his overview of the village’s ALPR system, Oakley said Skokie police cannot run any license plate and determine its location. A search must be tied to a “legitimate police investigation” and cameras only log the point in time a vehicle passed. They do not offer real-time movements, he said. 

Other ALPR systems exist, but Oakley said Skokie’s Flock software does not create “behavioral patterns” of residents or engage facial recognition technology; the cameras apparently only capture a still frame of the back of a vehicle and do not identify occupants. 

State law allows ALPR systems to retain the data they capture for a maximum of 90 days, Barnes said, adding that Skokie police only retain their ALPR data for 30 days before purging their system.

Skokie officers attach case numbers to searches in the ALPR database, and the department conducts audits of the system. It also has engaged an “audit assistance tool that alerts to any possible misuse, any outliers,” Oakley said.

Certain sworn personnel in the Skokie Police Department may add a license plate to a “hot list” if that vehicle is “associated with a criminal offense” or public safety concern, Oakley said.

The National Crime Information Center, the Illinois Secretary of State and other police agencies may also add vehicles to an ALPR system’s “hot list.” Skokie police share their ALPR database with 350-400 other in-state police agencies, Barnes said. 

When a license plate on a “hot list” passes one of the 27 stationary Flock cameras Skokie police maintain, or one of the ALPR cameras that is equipped in every Skokie police squad car, an officer will receive an alert, Oakley said. 

An ALPR alert does not trigger “automatic enforcement,” Oakley said. Police officers still need legal justification to make a traffic stop — an alert is not cause alone, Oakley said.

Oakley said Skokie’s volume of Flock cameras is because the village is unique for its many arterial roads, and the cameras were “strategically placed” at locations where there’s lots of traffic.

Skokie police began with 12 ALPRs in 2022 and, after obtaining permits, climbed up to the 27 stationary cameras they maintain today. Skokie police have no current plans to gain more, Barnes said, but that 27 does not include the various privately maintained ALPR cameras in Skokie. 

In a memo to village staff, Oakley wrote that the cameras “have assisted in thousands of investigations,” while Lockerby said that ALPRs have become “one of the most important investigative and proactive public safety tools available” to law enforcement.

Trustees, residents discuss Flock

After Levy asked how Skokie police can assure the cameras’ data is safely stored, Barnes said Illinois State Police approved of Skokie connecting Flock to that system.

The police chief said his department obtained more restrictive settings from Flock when it comes to how data is shared but has not yet reviewed certain settings, like whether to restrict only sharing the data that concerns cases of forcible felonies. 

“I did not foresee this tool being used for immigration enforcement and women’s reproductive rights cases like what hit the media late last year,” Barnes said. “That definitely changed the landscape on what we needed as far as permissions.”

Levy noted residents are concerned about Fourth Amendment violations as many consider having their license plates being continuously photographed as an “unreasonable search.”

Barnes said some case law indicates driving on a public road to be a privilege, not a right, and his department determined license-plate cameras are “a much less invasive tool than continuous pod camera footage,” which provide live video footage of roads to police. 

Answering other questions from Trustees Gail Schechter and Trustee Keith Robinson, Barnes said the Skokie police “have not experienced” officers using the cameras or their data for personal reasons and Skokie’s system has not been victim to a cyber attack.

Trustee Kimani Levy asked whether Skokie police could make information about its camera use public. Barnes said the department “can’t push out” the license plate numbers on its “hot list” and has no software to notify people if someone is using a Flock camera to “stalk” them.

During the meeting’s public comment portion, Kimberly Polka, of Skokie, cited a report from the American Civil Liberties Union about a Flock representative lying to a Wisconsin city council about its capabilities,and argued Skokie’s provider is “not an honest company.”

Nieman argued the village should add various measures to its ALPR system, like end-to-end data encryption that only Skokie police can access and an independent committee that reviews cases to ensure that only those with open warrants are being surveilled. 

Resident Julian Van Ostrad paraphrased a famous Benjamin Franklin quote — concerning how those who would give up a little freedom for a little security deserve neither — in expressing his concern of Flock cameras surveilling the town he loves.

“No place on earth is like a dream or a utopia, but [Skokie] has been a great community and I guess that’s why I sit here and I think about this and there’s just no reality on Earth that comes to my mind that doesn’t make this feel like an [Orwellian] novel,” Ostrad said. 

“That I am even standing here, honestly, and discussing the idea of us living in a surveillance state — me, my children — I just can’t believe it.”

Trustee Alison Pure Slovin acknowledged that multiple residents have reached out to the board with concerns about license-plate cameras, but she said some have also indicated to her that they support the technology, and so they must “balance both voices on this board as we move forward.”

“I can’t speak for the other trustees, but I can tell you people within the district I serve, so to speak, have also reached out to me, maybe privately, not to all the trustees, and have said they support [Flock cameras] because they feel there is a safety issue and anything that Skokie can do to keep them safe is something that they would commend us on and continue with,” Pure Slovin said.

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