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ORWELL INDEX
Retired Updated

Josephine County Sheriff | License plate readers

Ten Flock cameras ran throughout the county on a two-year, forfeiture-funded contract, until the Sheriff ended the program in August 2026. The readable county record holds one invoice vote and not one word of policy.

At a glance

The record
Admin Workshop minutes, 2 December 2025: a $33,000 Flock Safety invoice, described by the Sheriff as the year two payment of a two-year contract, approved 3-0 [1]
Scale
"They are located throughout the county" (the Sheriff to the Board); ten cameras (press, August 2026) [1] [2]
Funding
"The funding for invoice comes from the illegal marijuana forfeiture grant" (the minutes, 2 December 2025) [1]
The end
Announced mid-August 2026: "it is clear much of Josephine County is not ready or willing to accept the use of ALPR technology" (the Sheriff, to Jefferson Public Radio); KOIN reported cameras had been targeted and vandalized [2] [3]
Published policy
none found. The Sheriff's manual is published only as image scans, and no SB 1516 section 7 publication for this system was found on the county's site [1]
Contract, year-one payment, termination record
none of the three appears in the readable board record (194 of 1,410 documents are image scans we could not read). All are in the records request [1]

How it happened

  1. Decision

    The year-two payment, and the program's one appearance on the record

    The Board approves a $33,000 Flock Safety invoice 3-0. The Sheriff explains the system is an automatic license plate reader, located throughout the county, in year two of a two-year contract, funded from an illegal marijuana forfeiture grant, and credits it with helping solve several crimes. This is the only Flock item in the county's readable board record. [1]

  2. Context

    SB 1516 takes effect mid-contract

    Oregon's plate reader statute arrives while the cameras are running: policies published before deployment, a 30-day retention cap on non-case data, statutory vendor audit figures. We found no section 7 publication for this system on the county's site, and make no compliance claim; the section 6 figures are in the records request. [4]

  3. Context

    The Sheriff ends the program

    The Sheriff announces the contract is over, telling press the technology had been beneficial in solving crime but "it is clear much of Josephine County is not ready or willing to accept the use of ALPR technology"; KOIN reports cameras had been targeted and vandalized. The readable board record through 27 August contains no termination document, consistent with a decision made inside the Sheriff's Office rather than voted by the Board. [2] [3] [5]

A program in the past tense

Josephine County’s plate readers are past tense. In mid-August 2026 the Sheriff announced the end of the county’s ten-camera Flock contract, telling Jefferson Public Radio that “while the technology has been beneficial in solving crime and overall public safety, it is clear much of Josephine County is not ready or willing to accept the use of ALPR technology”. KOIN reported that some of the cameras had been targeted and vandalized before the decision. The stated reason is the community’s; this page adds nothing to it.

What the county’s own record holds

The readable board record contains a single item about this program. On 2 December 2025 the Board approved the contract’s year-two payment, $33,000, and the minutes preserve the Sheriff’s own description of the system:

Flock Safety is a software that is an automatic license plate reader. They are located throughout the county. … The Sheriff’s Office has solved several different crimes based off the Flock Safety System. The funding for invoice comes from the illegal marijuana forfeiture grant.

We could not find the original contract, the year-one payment, or any termination document in the 1,212 readable board documents. Some of that may sit in the 194 published only as image scans, which we could not read; the rest is the records request.

The statute that arrived mid-contract

The program straddled 31 March 2026, when SB 1516 took effect: no plate reader operation except as the Act provides, policies published before deployment, a 30-day cap on retaining data not tied to a case, and vendor-supplied audit figures including every agency with access. We found no published policy for this system on the county’s site and make no claim about compliance. A narrower fact stands on its own: for the roughly five months the cameras ran under the Act, the statute entitles the public to specific records, and the request asks for them, including what became of the data when the cameras went dark.

On the map

The community has mapped 14 devices of this type in the county on OpenStreetMap. These are community reports: the vendor and operator of each point are unverified, and none is confirmed to belong to this system. See them on the map →

Street names from reverse geocoding — © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL).

What we do not know

What you can do

Show up

Systems like this one are approved by boards, councils and committees that meet in public. We have not yet confirmed where each of them meets in Josephine County.

What we have documented in Josephine County →

Protect yourself

Practical steps to shrink your personal data trail. Our guides publish at launch; until then, EFF's Surveillance Self-Defense is the best starting point.

Surveillance Self-Defense →

Sources

  1. 1.
    Josephine County Administration Workshop minutes, 2 December 2025, from the Board's own agendas and minutes page · Primary document · · accessed
  2. 2.
    Rogue River Press, "Sheriff ends license plate reader program" · News · · accessed
  3. 3.
    KOIN 6, "'Targeted and vandalized': Oregon sheriff's office ends Flock camera contract" · News · · accessed
  4. 4.
    Enrolled Senate Bill 1516 (2026), Oregon Laws 2026 chapter 77 · Law · · accessed
  5. 5.
    Jefferson Public Radio, "Josephine County drops Flock cameras over privacy concerns" · News · · accessed

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