UNFLOCK Thompson's Station
Tollgate Village entrance sign beside a road, with a pole-mounted camera circled in red at the roadside. Street View imagery dated April 2023.
Tollgate Village Entrance
Citizen Information Campaign

UNFLOCK Thompson's Station

Block Flock. No Warrant, No Watch.

Automatic license plate cameras log everyday drives through Thompson's Station: school pickup, church, the grocery store, and soccer practice. This is mass surveillance of law-abiding citizens on public and residential roads.

Across the U.S., Flock Safety alone has said it operates more than 120,000 cameras in over 6,000 communities (company statements, mid-2026). The network grew from thousands of communities to that scale in a few years, often with little public debate before cameras go up. Thompson's Station is part of that buildup: the town contracted for four Flock Falcon cameras in October 2023, and Street View imagery near Tollgate Village and a school entrance shows ALPR-style hardware as early as April 2023 (imagery date, not a confirmed install date). The town order form ties those Falcons to vehicle break-ins at the park, where kids play.

Volunteers have mapped at least about 90 automated license plate readers across Williamson County (DeFlock The USA), including about 9 near Thompson's Station (MyTownView). Officials have not published a complete public inventory. The Atlas of Surveillance still lists only six Williamson County Sheriff's Office Flock ALPRs as of September 2025 (Atlas). The same volunteer count lists 323 readers in Davidson County. We know what we know because neighbors mapped what they can see.

That is warrantless logging of ordinary travel, with little public input and no public account of who searches the data, or why.

Take Action What's Happening

What's Happening

What These Cameras Capture, and What Is Still Secret.

Automatic license plate readers (ALPRs) photograph passing vehicles and turn the plate into a searchable record. Town Flock Falcon cameras are tied to parks where kids play. The October 2023 town order form gives vehicle break-ins at the park as the local rationale.

Critz Lane, a residential road with everyday traffic, and a pole-mounted camera circled in red along the shoulder.
Critz Ln · A Residential Road

What a read includes

Confirmed Flock and town-order-form capabilities include:

  • License plate number (full or partial)
  • Date, time, and location of the read
  • Photograph of the vehicle
  • Make, model, color, and body type
  • Distinguishing features ("Vehicle Fingerprint" / Vehicle Signature): bumper stickers, roof racks, damage, missing or covered plates, and similar visual traits (per the town Flock order form and Flock product materials)

Related trend, different product: Leonardo advertises SignalTrace to correlate phones, wearables, and other device signals with plate reads (404 Media). That is not a documented Flock Falcon feature. Falcon Bluetooth and Wi-Fi are for device setup and battery, not passenger device capture.

Product cutout of a solar panel above a black automatic license plate reader camera on a pole.
Product view of a solar ALPR-style camera. An example of the hardware, not a photo of one Thompson's Station pole.

How long the data can sit

The town contract sets 30 days of retention. Tennessee law allows a governmental entity to store ALPR captured plate data for up to 90 days, unless the data is kept for an ongoing investigation (Tenn. Code Ann. §55-10-302). In county meeting coverage, a commissioner cited the vendor's 30-day purge. Sheriff Hughes, in that same WKRN report, said the office does not share outside law enforcement, can approve other law enforcement requests, and said the agency owns the data.

Town numbers, county blanks

Town

Hard numbers from the October 2023 order form

  • 4 Falcon cameras
  • $10k per year
  • $50,450 term
  • Parks town Falcons
  • 30-day retention

Town order form (Oct 2023) PDF

Crowd counts are volunteer floors, not an official inventory. Officials have refused to publish a full location list.

Community map

This is a community map, not an official inventory. Locations were withheld.

Open Deflock Map for Thompson's Station Deflock

What a records response will and will not provide

A Williamson County Sheriff's Office response granted some categories and denied others. It did not name a path to a full public account.

Will provide

Contracts and MOUs, except consent documents that reveal locations. The ALPR General Order and written policies, through the public records request process.

Will not provide

A complete location list, or who operates each camera. Audit and search logs. Consent and install papers that reveal locations.

This page does not ask anyone to interfere with a camera. It asks for a public account of a system that logs families on public and residential roads.

Why It Matters

Ordinary Drives Become a Searchable Log.

Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants.

Louis D. Brandeis
Heritage Elementary School entrance road, with a school bus, an Enter Only sign, and a pole-mounted camera circled in red.
Heritage Elementary School Entrance

Everyday Routes

Plate readers log vehicles that pass, not only cars tied to a crime. That includes school pickup, church, the grocery store, soccer practice, and parks where kids play. These cameras are not a school system. They sit on roads families already use.

Who Gets the Data

A local read can be searched by the agency that holds it, and by others when lookup is turned on. The town order form lists nationwide plate lookup. Sheriff Hughes told WKRN the office does not share outside law enforcement and can approve other law enforcement requests. Residents still do not see that list.

No Public Account

A safety tool without a public audit is not accountability. Locations and search logs were withheld. Neighbors still cannot see who searched local plate data, how often, or why.

The record, then the misuse

Each read can store the plate, the time and place, a photo, the vehicle's make, model, color, and body type, and visual traits Flock calls a Vehicle Fingerprint: stickers, racks, damage, and missing or covered plates. The town keeps that window at 30 days. The searches themselves are not public.

First

Lindsey Isaacs and a black Dodge Durango

A Flock camera hit was used in the investigation. Isaacs was jailed 13 days on vehicular homicide and hit-and-run charges after a fatal crash. Witnesses described a maroon Durango. Her vehicle was cited for supporting damage that did not match. Charges were dropped, and another driver was arrested.

InvestigateTV, September 14, 2026

Second

Kansas Chief Lee Nygaard

Chief Lee Nygaard used Flock about 228 times to track an ex (164 searches) and her boyfriend (64 searches).

The Wichita Eagle

The wider record

Institute for Justice ALPR abuse collection

The Institute for Justice has documented dozens of romantic-stalking ALPR abuse cases. Its collection page lists 76 incidents as of the September 2026 update.

Read the Institute for Justice collection

Take Action

Lawful Questions. Lawful Conversations.

Lawful questions. Lawful conversations. No camera interference.

Who decides what

  • Town. Town Falcons and parks, permission for county installs, and renewal, retention, and sharing.
  • County and Sheriff. Contracts, a public account of counts and locations, search logs, and expansion.
  • State. Privacy legislation.
  • Congress. Federal privacy law and surveillance oversight.

Ask about the strategy and the endpoint

Ask the town

What is the strategy for Falcon cameras in parks where kids play and on local arterials, and what is the endpoint: renewal, a sunset, shorter retention, or a public audit of searches before the next term?

Ask the county

What is the strategy for how many readers the county runs, where they sit, and who may search them, and what is the endpoint for contracts, counts, locations, search logs, and any expansion?

Town board

Ask about town Falcons in parks, permission for county cameras, and the renewal.

Town Hall: 1110 Fountain View Blvd, Thompson's Station, TN 37179 · Phone (615) 794-4333 · info@thompsons-station.com · Official BOMA page

Regular Board of Mayor and Aldermen meetings: 2nd Tuesday of each month (except December) at 6:00 p.m. at Town Hall. Sign in for public comment. Check the latest agenda on thompsons-station.gov before you go.

Sample email (edit in your own words) 
Subject: Flock cameras: public questions from a Thompson's Station resident

Dear Mayor and Aldermen,

I live in Thompson's Station. Plate cameras are logging ordinary drives, including roads families use and parks where kids play. The town's October 2023 order form lists four Flock Falcon cameras, $10,000 a year, a $50,450 term, and 30-day retention.

Please put these questions on a public agenda:
1) Which cameras the town operates in parks and on local roads, and which county cameras the town has permitted.
2) The current contract, the renewal date, retention, and whether plate data is shared beyond the town.
3) A public account of who searches town plate data, how often, and why.
4) The strategy for these cameras, and the endpoint: renewal, a sunset, or tighter limits.

Thank you,
[Your name]
[Your neighborhood]

County, state, and Congress

Mayor's office: williamsoncounty-tn.gov, (615) 790-5700. Commission: County Commission.

Some nearby addresses fall in the 5th District. If Find Your Representative shows Andy Ogles, write Rep. Andy Ogles too.

More ways to take part

  • Share unflockts.com with neighbors.
  • Tip or correct information: info@unflockts.com.
  • File your own public records request with the Sheriff's Office or the town.
  • Speak in public comment at meetings.
  • Help map cameras with Deflock's tools. Lawful observation only.
  • Ask an HOA, the school board, or the county commission for an agenda item on ALPR transparency.

Learn more

Town order form ACLU Get the Flock Out ACLU-MA nationwide IJ ALPR misuse Atlas WCSO DeFlock Williamson Deflock map