DeFlock Durango organizers held a news conference at the Durango Community Recreation Center on Friday to present an ordinance that, if adopted by Durango City Council, would regulate Durango Police Department’s use of automated license plate reader technology.
DeFlock Durango organizer Ben Peters was joined by Councilor Shirley Gonzales, Enrique Orozco-Perez, co-executive director of Compañeros: Four Corners Immigrant Resource Center, and Anaya Robinson, public policy director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Colorado, who attended virtually.
A little more than a dozen people attended the meeting and had their questions answered after a presentation about the proposed ordinance.
Gonzales endorsed the ordinance and said she would bring it up for future consideration at City Council’s next regular meeting on Tuesday.
She said her stance on automated license plate readers – also known as ALPRs – has evolved over the course of conversations with members of DeFlock Durango.
She is concerned about how powerful ALPR data collection and surveillance capabilities are.
“We are all being surveilled in a way that is excessive, and we all know that there’s something we can do about it,” she said.
She said Flock cameras have been used by DPD for their intended purpose to catch criminals and she wants police to have that tool, but ALPRs have also been used by other law enforcement agencies around the country to identify undocumented immigrants.
“We do want the police to be able to use this service as it’s intended,” Gonzales said. “What we don’t want is for it to be unlimited, unscripted, unsupervised and tracking all of us at all times.”
DeFlock Durango is calling its proposed legislation the “Protect Our Privacy Ordinance.”
In short, the double-sided nine-page ordinance restricts how ALPR data can be used and accessed by police. It requires officers to obtain judicial warrants to access captured license plate data and requires ALPR data to be deleted after 72 hours except for exigent circumstances such as active crimes.
DPD currently holds onto data for 30 days before deleting it. Data is retained for longer if it is relevant to an active case.
The ordinance also restricts ALPR data from being sold or distributed without a proper court order, requires a vote of approval by City Council before the adoption of new ALPR features, and requires public meetings before the renewal of contracts or entrance into new contracts between the city and ALPR vendors.
The ordinance additionally establishes a Civilian Oversight and Accountability Committee charged with providing independent oversight of the city’s use of ALPRs.
DPD published a news release responding to the ordinance on its Facebook page on Friday shortly after the news conference began. Peters said he appreciates the police department took the time to address the ordinance because that shows it is taking the matter seriously.
DeFlock Durango members are wary of ALPR technologies that use artificial intelligence, photograph or record everything in their field of view and share data between agencies – including potentially federal agencies such as U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement – on nationwide networks with little oversight.
Flock Safety says on its website it does not work with ICE or any other subagency of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. But that hasn’t quelled concerns about Flock data being shared with ICE or used for immigration enforcement.
Colorado Newsline reported in August that Denver Police Department audit logs showed Denver Flock data was accessed in immigration-related searches more than 1,400 times between June 2024 and April 2025.
Peters has made several requests for DPD’s Flock network data. Last year, he shared results that demonstrated 60 other law enforcement agencies with 287(g) cooperation agreements with ICE had accessed DPD’s Flock data network from November 2024 to October 2025.
At the news conference, he said agencies with 287(g) agreements with ICE accounted for more than 91,000 of nearly 700,000 searches in August – what appeared to be the busiest month last year for Flock searches that hit DPD’s network.
Police Chief Brice Current said at that time DPD stopped network sharing with those agencies after the matter was brought to its attention.
Presently, DPD does not share data with federal agencies or immigration officials, he said.
He said he demanded Flock Safety implement a data-sharing agreement that law enforcement agencies must sign in order to access DPD’s data. The agreement holds agencies liable if they share data with ICE, and signing the agreement commits agencies to following Colorado law prohibiting law enforcement from aiding immigration enforcement.
Flock Safety also tightened up its processes to require agencies to include case numbers when searching Flock networks, he said.
Orozco-Perez said the proposed ordinance establishes “common sense guardrails” that ensure transparency and protect immigrant families.
“Surveillance technologies do not exist in a vacuum,” he said. “They operate within systems that already disproportionately impact immigrant families and communities of color.”
Orozco-Perez said DPD’s use of a mobile trailer equipped with Flock cameras outside the ICE field office in Bodo Industrial Park raises serious concerns because it was positioned to monitor residents exercising their constitutional right to observe law enforcement activity in public.
“When community members who are peacefully exercising their First Amendment rights and are themselves being watched, photographed and cataloged by surveillance technology, it sends a powerful message, and that message is not one of safety,” he said.
Current said in an interview on Wednesday that DPD deploys cameras at all major events, and it does so for transparency and public safety – not to discourage anyone from exercising their constitutional rights.
“Durango has a culture of having their voice heard,” he said. “Lots of people show up and exercise the First Amendment, and we want them to be able to do it in a safe environment.”
DPD’s first priority is preventing crime, he said. When a crime does occur, DPD’s priority becomes protecting victims.
He said video evidence of ICE incidents in Minneapolis that resulted in the deaths of Renée Good and Alex Pretti was in short supply, which has hindered investigations there.
Video evidence isn’t gathered for or against any group in particular, he said, but for serving justice.
Orozco-Perez said the proposed ordinance does not ban ALPRs, but it ensures the community has a voice in how they are used.
Peters said thousands of law enforcement agencies queried DPD Flock data in the past year without having to obtain warrants first, and warrant requirements are core to the proposed ordinance.
On Wednesday, Current reiterated to the Herald a point he made during his testimony to the Colorado Senate Judiciary Committee in February in opposition to Senate Bill 26-070, a bill proposing regulations on government access to location information databases.
He said ALPR data are breadcrumbs that lead investigators to probable cause for search and arrest warrants, and DPD has used ALPRs that lack data sharing networks for six years now. Requiring officers to obtain warrants to review ALPR data stops law enforcement investigations when they’ve only just begun, defeating the point of ALPRs.
Current said the city has a Citizen Complaint Review Committee that ensures local officers are held accountable.
“Oversight in any industry can turn to bureaucracy. But one thing that we love is even though we are not required to, we have oversight through our Citizen Complaint Review Committee, which is a diverse group from here in Durango that reviews our complaints and is able to provide that oversight,” he said.
At a DeFlock Durango virtual town hall in February, Peters said DPD has stronger ALPR policies than other police departments, but it’s not DPD he is most concerned about. He worries about other departments that lack local accountability.
cburney@durangoherald.com
