Four candidates running to become Harris County's next judge offered four distinct answers when asked whether they'd renew, revise or scrap the county's Flock Safety camera contract during a recent forum at the University of Houston-Downtown. The split exposes a surveillance debate that has already rattled Texas politics for months, as license plate reading cameras once championed as a crime-fighting tool have become a flashpoint over privacy, data access and police misuse.
The county's current agreement with Flock Safety runs from June 6, 2026 through June 5, 2027 and costs taxpayers $868,975, according to Chron. Harris County has paid Flock roughly $1.3 million since 2023, as previously reported by ABC13. Supporters of the technology say the cameras help police locate stolen vehicles and suspects, while critics counter that the system raises serious concerns about privacy, data access and misuse — arguments that surfaced directly in candidates' answers at the forum.
Republican nominee Orlando Sanchez, who spent 12 years as Harris County Treasurer and previously served on Houston City Council, stopped short of a firm position. He said the decision should be based on input from citizens and law enforcement, and that people should be punished when Flock camera policies are violated, but he did not give a direct yes-or-no answer about renewing the contract. Sanchez is running to succeed outgoing Democratic Judge Lina Hidalgo, who won reelection in 2022 by less than two percentage points, according to prior Hoodline reporting.
Plummer Demands Answers on Data Access
Democratic nominee Letitia Plummer, who resigned her Houston City Council seat under Texas's resign-to-run mandate in 2025 and won her party's May 2026 primary runoff against former Houston Mayor Annise Parker, said she would not renew the current contract as written. Plummer said she opposed the agreement in part because of privacy concerns affecting Black and Brown communities, and she called for a public-use policy spelling out who has access to collected data, who can view it, and how long it is retained. She added she would be open to further conversation if those privacy and data-access questions were answered, but reiterated she would cancel the contract as it currently stands.
Write-in candidate Marianne “Yan” Hess said she would not renew the contract unless privacy and misuse concerns are addressed, and that she would approve it only if safety measures resolved issues around privacy, misuse and mistaken arrests. Hess said the contract should not be approved under its current conditions. Fellow write-in candidate Vince Duncan took the hardest line, saying he would end the Flock camera contract outright. Duncan said he opposed what he described as 24-hour surveillance everywhere people go, warning the cameras could lead to broader surveillance and abuse, and arguing Harris County simply does not need them.
Approval Came Without Hidalgo's Vote
The current contract was approved under outgoing Judge Lina Hidalgo, though she abstained from the May 28, 2026 Commissioners Court vote that renewed the $868,975 agreement without explicit data oversight parameters, according to the Houston Press. Hidalgo has since called a special Commissioners Court meeting for October 15 to address privacy safeguards, after noting that county staff could not specify which personnel are authorized to view the camera data the system collects.
The fight over Harris County's contract is unfolding against a backdrop of statewide upheaval. Governor Greg Abbott ordered all Texas state agencies in August to freeze funding for Flock cameras, a move that led the Texas Department of Transportation to suspend installation permits on state roads and resulted in more than 900 cameras being unplugged statewide, per the Texas Tribune. Before the freeze, the state's Motor Vehicle Crime Prevention Authority had funneled at least $30 million in grants to help agencies deploy more than 3,200 cameras statewide, with another $10.9 million planned through 2027.
Misuse Cases Fueled Local Backlash
Houston Police Chief Noe Diaz announced in September that HPD will lose more than 200 of its Flock cameras as a direct result of the state funding freeze, a significant hit for a department that performs tens of thousands of license plate searches each month, according to the Houston Chronicle. The Harris County Sheriff's Office separately suspended three deputies' access to its 480-camera network in August and opened an internal investigation into potential misuse, with officials noting deputies must now enter a valid records code or criminal case number before running searches, FOX 26 Houston reported.
Local misuse cases have added urgency to the debate. Former Katy police officer Sergio Guadalupe Rodriguez was indicted in Fort Bend County in April on felony stalking and misuse-of-official-information charges after running more than 2,300 unauthorized searches of a woman's license plate, KHOU reported; he was fired shortly after the indictment, as Hoodline detailed. Former Pasadena Police Sergeant Michael Palitz surrendered his Texas peace officer license in August to avoid prosecution after an internal probe into allegations he used Flock access to track a female officer, resolving the matter through an agreement with the Harris County District Attorney's Office.
Harris County isn't alone in reconsidering its arrangement. Several Texas municipalities, including Pflugerville, Bastrop, Monroe and Bandera, voted earlier this year to terminate or deactivate their Flock contracts amid privacy concerns and mass surveillance pushback. Pflugerville decommissioned 28 cameras after discovering more than 400 outside agencies had searched its local data. Whether Harris County commissioners move to alter or cancel the county's contract before it expires in June 2027 remains an open question heading into the October 15 special meeting and November's election.
