Flock Surveillance in Indianola and Warren County, Iowa and the information I received from Freedom of Information Act requests
Recently, I came upon a website that shows the reported locations of cameras, automatic license plate readers (ALPR) and other surveillance equipment around the country (deflock.org). Many companies make these systems, but Flock is one of the more prominent ones. I was fairly shocked to see the saturation level of these systems, not only in Indianola and surrounding communities, but all over Iowa and the United States, that seemed to happen very rapidly, with little public debate upon the virtues and dangers of such systems. Seriously, click that deflock link above and I'll bet that you'll be shocked about how wide their net has become.
There are certainly advantages to ALPR technology in finding or tracking criminals, stolen cars and missing people. That is an unquestionable benefit to public safety. However, systems such as this, combined with AI, can create a shockingly comprehensive view of an innocent person's life, especially if combined with additional (or potential additional) features like video, listening capabilities or even facial recognition. There's also new technology coming on board all the time (see article at the bottom for information on Signal Trace, which can also track everything electronic down to your fitness tracker). Since all these surveillance devices arrived quietly without any public debate, it's not a stretch to assume that their capabilities can be expanded in the same manner.
It's important to note that police and other agencies may place your vehicle on the Flock hit list without a warrant from a judge proving probable cause for tracking you. The Iowa House introduced this bill to add this requirement, but to my knowledge, it has not yet been put into law.
In addition to the various threats to civil liberty and privacy (even in public places, the government should not be actively tracking you without proving probable cause), there are many concerns and proven instances of misuse and abuse (stalking, tracking people at protest events, etc, see links at the bottom). My concerns and curiosity led me to use Freedom of Information Act requests to learn more. Below you will find the information that I obtained, and more about that process.
The Alarming Proliferation of Flock Surveillance in the US, 2024 to date
Below is the text of my FOIA request to the Indianola Police Department, submitted in April, 2026.
Soon after mailing this FOIA request, I received a phone call from the Indianola Chief of Police Rob Hawkins asking for some clarifications, and some extra time due to the comprehensive nature of this request. He was quite cordial and I considered that understandable and told him to take the time he needed.
He called back a few days later with a quote (which was expected) for the costs in compiling item #8 of my request. The estimated cost was between $1000 and $1500 for the IT related costs of searching all department communications (50-75 hours at $20/hour). I considered that reasonable, but declined to pursue that portion (for now). The rest of my FOIA was done at no cost due to the fact that this is an issue of significant public interests (involving civil rights).
On April 14th, I received a phone call from Chief Hawkins to let me know that he had sent the requested information, and to let me know that he would be happy to meet with me to answer any remaining questions or concerns. Again, very cordial, but I have not yet taken him up on that offer.
The documents provided to me are below.
Here is the link that the Indianola Police Department provided to their transparency portal in the document above:
https://transparency.flocksafety.com/indianola-ia-pd
The final, and most interesting document that was provided is a letter to the Warren County police chiefs and sheriffs from the Warren County Attorney. This is the document that led me to my next FOIA request to them, along with the response to item 2, regarding contracts with Flock.
This led me to the opinion that the Warren County Attorney may have been the driving force for Flock implementation throughout Warren County. I was happy to read that there seemed to be at least some in law enforcement who were resistant to the idea, though Norwalk and Carlisle added systems afterwards, as you will see below.
Based on the information above, I submitted a similar FOIA request to Warren County Attorney Doug Eichholz on May 4, 2026 (I omitted item 8 due to the likely cost and edited the text to apply properly to the county level). Given the fairly rapid response by the Indianola Police Chief, I expected some sort of acknowledgement of receipt for this request. I got none.
Allowing for delays in mail delivery, I wrote an email to the Warren County Attorney, with an attachment of my FOIA request on May 14, 2026 to make sure that they received it. This also was met with no response, so on May 20th, I mailed another copy of my FOIA request to them via certified mail, which requires a signature of receipt. This was received and signed for on May 22nd.
Finally, on June 4th, I received a response to my email from May 14th. See below for that response.
The Warren County Attorney appears to have provided as little information on the Flock ALPR systems as possible, using Iowa Code 22.7(50) as justification. That reads as follows:
It appears to me that his justification for not answering much of anything is that, if the public was fully informed of the capabilities of Flock systems, and about how they were being used, they'd be strongly opposed and would find ways to defeat this system, or work to get it removed. This is an interesting attitude from public officials who are supposed to serve us. The Indianola Police Department was more open in their response.
If you remember the public outrage after the Super Bowl about the Ring Camera ads that showed the power of AI surveillance and how Ring can be used to create community surveillance (click here for that story), you might be alarmed to see that Warren County Attorney Doug Eichholz appears to have adopted that type of program (click here for his Community Camera Program).
The issue that appears to be very confused, is that of who holds the contracts with Flock. The Indianola Police Department told me in their response that the Warren County Attorney holds the contract (and thus did not provide a copy). The Warren County Attorney referred me back to the individual cities in his response (and thus did not provide a copy). After receiving his FOIA response, I emailed Warren County Attorney Doug Eichholz noting that the response to my FOIA request to the Indianola Police Department said that the Warren County Attorney held the Flock contract. He said that this was incorrect, he was only the pay agent for the first two years. I then followed up with the Indianola Police Chief by email and was told that Indianola does not yet have a contract (or invoice, as he put it) as Warren County paid for the first two years, but that Indianola had not yet received an invoice from Flock for renewal for FY2027, but expected to see that soon. UPDATE: I will be sending another FOIA request to the Indianola City Council to further attempt to reveal the hold of the Flock contract.
In short, neither admitted to possessing a Flock contract, though installing these systems without any sort of contract would be highly irresponsible as it would leave comprehensive tracking data on all Warren County residents without protections in regard to how the Flock Safety Corporation uses and retains access to that data, who they can share it with, and how long that information can be stored. It seems much more plausible that someone does indeed possess a contract, but isn't revealing it, or that it has been structured in such a way that yet another party (perhaps the city of Indianola) actually holds it. The latter seems the most likely, but also seems to me like a way to deliberately keep the terms of that contract away from public knowledge. The contract itself was certainly one of the documents that I most wanted to see from this process.
I think we have a right to be wary and skeptical. Now that this debate is in the public eye, many communities around the country are ending their contracts with Flock, for a wide variety of reasons. In my opinion, the people and public officials in Indianola and Warren County should have an open debate and decide whether the risks to civil liberties and the risk of misuse or abuse of the technologies are worth the gains to public safety, and certainly make sure that if the technology is to stay in place, clear and reasonable limitations should be placed upon it. While Indianola does have limitations in place, as shown in the documents above, I don't believe that they go far enough. My suggestion would be, at minimum, to require a warrant to place someone on the list for targeted surveillance, while allowing things like Amber Alerts, stolen vehicles and missing persons to be placed immediately on that list. I would also place clear limitations on any outside entity (including Flock themselves) using, compiling or retaining that data beyond the scope of a warrant request.
It appears that Indianola will be renewing with Flock this year! Please make your voices heard!
Please see links below for more information on Flock surveillance capabilities and objections to them. I will add more posts as I continue to find out more information. Thank you for your time.
scott@oldschoolradical.com
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