by David Mendez

The Shoreline City Council has cancelled a planned meeting with Flock Safety, a security technology company that’s been under increasing public scrutiny for the growing presence of its camera systems.

The meeting was planned for the city council’s April 27 dinner session, a kind of meeting in which council members hear reports from vendors, partner agencies and community groups. Shoreline residents have joined the growing wave of opposition to Flock over the last year, especially as ties between the company and federal law enforcement have been revealed.

“Several council members expressed concern that this was not a good time, and not something that they were interested in pursuing,” Shoreline Mayor Betsy Robertson told The Osprey on Friday. “There are no plans to pursue a conversation with Flock,” she added.

A meeting with Flock was planned at least as far back as Jan. 22, according to an archived snapshot of the city council’s agenda planner. On April 16, an updated version of the agenda planner stated that the workshop dinner meeting was cancelled.

The meeting, Robertson said, was planned as an information-only session requested by Shoreline Police Chief Tommy Collins, to learn about Flock and its operations.

“I have a tremendous amount of respect for our chief and I wanted to honor his request,” Robertson said, adding that she was uncertain about how the meeting with Flock would be accepted by the community. “It became really clear that it’s going to be a nonstarter for Shoreline.”

Since its founding in 2017, Flock has grown its business by selling automated, solar-powered license plate recognition cameras to homeowners associations, private businesses and law enforcement agencies. The company has grown to offer real-time video and data collection, gunshot-detection audio systems, surveillance cameras, drone systems and software that ties ALPR data with public records and commercially-available data. A cornerstone of Flock’s business is its “National LPR Network,” which the company says is “fueled by shared data from across the country.”

In Shoreline, Flock ALPR cameras can be easily found in the parking lot of the Aurora Village shopping center, Aurora Avenue North and North 205th Street, near entry points to and from the Home Depot parking lot.

Last October, the University of Washington’s Center for Human Rights published a report revealing that at least eight Washington state law enforcement agencies enabled the ability to directly share their Flock system networks with U.S. Border Patrol, and that Border Patrol had “back door” access — access without explicit permission — to at least ten agencies across the state.

Flock’s own security practices have raised alarm among technology and security experts. Tech news outlet 404 Media, in particular, has found instances of Flock leaving its cameras unsecured to the open web, and kept track of questionable use of the automated cameras by law enforcement officers.

Growing uproar has led cities and towns across the country to pause or end relationships with Flock, including the neighboring Lynnwood Police Department.

Lynnwood began using Flock’s ALPR system on June 29, 2025. Two days later, on July 1, the department “discovered that a vendor feature had created broader data access than intended, and promptly disabled it.” The Flock program was “formally paused” on Oct. 30.

At the Shoreline City Council’s April 12 meeting, resident Nicole Solano chastised the council for scheduling the meeting with Flock.

“If you are even considering Flock at all, there’s a lot of community members that are very, very afraid that you’re even having this meeting with Flock and a representative from Flock,” Solano said. “I think it would be prudent to cancel it. I think that would make the community that's the most vulnerable right now, the most afraid, feel a bit more comfortable, to actually stick to what we passed, all of us, in Resolution 560 — that we stand with our immigrant community, that we cherish them.”

Though Flock doesn’t feature automated speed cameras among its products, residents have feared the company would offer speed camera solutions to Shoreline as the city builds its school zone speed enforcement program.

Though Robertson does not yet know which companies would be in the running for providing speed camera services, she said that Flock won’t be among them.

“Flock is not going to backdoor their way into Shoreline through our traffic camera program,” Robertson said.