Centralia Police Chief Andy Caldwell made a trip to Olympia this week to testify on a potential Washington state law that would regulate the use of license plate reading technology such as Flock Safety cameras.
The chief has been a steady advocate of the Flock camera system used in Centralia, Chehalis, Napavine and elsewhere across the state, raising it up as a tool to help law enforcement agencies solve more crimes.
The Washington state Senate Committee on Law and Justice heard Senate Bill 6002 this week. The bill proposes regulations on automated license plate reader systems in the state.
Many stakeholders signed in as “pro” — meaning in favor of the bill — or as “other” supporting regulation of the systems but advocating for changes concerning how long an agency could keep the data and photos collected, who they could share it with, and if the data would be subject to public records requests.
The issue has struck at a complex intersection of political views and values as lawmakers seek to balance public safety with Washington’s privacy rights and growing concerns over who can access the data collected by these systems.
The cameras’ reported use for immigration enforcement and other purposes by the federal government in the last year has created public concern over the technology and spurred a push to regulate it in states across the country.
The bill is currently sponsored mostly by Democrats but is backed by a bipartisan duo that helps lead the Senate Law and Justice Committee: vice chair of the committee, state Sen. Yasmin Trudeau, D-Tacoma, and ranking member of the committee, state Sen. Jeff Holy, R-Cheney.
Caldwell joined a group of law enforcement members and advocates who testified as “other” during the hearing. He embraced the need for regulation of the system but also advocated for the preservation of parts of the system that make it a useful tool for the state's law enforcement agencies, especially those with smaller staffs.
“I fully support the need for legislative oversight to govern law enforcement use of automated license plate readers and to clarify recent conflicting lower court decisions regarding disclosure of ALPR data,” the local police chief said.
The camera systems used for law enforcement, parking enforcement and, in some more recent instances, immigration enforcement, take photos of the licence plate of every car that passes by. Some members of the public have likened the new technology to a form of mass surveillance and control by government entities.
Caldwell has attempted to tackle those same claims in local meetings, such as a presentation at the Centralia City Council. To see reporting on the meeting, visit https://tinyurl.com/242v72te.
Caldwell took another stab at quashing those fears during his testimony in Olympia, denying that the licence plate reader systems were used as a form of surveillance. In his short time speaking, he urged state lawmakers to take him up on his offer to demonstrate how the Centralia Police Department uses the technology.
“There is considerable misinformation circulating about how ALPRs function and how they are utilized,” Caldwell said. “I’ve organized meetings with concerned community groups and media to demonstrate our system and, without fail, their perspectives have changed. I’m going to offer that same thing to any member of this committee and anybody who's going to vote on this bill.”
Other advocates of law enforcement and local governments signed in as “pro” or “other” and sought amendments to the bill that would allow the continued use of Flock cameras and other systems as an investigative tool. Requests for amendments included allowing departments to keep the photos and data from the license plate readers for up to 30 days to allow time for the information to be used for local investigations.
City of Redmond Police Chief Darrell Lowe and James McMahan, a representative for the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs, signed in as “other,” advocating for the longer retention period as well as allowing for use of the technology for solving high-level misdemeanors and without a judge-ordered warrant.
“There are provisions in this bill that we support, absolutely,” McMahan said. “There are also provisions that give us a significant amount of concern.”
Some law enforcement advocates similarly agreed with a need to regulate the systems but ultimately signed in as “con” — meaning they are opposed to the bill — including Pasco Police Chief Ken Roske, who raised concerns that excessive restrictions would hurt his agency's ability to take advantage of the technology.
Others signed in “pro” formed an opposing coalition looking for amendments to the bill going in the other direction. Groups representing immigrants, members of the LGBTQ community, reproductive rights and others asked for shorter data retention periods, more restrictions on access to the data and that all of the data be available for public records requests.
A representative for the American Civil Liberties Union of Washington, Tee Sannon, testified on behalf of the organization in favor of the bill. Shannon voiced the same three primary requests as others and cited the Washington state Constitution's specific allowances for privacy rights as legal justification for the strict regulation.
“Washington’s Constitution provides one of the strongest privacy protections in the country,” Sannon said. “ALPRs collect sensitive data at a massive scale about ordinary people that are not suspected of any wrongdoing.”
The specifics of these requests varied, with some requesting that agencies be required to delete data within minutes of the photos being taken. Others asked that data sharing between agencies be more strictly regulated.
The bill seems poised to be replaced with a new version that will make minor tweaks to the first version, but possible changes remain to be seen. According to Trudeau's announcement at the end of the committee hearing, a large number of people signed in without testifying and signaled their stance on the bill with 2,122 “pro,” 309 “con” and six “other.”
The bill is scheduled for executive session in the Law and Justice Committee on Thursday morning where it will likely receive a vote from the committee to decide if it will move forward in the legislative process.
