When Brookings agreed to install Flock Safety surveillance cameras, we were promised the city would own the data, retention would be temporary, and Flock would not sell our information. The contract explicitly stated: “Flock does not own and shall not sell Customer Data.” Under those terms, the decision made sense.
On Feb. 16, 2026, Flock rewrote its terms and conditions. It granted itself a perpetual, irrevocable license to use and disclose all customer data. It deleted the promise not to sell that data, calling the removal “redundant.” I have read the current contract in full. No replacement language exists anywhere. That is not a redundancy. It is a lie.
Meanwhile, Flock’s own website still promises “Your neighborhood owns 100 percent of the data” and “Flock Safety will never share, sell, or access your data.” The contract now says the opposite. Flock is advertising promises it has already removed from the agreement.
More than 40 cities nationwide have suspended or terminated Flock contracts over these issues, including Mountain View, Cambridge, Santa Cruz, and Boston. Brookings should not be the last to act.
If these terms had been presented from the beginning, no reasonable council would have approved them. I am urging the City Council to publicly disclose our current contract, hold a public meeting, and end our agreement with Flock Safety. When the facts change, the decision must change with them.
Andrew Konechne
Brookings
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