It’s a non-binding vote, but it will be interesting regardless.
League City voters in November will weigh in on whether the city should use Flock cameras or other automated license plate readers, although city officials said the referendum will be non-binding.
The League City City Council on Tuesday voted unanimously to put the measure on the Nov. 3 ballot, days before the city of Conroe will consider a similar ballot measure regarding the use of the cameras.
During League City’s meeting, a dozen public speakers urged the council to put the issue to a public vote. The Chronicle has reached out to Flock Safety, the company whose license plate readers are used in League City, for comment.
Council Member Courtney Chadwell said he was “generally against governing by referendum.”
“We can’t always reduce an issue to a simple yes or no at the ballot box,” he said. However, Chadwell said he supported putting the issue on the ballot as a “straw poll” to gauge public opinion.
Council Member Chad Tressler, who initially said he would vote against placing the issue on the ballot, agreed that the issue of whether to use license plate readers was not the correct use of a referendum.
“It’s risky and throwing the baby out with the bath water,” Tressler said. He later voted for the measure after asking how many votes it needed to pass.
[…]
The League City Police Department initially installed nine Flock Safety cameras at designated locations throughout the city in late 2022, with council approval. After a lengthy process to obtain state authorization, the department installed the 33 more Flock cameras at major intersections in 2023.
See here and here for some recent discussion. As Houston Public Media makes clear, this is basically a straw poll, which League City’s council can then choose to act on or not. I would advise League City voters to be aware of bait and switch possibilities, so don’t stop paying attention if this goes the way the abolitionists would like. I’ll have these referenda on my watch list for November. Bay Area Houston has more.
[ooh! i was hoping you would pick this up.]
A few weeks ago, the City posted on NextDoor a full write-up stating their position for Flock cameras, mostly saying that they were planning to continue using them based on the the benefits they think they have seen so far.
As you can imagine, the comments lit up.
A shocking number of folks were totally supportive of the cameras – if you aren’t doing anything wrong what are you afraid of, etc – and it was so disheartening.
I am guessing this came up at Council due to that published statement.
(i will see if i can find it)
(i suppose they posted on other forums too – I can’t find it on the web page at this point.)
@in League City too…
Nothing says dissemination of public policy or addressing constituent concerns like posting on NextDoor. That’s akin to POTUS firing a federal govt official on Twitter. SMH.
Lived in LC a lifetime ago, but I’m with the shocking number of folks in support – I don’t care if LCPD wants to pull footage to see me driving back and forth on FM 518 from Kemah to I-45 (for example), and would applaud them if they were able to review footage and able to identify a car used in the commission crime (and by proxy, the owner of said car) at 3am (for example).
And bring back red light cameras to Houston proper !