September 17, 2026, 12:20 AM ET
The city of Westland is apparently bringing a backhoe to its Flock cameras.
Westland Police Chief Kyle Dawley announced in July that he would not renew his department’s expiring contract for Flock cameras because of a City Council that was “deeply divided” over keeping them.
In a video posted to Facebook Monday, Department of Public Service worker Christopher Stevens posted a video of a backhoe grabbing a Flock camera by its base and ripping it off the ground. He posted the video with the caption “satisfying.”
“This is something that the people of the city of Westland wanted, and it was something that the police chief enacted and I followed the orders that were given to me,” Stevens said.
Flock is the most popular vendor of automatic license plate readers, which are AI-enabled cameras that capture the rear of vehicles and their license plates. Police can look up license plates through the data collected by the cameras to aid in criminal investigations.
While the cameras have popped up all over Metro Detroit, at least six communities, including Westland, have decided to get rid of the cameras. Community leaders have raised concerns about the company changing its terms and conditions and the ability of police to access data without giving a clear reason.
Cameras are usually approved by the public body that governs a municipality, in most cases a city council or a board of directors. Stevens believes residents, not councilors or administrators, should approve the Flock cameras.
“If your community wants it and votes for it, that’s fine,” Stevens said.
Stevens also said that several police officers around the country have been accused of using the cameras to track people who are not charged with crimes.
Voters have cited disdain for Flock cameras in their rejection of police millages in Waterford, Independence, Sumpter and Orion townships. The four communities are putting police millage issues on the ballot in November as a second effort to maintain funding for police services.
Since then, Independence and Sumpter townships have gotten rid of their Flock cameras amid public pressure. In Waterford Township, Police Chief Scott Underwood has defended his department’s use of Flock cameras, calling them a tool his officers have used responsibly to investigate high-profile crimes like human trafficking, homicides and sex crimes.
“Our detectives wouldn’t want to be the ones knocking on the doors of those people’s families and saying, ‘We could have had a chance to bring you justice, and we could have had a chance to arrest these people who committed these crimes, but we don’t have a lead, and the reason we don’t have a lead is because we took down this technology that could have helped us with Underwood at night.'” about the millage.
Underwood has expressed support for bills proposed in the Michigan Legislature that would establish statewide rules for the use of automatic license plate readers.
mbryan@detroitnews.com
