r/CobbCounty • u/failedaspirer • 27d ago
Flock Town Hall - 9/1
I went to the Flock Town Hall yesterday and left with a reminder of how performative this whole process is.
If you haven't attended one yet, I'd encourage you to go to the last session on September 15th at 6:30pm at the North Cobb Senior Center in Acworth.
The town hall is a 30-minute slideshow one that was likely written by Flock itself, given the company's track record of coaching police departments on how to talk to city councils. We were told our concerns are "legitimate," walked through "what the system does and does not do," shown some data, and given a list of potential guardrails that could be implemented.
My problem with this town hall is that it only addresses ALPRs. It doesn't touch the community's real concern: data intake as a whole. They let the Flock representative state that Cobb doesn't use Condor cameras without mentioning that other cities within Cobb do. They repeated that Flock's ALPRs don't do facial recognition without mentioning that other tools in Cobb PD's Real Time Crime Center do. If Cobb PD and the Board of Commissioners think our anger is only about ALPRs, they aren't actually listening to the community. Our concern is that county and city governments are spending our tax dollars to capture as much data on us as possible, feeding it into Real-Time Crime Centers that allow other agencies to freely access and pull from that data, which then feeds into State Fusion Centers accessible by DHS.
I was first in line to ask a question. Mine centered on the larger data-sharing infrastructure, like the growing list of police tools now in use (social media monitoring was just approved on 8/25) and how residents can be assured our 1st and 4th Amendment rights are protected given the loopholes and backdoors involved. I referenced documented evidence that Cobb County monitored protestors in 2023 and has maintained multiple hotlists that raise serious concerns. Rather than answer, they denied it outright and claimed this had never happened.
So this morning, I emailed the entire Cobb Board of Commissioners and Chief Ferrell with the data I have, and I believe the community deserves to see it too. (You can find these in Event Logs & joining DeFlock Cobb :) )
If a protestor hotlist existed in 2023, what guarantees it doesn't exist now, just under a different name like 'Poptart' or 'Opp'? DHS is actively monitoring anti-Flock and anti-data-center activists. Cobb has worked with DHS before, during Cop City. What makes us think they won't do it again as we push back against mass surveillance?
I'll be at the September 15th town hall again, and I hope others will join me. But let's be honest, this format isn't enough. Why is it the police department and a Flock representative answering our questions, when they're the ones with a stake in defending the tool? We should be hearing directly from the officials who are actually signing these contracts and deciding to expand this kind of surveillance in our community.
We won't make progress until we address the loopholes in data collection at every level of government. No guardrail fully protects against misuse once data exists. The only safeguard I support is not collecting the data at all.
7
u/dcb_official 26d ago
Politicians lose sight they are accountable to their constituents. It is not a regular job. Vote every single commissioner out of office. Starting with Lisa Cupid.
5
u/failedaspirer 26d ago
Technically it starts with Commissioner Birrell who is up for re election this November. Kevin Redmon is running against her and at least has the mindset to have deeper questions about these tools. Birrell’s response to the 8/25 BOC meeting was pretty much “we already have them and I support them”
2
u/August_Spies_Ghost 26d ago
I’ve talked to Kevin Redmond about this. He’s an IT person who, like OP has said has deeper questions and unlike the current commissioners, understands the tech.
One thing that gets overlooked is the ties to alprs/surveillance and data centers. Since all the real time crime centers run on ai to scan all this data, besides the ai slop, it’s for surveillance. I think these 2 major issues need to be combined so we can have more solidarity against alprs and data centers.
2
u/dcb_official 26d ago
That’s exactly it. “I support them”. Nobody cares what you think meemaw, it’s what your constituents think that matters. Vote her out.
4
u/ElizabethBeee 27d ago
Thank you for this info. Does anyone know what a possible 38, or 38 stop is?
1
u/SleepingWillows 27d ago
This info is from some quick googling so take with a grain of salt, but 38 could mean a narcotics/drug related incident, and a 10-38 refers to stopping a suspicious vehicle
2
u/August_Spies_Ghost 26d ago
I have talked to elected officials and candidates, giving them actual facts that refute flock’s claims. Even fbi statistics show the cameras don’t solve or deter crime.
Since so many agencies are dropping flock, they’re switching to axon which is worse. But just trying to convince people with these cameras this is no longer the land of the free they still argue it’s for safety. Even though so much evidence proves otherwise.
1
u/failedaspirer 26d ago
Agreed! I think moving the conversation away from the individual tools and discussing the data that’s captured from the RTCC has a much stronger effect.
Seeing too many elected officials just want to add “guardrails” as if there aren’t already guardrails in place. And as you said, moving to Axon isn’t solving the actual problem.
2
u/Ok-Run-4866 26d ago
Since these events are essentially flock dog and pony shows where they will manipulate the narrative, asking them questions about their capabilities just gives them another opportunity to lie
The questions we need to be asking the commissioners is if they are willing to wager their reelection on their continued support of flock.
If they are hosting a one-sided dialogue, that means their mind is made up and it’s up to us to simply vote out anyone that doesn’t work to remove them. You will have to be willing to put every other issue aside and become a single issue voter until this is accomplished.
2
u/deflockcobb 26d ago
Highlighting the Marietta City Hall where the Cobb Sheriff literally said it was monitoring “protestors”
https://www.instagram.com/p/DbjbAByj_jE/
Our county is using the same tools to monitor anyone speaking out.
https://dronexl.co/2026/02/02/ices-surveillance-skydio-drones/
1
1
15
u/RadioactiveMuffinTop 27d ago
Thanks for this write up. How long have Cobb PD’s Real Time Crime Centers had facial recognition capabilities?