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East Palo Alto City Council member Carlos Romero joined a group of residents Tuesday in calling for the review of its Flock Automated License Plate Reader technology after nearby jurisdictions reported data breaches.
“I do think it’s worth revisiting again, the Flock camera issue, given some of the issues across the country, and in particular, very close to home,” Romero said at the council’s meeting Tuesday.
City leaders last year pushed back on renewing a contract with Flock, requesting a fully fleshed out presentation from surveillance company representatives. But in December 2025, a split council approved a three-year contract renewal with Flock, despite resident concerns over data privacy and improper usage for immigration enforcement. Recent investigations found that numerous nearby jurisdictions, including Atherton, Menlo Park and Mountain View, have shared data with other law enforcement agencies in violation of local policies.
Earlier this week, Mountain View opted to disable its cameras after an investigation by the Mountain View Voice revealed that more than 250 California law enforcement agencies had searched the city’s license plate camera data without its authorization or knowledge.
Despite its approval of the extension, East Palo Alto has the option of terminating that agreement as city staff continue to negotiate with Flock.
“We have not executed an agreement yet, so if the council wants to revisit this, that is a discussion we can have before executing the contract,” City Manager Melvin Gaines said at a Tuesday evening council meeting.
Romero cited local cities that have cancelled contracts with Flock and concerns over a federal administration that has used new tactics to increase immigration enforcement.
“We really need to make sure that we are not providing the mechanisms with which, I think, an out-of-control agency could use to round folks up, violate people’s civil rights, and do so with impunity,” Romero said. “So I really think that it’s worth revisiting whether or not we want to continue with that contract.”
East Palo Alto, like many other local cities, began a one-year pilot with Flock at the end of 2024, installing 25 non-mobile cameras throughout the city. The cameras document the rear license plates on cars 24/7 and store recordings for 30 days in East Palo Alto.
Local police said the cameras have been successful, helping officers quickly locate car collision and sexual assault suspects in a department with limited resources. But dozens of East Palo Alto residents felt the risks outweighed the rewards, citing mistrust of the new technology in a city with a large immigrant population.
In a December presentation to the East Palo Alto City Council, Lily Ho, a Flock representative, claimed that the surveillance data had never been hacked or indirectly shared with non-approved agencies, and that research finding “vulnerabilities” in the company are not credible, she maintained.
Those claims conflicted with the findings of the Mountain View Voice investigation.
Mountain View authorities attempted to build a surveillance system with strict access guidelines and called the data breach disappointing. The city has since disabled all cameras and cities across Santa Clara County are weighing the same possibility.
“This was done under the nose of Mountain View PD,” East Palo Alto resident Filiberto Zaragoza said during the public comment period at the Feb. 3 meeting. “As the community mentioned before, we cannot trust Flock, but we have now renewed our contract and allowed even more cameras to be constructed. You dismissed our concerns and now they are real.”
The East Palo Alto agenda setting committee will consider the item.
