Mesa Says 38 of Its 521 Signalized Intersections Have License Plate Readers. Flock Won't Say How Many Cameras Anyone Has.

Mesa told The Arizona Inquirer that 38 of its 521 signalized intersections have license plate reader technology. By our arithmetic that is 7.3 percent of the city's traffic signals, and it is the only camera count we have been able to get from anyone in Arizona's plate reader business this week.

Flock Safety, the best-known vendor, told us it does not share camera counts at all. Both answers reached our desk by email on Oct. 27, a few hours apart.

Kevin Smith of the City of Mesa answered one of our questions: of the 521 signalized intersections in Mesa, 38 have the technology. He asked that the rest of our questions go through a public records request.

Two limits on that number. It counts intersections, not cameras, so one intersection could hold more than one. And Mesa did not say which vendor supplies the equipment, so we cannot say how many of the 38 are Flock. Mesa answered the question it could answer directly, which is more than most agencies have done on this subject.

Andrew Smith, a media relations specialist at Flock Safety, wrote that the company does not share specifics regarding individual agency contracts, camera counts, locations or deployments. He said the customer agency is the best source for local deployment, policy, retention and outcome information, and pointed us to the company's media FAQ.

That leaves the public with a simple arrangement. The vendor says ask the city. The city says file a records request. The count of cameras that read plates on Arizona streets is not published anywhere we have found.

Tempe's council voted 6 to 1 in mid-October to ban automated license plate readers for city agencies, effective in mid-November. Vice Mayor Arlene Chin cast the only no vote, calling the ban's reach over the whole technology short-sighted. The ordinance writes the ban into city code: city agencies may not obtain or use the systems or query their data, and existing plate data is ordered destroyed. It carves out plate data that police obtain from outside agencies through warrants, subpoenas and court orders, and data that partner agencies collect independently for officers on multi-jurisdictional task forces. Arizona State University's 20 Flock cameras on its Tempe campus are not affected. One speaker at the meeting said the ban stops Tempe from owning cameras and running its own searches but does not stop it from using the tracking data, and the ACLU of Arizona called the subpoena-related exceptions too vague. The city had announced in August that it was removing its Flock cameras.

Four questions remain for Mesa: how many cameras sit at those 38 intersections, which vendor supplies them, how long the data is kept, and who audits searches. Flock's own policy changes this summer cut its default retention from 30 days to seven and added case numbers for searches, according to reports at the time, which is the kind of detail a city can confirm for its own system and a vendor will not.

For readers: each city decides these policies for itself, so the number to ask your own city for is the one Mesa gave us.

How we reported this: Mesa's and Flock's figures and statements come from emails to the Inquirer's news desk on Oct. 27. Tempe's ban is described from the Arizona State Press, KJZZ and MotorBiscuit reports of the Oct. 15 council vote, which differ slightly on the list of exceptions; we have not read the ordinance text itself. The Mesa figure counts intersections, not cameras, and Mesa has not named its vendor. We are looking for camera counts, vendor contracts, retention periods and audit logs from Mesa, and the same records from other Arizona cities that use these systems. We contacted the City of Mesa and Flock Safety; Mesa asked that our remaining questions go through a public records request. Tips and corrections: [email protected].