City council approves 100 license plate readers at 25 Detroit intersections
DETROIT (FOX 2) - On Tuesday, the Detroit City Council voted to approve millions of dollars to fund 100 license plate readers around the city to assist police in catching violent criminals.
The latest approval of surveillance technology follows previous expansions of facial recognition technology that has made some residents uneasy about police using privacy data to conduct criminal investigations, and then later storing the information for other police departments to use.
By a 7-2 vote, city council appropriated $5 million in federal funds to place the technology at 25 intersections in Detroit. Their placement will be based on crime data and traffic flow, Detroit Police Chief James White said.
"It will scan roads for wanted vehicles, then log license plates into databases for investigations for homicides, carjackings, and serious crimes," he told the council. White also assured the technology would not be used for traffic enforcement or to stop reckless drivers.
Council members Gabriela Santiago-Romero and Latisha Johnson were the two no-votes.
Among the worry from some residents is how long the data would be stored. The police department's policy is to hold onto the data for 90 days before discarding it. The American Civil Liberties Union voiced worry about DPD providing no "reasonable justification for why they need to retain 10s of millions of data points on the exact whereabouts of innocent Detroiters for 90 days," and attorney said.
A member of the Michigan Immigrant Rights Center also voiced concerns that license plate information could be shared with agencies like Immigration Customs and Enforcement looking for people not staying in the country legally.
MORE: 'I am tired of being surveilled': Detroit's plan to add more license plate readers draws backlash
One resident referred to the contract as abetting "technological racism" due to its similarities with DPD's use of facial recognition.
"We're not looking at any civil matter. We have policies against it. We have policies against using it for immigration and we strictly adhere to those policies and a remedy for those policy violations is strict, strict and severe disciplinary action," White said. "Again, I'm happy to report that we have not had any infractions."
White added the license plate technology was used in the investigation for Wynter Smith, the 2-year-old Lansing toddler that had been kidnapped from her home earlier this year. It was utilized in locating Rashad Trice.
The vendor is Motorola Solutions Inc.