Flock stops billing Texas police to keep its cameras lit past the election

Ninety days free, and a penalty-free exit

Flock Safety chief executive Garrett Langley met Dallas police chief Daniel Comeaux on Wednesday, and more than 300 of the city's roughly 700 license plate-reading cameras, slated to go dark, stayed lit instead ¹². Dallas has not disclosed its terms ². Three other jurisdictions show the template: Addison, New Braunfels and Johnson County accepted a 90-day payment pause, keep full access, and can exit the affected contracts penalty-free if state money never returns ¹.

The freeze Texas officials expect to end after 3 November

Governor Greg Abbott blocked state funding for the cameras in late August, after an investigation found↗ the Motor Vehicle Crime Prevention Authority had routed at least $30 million into 3,200-plus devices ¹. Texas held roughly 13,000 of them before the freeze, by the watchdog DeFlock's count ³.

Fourteen cities and counties have since shut off more than 900 cameras; El Paso's council voted to tear down all 150 of its own ¹³. The Department of Public Safety is holding more than 900 on a frozen $15 million grant, a network queried once every four seconds by more than 3,000 agencies in June ¹. Johnson County has $500,000 of local money already paid out and awaiting reimbursement ¹.

Officials hope the money returns after the 3 November vote; Abbott's office has said nothing on the record ¹. Flock is lending Texas its cameras until the election, and the state has not promised to repay the loan.

A bill named for Flock binds the whole shelf

Senator Josh Hawley's Stop Flock Abuse Act↗ would require permanent deletion of driver data within 10 days unless tied to an active investigation, written approval for every search, audit logs, encrypted US-only storage, and bans on facial recognition and data sales ⁴. Only a summary is out; no text has been filed ⁵. Flock's own default already hard-deletes plate data in seven days, so a federal ceiling would bite agencies and states, where retention limits run as long as five years ⁵.

A second bill would bar federal agencies outright

Flock told Congress↗ that privacy should not "depend on one vendor's good judgment" ⁶. The rules reach Motorola Solutions, Flock's primary plate reader competitor, and Axon, whose executives declined Hawley's hearing alongside Flock's ⁵⁷. Progressives went further on Friday: the Ban Flock Act↗ would bar federal agencies from plate readers and pause federal grants to any government holding a reader contract ⁸. A federal jury in Bexar County found on 28 September that the sheriff's office used the readers to flag drivers for unconstitutional stops ⁶.

The map lists what the company does not

Flock advertises 120,000 cameras across 49 states ⁴. A website built from an exposed Flock map key↗ lists 335,701 devices↗, 208,109 of them active, a count that includes decommissioned and planned units ⁹¹⁰. Flock learned of the key in November 2025, closed it that December, and told customers only after the site was published ⁹. For a private company carrying a $7.5 billion valuation on $950 million raised and roughly $300 million of revenue, it was a hard week to pitch a city council ⁷.

What would cancel the bet

Johnson County commissioner Rick Bailey calls spending on the cameras as good an investment as "boots on the ground" for police, and Dallas's council rejected an earlier funding cut ¹². Flock says new partnerships with cities outpace non-renewals 10 to 1 ⁷. Two dated tests settle it: the bill's filed text, and the first vehicle authority grants issued after 3 November. If the money flows, the free quarter held Flock's Texas book. If not, the exits stay penalty-free and the cameras left running unbilled are Flock's own hardware, owned and leased rather than sold ⁷.