Salt Lake City has halted a request from its Police Department to buy new automated license plate readers for key traffic intersections after the initiative generated impassioned public pushback.
While accepting grants of $666,000 toward Jordan River cleanup and restoration and $3.2 million to offset police costs around homeless shelters, a divided City Council sidetracked a $224,000 grant to buy the new devices.
These license plate readers were to be funded by the U.S. Department of Justice. Cops want to put them on traffic light poles at major junctures including the north side’s Beck Street and others where high volumes of traffic leave and enter the city.
The public outcry over the technology has emerged as the police force continues to expand its fleets of cameras and aerial drones in tandem with developing a new real-time crime monitoring center at its downtown headquarters. Both are part of a campaign this year to improve public safety.
City and law enforcement officials note similar license plate reading devices are already deployed in Utah’s capital, often funded by these same DOJ grants. They’re also governed by strict state rules and used only for active crimes or investigations.
Separate from those license plate readers, the Salt Lake City Police Department has embarked on adding 10 cameras to an existing fleet of roughly 60 pole-mounted and trailer units now in use.
Police Chief Brian Redd said recently that the upgrades in technology can bring mighty advantages and efficiencies as officers react to unfolding situations.
“Officers are updated with the information as they’re responding,” Redd told the council on the use of drones and license plate tracking technology. ”This can improve the safety of the officers and the community, because they have real-time information as they’re approaching.”
At the same time, Redd said, neither the department’s expanding capabilities nor its real-time crime center amounts to “constant monitoring” in terms of mass surveillance.
“There has to be a reasonable suspicion of a crime” for the devices to be used, Redd told the council, “and these things are tracked and audited.”
Pushback from the public
About a dozen residents raised alarms publicly over the license plate technology, voicing concerns about over-policing in west-side neighborhoods, surveillance, privacy, facial recognition and how any information gathered might be shared with federal agencies, including immigration authorities.
“We must not allow ourselves to provide more tools of tracking and surveillance to a government that has consistently made threats against its own citizens,” said resident Charlie Padilla.
Fears over stepped-up U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids and controversy over the data-sharing practices of an unrelated surveillance company known as Flock Safety are spurring some of the latest concerns.
As the council voted 5-2 to delay the grant request, several members sought information on safeguards for how the license plate readers might be used and secured and how data collected might be passed to other agencies.
“Even if our good intentions are there, potentially there are some holes in the policies,” said council member Alejandro Puy, representing the west side’s District 2, as he urged to hold the request. “I want to make sure that we are aware of those.”
Added council member Eva Lopez Chavez: “There’s a trust deficit publicly with these systems and surveillance.”
Police chief weighs in
The Justice Department money involved is available through the Davis County Sheriff’s Office, which got a $1.5 million grant through the federal government. That law enforcement agency is doling out some of the money to other Utah governments.
None of the license plate readers or other police devices that might feed into the downtown crime center will be constantly monitored or use facial recognition software, Redd said.
Facial recognition technology ”is also governed by state statute,” the chief told council members, “and it’s very limited in its use in Utah.”
None of the data collected or stored by Utah’s largest police department would shared or sold to private entities, he said.
And while police can share data with federal authorities like the Drug Enforcement Administration and the FBI, said Redd, “we’re not sharing with ICE right now.”
Should SLC walk from DOJ grant?
Several residents highlighted the experiences of other major cities with private surveillance camera company Flock Safety, which has sparked controversy over its use of AI and alleged data sharing with ICE.
This month, Flagstaff, Arizona, became the latest city to cancel its contracts with Atlanta-based Flock over its data-access policies.
The license plate readers that police in Utah’s capital hope to deploy are not tied to Flock.
Salt Lake City resident Lilah Rosenfield said while the city’s readers would not be linked to Flock’s system or services, “this does not mean that other systems do not have many of the same privacy and security problems.”
Turning down the latest DOJ money and even removing existing license plate readers from city streets, Rosenfield said, gave the City Council a chance to protect residents “from surveillance, from government waste and from authoritarianism.”
Council member Victloria Petro said she wanted to investigate options of taking the existing system offline and encrypting in-house “without cloud connectivity” to protect it.
“I also need to have a serious talk with chief,” Petro said, “about the urgency of this.”
Two council members voted against delaying the DOJ grant for more study: Sarah Young, who represents Sugar House and Dan Dugan, whose district straddles of the east bench.
Dugan did not comment on his vote. Young said she was wary of passing up grant money for what police consider valuable law enforcement functions, such as emergency searches for missing children.
“Where can I get another $224,000 to be able to support resources that we need?” Young asked. “... At this point, it will be coming from city taxpayers, as opposed to this potential grant.”