As Americans are finding out more about the widespread use of automatic license plate reading cameras (ALPRs), the massive databases of personal information they generate, the invasiveness of that information, how the information is being used and how the camera companies and cops have lied about how these databases and cameras are being used, more and more cities are opting to end their use of these systems, but the City of Grand Junction (G.J.) and the Mesa County Sheriff’s Office (MCSO) are not yet among those opting out.
Both the City of G.J. and the MCSO use automatic license plate reading cameras (ALPRs). G.J. primarily uses cameras by Vigilant Solutions, which was acquired by Motorola. Vigilant/Motorola maintains a vast database of residents’ sensitive personal information, and can disclose this information to law enforcement agencies. In 2018, the public first discovered that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) had a a $6.1 million contract with Vigilant/Motorola to tap into their databases.
MCSO uses Flock Safety cameras and just bought 11 more of them in July of 2025 (pdf). In Grand Junction, ALPRs are mounted on police cars as well as on poles at intersections. Both Vigilant and Flock have been widely criticized for using their ALPR databases to create mass surveillance networks and both have been found to be sharing private location data with law enforcement agencies, raising major concerns about civil liberties, privacy violations, and misuse of data. The cameras can capture not just license plate numbers but people’s “patterns of life” and their vehicles’ characteristics like colors, dents, missing hubcaps and bumperstickers, on virtually all cars driving by them. The information is collected without drivers’ knowledge, without them having broken any laws and without any search warrants being issued. Here in Mesa County, it was recently discovered that law enforcement illegally shared camera data with ICE agents in violation of state law.
As a result of people’s growing discomfort with these cameras, the invasion of privacy they bring and the growing body of evidence of law enforcement misusing the data they generate, more and more jurisdictions are ending their use of these cameras and cancelling their contracts with the camera companies Vigilant Solutions and Flock Safety. So far, though, that list doesn’t include Grand Junction or the MCSO.
The loss of public trust that use of the cameras was causing “outweighs any possible benefits the technology would offer.” — Delano, CA police chief
In 2019, the police chief of Delano, California, a city that has a large number of undocumented immigrants who work on farms, advised the Delano City Council to stop using the cameras. Delano’s primary ALPR vendor was Vigilant Solutions, the same company the City of Grand Junction uses for its ALPRs. The police chief’s recommendation came after the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) found ICE was making sweeping use of the cameras. The Delano police chief told the City Council that the loss of public trust that the city’s use of the cameras was causing “outweighed any possible benefits the technology would offer.”
The Ypsilanti, Michigan City Council voted 5-0 to ban automated license plate reading cameras in September of 2022.
In 2025, Denver Flock camera data revealed the cameras were being used for frequent immigration searches. On May 5, 2025, Denver City Council voted to stop using license plate-reading cameras due to privacy concerns, but despite this, Denver Mayor Mike Johnston unilaterally approved continuing the city’s contract with Flock anyway after City Council voted down the contract.
Austin, Texas announced in June it was ceasing use of ALPRs due to privacy concerns.
On August 6, 2025, Scarsdale, New York announced it was cancelling its contract with Flock Safety amid privacy concerns after 449 residents signed a petition in April opposing the mass surveillance.
On 8/27/25, the City of Evanston, Illinois, announced that it had deactivated all of its Flock license plate-reading cameras and terminated its contract with Flock after the Illinois Secretary of State published an audit (pdf) that found U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents had gained access to Illinois license plate-reading camera data in violation of state law. Flock operates the largest license-plate reading database in the U.S.
The use of these cameras and existence of the vast databases of personal information they generate will prove invaluable to the authoritarian government we now are currently entering into under convicted felon/sexual abuser/President Trump, who has called himself “the chief law enforcer of America,” as he increases his efforts to punish political rivals and people who don’t agree with his political views.
These cameras need to be discontinued as blatant disregard of our 4th amendment rights to be protected from unreasonable searches a seizures