Glenrock's Flock Records Arrive October 30, as the Legislature Moves to Rein In the Cameras

A state committee is writing a bill that would outlaw much of what Glenrock's own logs show.

The Town of Glenrock will release its internal emails about its Flock license plate cameras by October 30. Meanwhile, a committee of the Wyoming Legislature is writing a bill that would sharply restrict how towns like Glenrock use those cameras.

What the Legislature is doing

The Legislature's Select Committee on Blockchain, Financial Technology and Digital Innovation Technology has spent the interim drafting license plate reader limits. I watched its most recent meeting in Laramie, and members said plainly that the cameras are very unpopular with the public. Senate co-chair Chris Rothfuss (D-Laramie) said that kind of tracking still "creeps people out for good reason."

The committee took no vote and plans to keep working on the bill at its November meeting in Cheyenne. As drafted, the bill would:

• Ban casual or unauthorized access by government employees.
• Ban vendors from selling the data to data brokers or sharing it, except where federal law or a court order requires.
• Allow "hotlist" searches only with a court order, or in an emergency followed by a court check.
• Keep data only as long as needed to resolve an arrest, a citation, protective custody, or a missing-person case.
• Take effect July 1, 2027.

The bill has critics on both sides. The Cato Institute testified that it starts in the right place but should also cover newer tracking tools. The Wyoming Association of Sheriffs and Chiefs of Police supports banning misuse but opposed the retention limits and the timing of court oversight.

How Glenrock measures up

Glenrock's own audit logs, covering October 2024 through June 2026 (GLENROCK_00040–00074), show the kind of use this bill is written to stop:

• No real reason given. Of 375 searches, only five carried case numbers, all from one case. About 98 were logged only as "Test" or "Training." Under the bill, casual access is the thing being banned.
• December 8, 2025. Chief Colter Felton ran two hit-and-run searches, then 48 more labeled "Test," six of them filtering for the same vehicle make.
• Data held too long. One search covered a 108-day window under a policy that calls for 30-day retention. The bill ties retention to resolving an actual case.
• Sharing far beyond Glenrock. A single search reached 6,281 camera networks run by other agencies. Glenrock's contract also gives Flock a perpetual, worldwide license to use the Town's data to train its AI (§4.3). The bill moves to shut down vendor sharing.

Why the timing matters

If Glenrock's contract renews, it renews for 24 months. That would lock the Town into Flock until 2028, well past the bill's July 2027 start date. Residents would be bound to a system the Legislature is moving to restrict, under a contract that gives the vendor rights to their data forever.

Why this matters to you

A Flock camera photographs every car that passes and records its plate, the time and the place, in a database that can be searched. The Fourth Amendment requires the government to have good reason before it searches you. The committee's court-order requirement is an attempt to restore that rule. Glenrock's logs show what happens without it: the movements of everyone in town become searchable on a "Test."

In Glenrock, one person sits in every seat meant to check the others. Chief Felton signed the contract, administers the system, is named by Policy 10.02 as its auditor, and is its heaviest user.

One man holds every key

In Glenrock, one person sits in every seat meant to check the others. Chief Felton signed the contract, administers the system, is named by Policy 10.02 as its auditor, and is its heaviest user. No audit appears anywhere in the 74 pages the Town produced. The October 30 release includes a search of his phone.

What comes next

The Town's emails arrive October 30. The committee meets again in November in Cheyenne, and the public can comment.

WY4Privacy, a Wyoming grassroots campaign against warrantless surveillance, has more at wy4privacy.org