Submitted by Rich Gurka
Just recently the Los Angeles Police Department decided to not renew their contract with their FLOCK camera license plate reader provider, due to serious public safety and privacy concerns. An online search lists at least 80 other municipalities that have decided to get out of their similar FLOCK contracts too.
I would venture to opine that these municipalities have much more advanced police departments than those located in White County, Illinois and that their governing boards and legal staffs are more savvy when it comes to the legal issues involving FLOCK.
From what I’ve read, it costs municipalities somewhere around $2500 PER MONTH, PER CAMERA, to enter into a FLOCK camera contract. Perhaps I’ve missed it, but I’m unaware of how much the City of Carmi or the White County Sheriff’s Department is paying for whatever contract has been entered into. What’s going to happen is that police departments are going to have to justify the public money expenditures and then will resort to issuing traffic and other violation notices to innocent residents.
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“Hey Joe, you have a tail light out on your truck.” “Hey Jane, you failed to signal before you turned off of Main Street.” “Hey Richard, you weren’t wearing your required face mask while walking on the public sidewalk.”
FLOCK was sold as a method to save lives, to assist law enforcement in Amber Alerts, kidnappings, bank robberies, lost dementia patients, and serious crimes. Yes, that is all well and good. But, anyone with a brain can see what will eventually must occur to justify the cost. The standard answer will be “We cannot put a monetary value of a process which potentially has the ability to save lives.”
Most folks around here do not care about this intrusive government surveillance. “It doesn’t affect me; it doesn’t bother me”. It is sad that folks are not as concerned about this as they are/were about the potential sale of the Carmi sewer plant.
“First they came for the Communists, but I did not speak out because I was not a Communist.”
“Then they came for the Socialists, but I did not speak out because I was not a Socialist.”
“Then they came for the Jews, but I did not speak out because I was not a Jew.”
“Then they came for me, and there was no one left to speak for me.”
“First They Came”, by Pastor Martin Niermoller, 1946.
What say you, Carmi Mayor Stendeback, Sheriff Weiss, county board members and Carmi aldermen? How much public taxpayer money is being wasted to create a police state?
Ps: was there any type of ‘gratuity’, a ‘kickback’ to those who pushed for the approval of the FLOCK contract? I believe the FLOCK contract may have been initiated under the previous administration. I’ll answer that: “Of course not!! This isn’t Chicago or Springfield.”
Don’t be naïve. It can happen here too. I recall back in the late 1980s when it was discovered that a Carmi alderman had an unknown, hidden electric meter located in a closet in his home in Carmi and that the homeowner hadn’t been paying for his electricity for many years. I regret not saving that Carmi Times newspaper article. That article is long gone. That was prior to the creation of the public internet.
Rich Gurka
