City discusses fate of license cameras

Electric City's leaders are wondering if residents want to keep using cameras at the end of town that snap photos of every car passing by, then stores the photos, records its license plate, time, and other information in a sharable online database.

The city council on Tuesday postponed a decision on the city's Flock Safety license-plate reading cameras until October, pending information on the cost and filing deadlines for a possible special election to let voters decide.

The council took no formal action, and members agreed to let the two-year camera contract expire at the end of the year, but to revisit the question next month.

Mayor Blake Martin, presenting the public safety committee's recommendation, said the committee favored allowing the contract to lapse, leaving the city's second camera uninstalled and asking voters in February whether they want to continue the program.

"They do, we install the camera. We renew our contract," Martin said. "If they say no, we take the other camera down."

The council approved the purchase unanimously in February 2025, as a sole-source buy funded by moving money out of special purpose tax reserves. Then-contracted Police Chief Paul Bowden, who heads the Coulee Dam Police Department that until recently provided Electric City's law enforcement under contract, made the case for the system. He told the council the cameras photograph only the rear of passing vehicles, run plates against the national crime database and retain images for 30 days. He said the network could also assist with Silver Alerts and missing children, and could be shared with neighboring agencies.

Only one of the two cameras was ever mounted. Bowden told the council in January that he was working with the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation on a site for the second; in April he said he had found a location and was awaiting a property owner's signature. Martin said Tuesday that the city now appears to have that signed permission, but that the committee recommends holding off. The unit would be returned to Electric City and stored, he said, because the city paid for it.

The installed camera is not currently operating. Bowden told the council in April that Senate Bill 6002 requires automated license plate reader programs to be registered with the state Attorney General's Office, and in July confirmed the camera "is not active right now." Councilmember Brian Buche referred to that Tuesday, noting Bowden had said the cameras were disabled.

Martin said some residents consider the cameras a Fourth Amendment violation.

"Frankly, I think courts thus far have ruled that they're constitutional and there's no issue with them," said the mayor, who is a deputy of the Okanogan County Sherrif's Office. "But nevertheless, people have some strong opinions about them."

Indeed. Flock cameras and the national network of ALPR (Automated License Plate Recorder) networks they are linked to have stirred a hornets nest since 2022 when people said it was becoming a nationwide surveillance network.

ACLU sued, but distinguished uses such as locating stolen cars and responding to AMBER Alerts from the creation of a searchable historical database of ordinary motorists' movements. By 2023, it was arguing that Flock's interagency sharing made the technology qualitatively different from older, locally contained ALPR systems. And in 2025, data reviewed by 404 Media contained more than 4,000 nationwide or statewide lookups associated with federal requests or possible immigration enforcement.

Martin said he has seen Flock cameras used to solve crimes, but that the city has not been given local examples.

"We really don't have any success stories to say, 'hey, look at this. This is the good that they've done,'" he said.

Buche said a woman from Moses Lake who had wandered off had been tracked leaving that city, entering Electric City, and was found in Grand Coulee within the past year.

Cost drove much of the discussion. Martin estimated a special election at about $1,100, depending on how many other measures share the ballot, and said a regular election would cost less but that the filing window has passed. February is the next date, with a possible April date after.

Councilmember Matt Gilbert questioned the expense while the city is seeking law enforcement services, calling it not "the wisest choice to use our funds if we need that for an actual police officer." He suggested an online survey or mailer instead.

Martin said those would draw a narrower response. "You're only gonna get the people who are super passionate about it, one way or the other," he said. "Let the people decide."

Councilmember Joe Higgs, a retired police officer, said he is undecided but wanted the privacy argument represented. When Gilbert compared the cameras to cellphone tracking, Higgs said the two differ: "Cell phone is a personal choice," he said, but the cameras "have been shown multiple times to do more than just read license plates."

University of Washington Center for Human Rights researchers, in their October 2025 report, found that at least eight Washington agencies had apparently directly shared their Flock networks with Border Patrol at some point in 2025, including Yakima and Wenatchee police. And Border Patrol searches were found in the data of agencies that had not explicitly authorized such sharing.

Higgs also questioned the cost comparison, saying Gilbert's reluctance to spend $1,100 on an election didn't fit with wanting "to spend $4,000 to have" the cameras. Gilbert replied that letting the contract expire requires no spending now.

The city received a $6,000 Flock invoice in July, billed at roughly $3,000 per camera annually, including the uninstalled unit. Without the subscription, council members said, the hardware has limited use; Councilmember Cheryl Hoffman said that without the software, "they're a camera." The equipment could be declared surplus and sold to another agency, Martin said.

Electric City may soon be without a police department. Martin said no submissions have been received for its request for proposals, reissued in August after drawing no bids, but that Grant County Chief Deputy Layman is preparing a proposal that is awaiting legal review.

Hoffman asked what would happen if voters rejected the cameras after a law enforcement contract assumed their use. Martin said he doubted any contract would require them.

Martin is to report election costs and deadlines at the October meeting. In a separate vote, the council moved all remaining 2026 meetings to 6:30 p.m. on the second Tuesday of the month.

This story has been edited to reflect the fact that Electric City still has police coverage under its current contract with Coulee Dam PD, but that contract ends soon (Nov. 3, 2026). The earlier version said the city is currently without a department, which was stated in the meeting but is inaccurate.