Altadena Town Council members Anton Anderson and Isis Moulden say they went looking for records showing residents were consulted before dozens of license plate reader cameras went up around the community — and found nothing. The pair reported the gap as the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department negotiates a new contract with Flock for the camera network, according to Anderson.
The council took no action on the contract presentation, but the discussion, first reported by Pasadena Now, laid bare how little formal oversight exists over a surveillance system that has quietly grown to 77 cameras across the burn area. Anderson, who represents Census Tract 4610, said no record of Altadena public community comment was found when he and Moulden looked into it, and he called public oversight a major concern.
Altadena currently has 70 automated license plate reader cameras, with Flock supplying 40 of them and Motorola providing 30, and that count rises to 77 once border cameras shared with neighboring areas are included. The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department declined to provide specific camera locations, saying placement is intentional and strategic, targeting high-traffic and high-crime areas. Anderson said about half of the cameras sit west of Lake Avenue, and Census Tract 4610 alone contains nearly half of that western cluster.
How the Cameras Got There
The network traces back to a burglary problem in burn areas after the Eaton Fire, which prompted the Sheriff's Department to install cameras across Altadena. Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors Chair Kathryn Barger backed the deployment at the time, according to a FOX 11 report, as deputies also rolled out high-visibility patrols and a post-fire Home Check Program alongside the cameras. Flock provided the county a full year of trial access to its network without charge.
Despite that year of free access, Altadena still has no camera-specific oversight body of its own, and its data retention policy remains undetermined, Anderson said. Sheriff's officials told council members that logged searches and random audits from the department's Data Systems Bureau serve as the accountability check, and they maintain that anything visible from a public street is lawful to record — meaning residents cannot opt out of being captured on camera on public roads. Anderson and Moulden met with sheriff's representatives in August and asked 15 questions about the program, according to the same report.
Residents Push Back at the Meeting
The council's own outreach found a skeptical public. Council members launched an informal, non-scientific online survey in July that drew 230 responses, with more than half of respondents wanting a say in camera deployment and roughly half calling for tight control over how the data is managed. Per Anderson, survey respondents also expressed opposition to the collection of the data itself.
At the town council meeting, twelve public comments addressed the cameras, and most opposed them. Resident Lori Paul called for immediate removal of the system, saying the cameras were installed without public consultation. Robert Staehle asked the council to pursue a county-wide ban on broad private-company surveillance, while Yadi Younse pressed officials on who signed the contract and who was even told the system existed. Emily Stowe told the council she counted four cameras visible at a single intersection on Hill Avenue.
Not everyone at the meeting wanted the cameras gone. Altadena Fire Brigade founder Brissa Page asked why the community received donated surveillance cameras instead of funding evacuation sirens, and separately requested utility sponsorship for sirens. Resident John Hainer voiced support for keeping the system, and resident Deb Halberstadt also backed keeping them in place. Town council member Connor Cipolla was also identified in the discussion.
A Contract Presentation With No Presenter
Adding to the confusion, Los Angeles County Public Works staffer Dominic Osmena was scheduled to present on the Flock cameras but did not do so at the meeting, and Altadena Sheriff's Station Captain Ethan Marquez was scheduled to give a public safety report. The town council meeting could be watched live. Town Council Chair Nic Arnzen announced that a community meeting on the cameras will be held, though he said the format is still being shaped; Los Angeles County representatives and the Altadena Sheriff's Station captain have indicated openness to attending, and Flock representatives may also take part.
A Regional Reckoning Over Flock
Altadena's murky paper trail lands amid a fast-moving legal and political shift around license plate reader networks statewide. A California First District Court of Appeal ruling from February is cited by Justia Law. The debate also includes questions about compliance.
Neighboring cities are already grappling with the same questions. South Pasadena voted in March to terminate its Flock contract and remove 14 street cameras over data privacy concerns and fears of federal agency access, as reported by LAist and KCRW. In Pasadena, where Flock logged 18,648 searches in 2025 and helped recover 27 stolen vehicles worth roughly $700,000, Vice Mayor Jess Rivas has pushed to end the city's contract entirely, arguing local safeguards cannot stop federal immigration authorities from reaching the data. That debate has split Pasadena's Public Safety Committee between terminating the contract, cutting data retention, or switching vendors, and in August, advocacy group Pasadena Privacy delivered more than 2,700 letters demanding the city drop the program when its contract runs through 2027.
Questions about camera data and civil federal immigration enforcement remain open in Altadena. Whether that reassures Altadena residents remains an open question locally, but the pattern beyond the San Gabriel Valley suggests the scrutiny is only intensifying — Pflugerville, Texas, recently canceled a Flock contract after discovering unauthorized outside searches of its camera data, as Hoodline previously reported.
