In El Cerrito, the police department said the company Flock is beginning the process of taking down its license-plate reading cameras. The council voted not to renew the contract for these cameras following public outcry earlier this year. As with many other cities around the country, in El Cer rito, some in the community maintain the cameras help catch and deter criminals, and others are voicing major concerns about who the information could be shared with. The community group Flock out of El Cerrito shared video from Sunday of Flock cameras in the city flickering colored lights when cars pass by. “We know that they’re property of Flock, and so it’s Flock’s responsibility to take the cameras down,” said Nakiesha Koss, who said she’s part of a group of neighbors pressuring the city to do more. “It’s a privacy issue that we can’t see what they’re collecting, if anything,” Koss said. “And so we’re hoping that the city will, at the very least, put bags over the cameras for now, while Flock gets it together to take them down,” Koss continued. Flock sent NBC Bay Area News a statement responding to these concerns, noting, “El Cerrito’s cameras are not collecting images.” “The infrared lights are motion-triggered, but the cameras are offline,” the statement continued. The El Cerrito Police Department posted on Wednesday that it is working with Flock to coordinate the cameras being removed. The department said that Flock has work orders to remove the cameras between July 30 and Aug. 18. “Flock’s engineering division has advised ECPD that the flashing light is the camera’s infrared signals which are activated by motion,” the police department said in the post on Wednesday. “Flock has further confirmed that the cameras are not generating or capturing images and have not been doing so since the agreement expired on June 6th when all of the cameras were decommissioned. Some in the community, like the General Manager of El Cerrito Honda, Sheriff Demetri, believe the cameras’ value outweighs their cost. “We have the technology to deter these criminals, we should use it and maximize it,” Demetri told NBC Bay Area. He fears the area will be less safe with the cameras gone. Demetri said Flock cameras helped track a suspect who stole a car from his dealership. “The Flock cameras were able to track this vehicle, getting off the Bay Bridge, driving through the city, and they were able to catch it before the vehicle was stripped down or burned or anything else happened to it,” he continued. While the city’s police chief had said the cameras were an effective tool for tracking criminals, neighbors who oppose the cameras cited concerns about privacy and about the technology to share information with federal agencies, like ICE. The police chief shared earlier this year that federal agencies did gain access to the city’s Flock cameras without their knowledge. While some neighbors hoped the cameras would have already been taken down, the police department expects the process will take a matter of weeks. ...read more read less