A pair of license-plate-reading cameras has operated for seven years in Brewer without complaint, even as residents across Maine push back against such technology.
Brewer installed two automatic license plate readers in 2019 along Route 1A, just east of the interchange with I-395, as part of a pilot program, according to the city.
Brewer has not received a complaint about its cameras, Public Safety Director Chris Martin said.
Automatic license plate-reading cameras have drawn bipartisan scorn recently in Maine, with communities and lawmakers trying to ban the cameras. That the cameras have existed in Brewer with no blowback shows how new knowledge of the technology is to the general public and how hard it is for people to find reliable information about where such cameras exist.
The controversial cameras can record and log the license plates of passing vehicles and alert police departments if they detect one connected to an active investigation. Regardless of brand, the devices are commonly referred to as Flock cameras, one of a handful of companies that make such products.
Brewer uses a Leonardo ELSAG Vehicle Plate Hunter. The cameras in one location capture east- and west-bound traffic, Martin said.
More than 40,000 vehicles a day pass the cameras during peak summer months, Martin said. That traffic, along with being a connecting route between the Bangor, Mount Desert Island and Down East areas, makes the location critical, he said.
Brewer did not pay for the installation or operation of the cameras, Martin said. If tax dollars are not being used, approval would not necessarily come up in a public meeting.
That lack of transparency is a problem, said Alicia Rea, a policy fellow for the American Civil Liberties Union of Maine.
“What is the incentive for this company to be giving away that free technology and software?” Rea said. “Who owns the data? If we’re collecting all of this data, how is that company, Leonardo, using it on the back end? Because they have to be turning a profit somewhere. Is it on the backs of Mainers’ data?”
Brewer police does not retain the cameras’ data beyond what is necessary for the system to function and it does not have a local database of license plate reads, Martin said.
“The system is used solely for legitimate law enforcement purposes and operates in accordance with Maine law governing automated license plate recognition systems,” Martin said.
Data from the cameras cannot be stored for more than 21 days under Maine law.
The ACLU has not seen any examples of a contract between Leonardo and a community, so it cannot say if the camera company is following Maine law, Rea said.
The cameras infringe on people’s constitutional rights, Rea said. People’s behaviors in public may change because they’re being watched all the time, which is a First Amendment violation. It’s also a Fourth Amendment violation because the cameras allow the government to record everyone, store the footage and then search it, Rea said.
“They gather that information first and apply it to a crime later, which makes us all suspects in that system,” Rea said.
The city of Bangor has received multiple complaints about using the cameras, despite the fact that the city does not operate any. Complaints appear to be driven in part by an online crowdsourced database, DeFlock, which lists nine automatic license plate reading cameras in Bangor, as well as two cameras in Brewer.
Cameras have been installed in Hancock and Washington counties based on the success of the pilot program in Brewer, Martin said.
Reps. Laurel Libby and Quentin Chapman, both R-Auburn, spearheaded a petition this summer in their hometown to ban the automatic license plate readers. There were enough valid signatures for it to go before city council, which has not yet addressed the issue.
South Portland installed Flock cameras but removed them in June after public backlash.
A Maine lawmaker introduced a bill to ban the cameras this spring, but it will not be taken up until the next legislative session in January.