Dayton is in the final stages of hiring an outside law firm to independently investigate how its Flock license-plate camera system was misused, a timeline that now stretches from a data-sharing lapse identified in October 2025 to a disclosure to city leaders that did not come until May 2026, according to WHIO News Center 7, whose reporting K99.1FM carried. City Commissioner Daryl Fairchild told News Center 7 on Wednesday, Nov. 11, that the city had signed a contract to hire the outside firm.
The city has more than 70 Flock cameras around Dayton, and they have been covered up since May, when the misuse first came to light and city leaders suspended the program after the police chief said the department had misused the technology, News Center 7 reported. City leaders have not decided whether the Flock program will return.
The questions commissioners want answered are about the timeline as much as the technology. Dayton police said Flock data was misused in October 2025; in January 2026, police went to commissioners and asked for more technology; and the misuse was not revealed to city leaders until May 2026, News Center 7 reported. City Manager Shelley Dickstein said of the findings, in remarks reported by News Center 7, “It does reveal egregious violations.”
“We need to know, and particularly who knew what around the failures and when they knew it and why that wasn’t particularly disclosed in January,” Fairchild told News Center 7. Commissioner Darius Beckham, in a statement to News Center 7, said it was “negligent to ask for additional Flock technology in January, knowing about the misuse in October,” adding, “The ordinance was not followed, and we must decide if the technology will stay or go.”
Commissioner Matt Joseph framed the investigation as a balance the city thought it had already struck. “We’re trying to figure out how we get information that helps to solve crimes but doesn’t infringe on people’s basic rights,” Joseph told News Center 7. “Very clear, written in emails, in policy, passed as a policy on the commission dais, but they weren’t followed. So, I want to know what broke down.” Joseph also said, “Obviously, something went wrong,” News Center 7 reported.
The Dayton Police Department’s own account, in a statement provided to News Center 7 by spokesperson James Rider, says the department halted use of automated license plate readers indefinitely while an independent review was conducted. The department said that in October 2025 it identified a higher-than-expected level of data sharing within its fixed-site ALPR system, found that a network sharing feature had been enabled allowing broader access than intended, and then disabled the feature and limited sharing to law enforcement agencies within Ohio, according to the statement reported by News Center 7.
The same statement says a comprehensive review found that required processes in the city’s Surveillance Impact Report had not been fully implemented, including required approval for external data sharing, documentation ensuring data would not be used for immigration enforcement, and notification to the City Commission about data-sharing relationships, News Center 7 reported. An administrative investigation found that enabling the automatic sharing functions resulted in approximately 7,100 search requests citing immigration-related purposes from various law enforcement agencies; the requests were not specific to Dayton, and the department said it cannot confirm whether any data was returned or whether action was taken based on those searches.
The department also said the former commander of its Support Services Division, who helped develop and present the safeguards in the Surveillance Impact Report, failed to implement them and will no longer serve in the Dayton Police Department, according to the statement reported by News Center 7. News Center 7 said it reached out to Dayton police repeatedly with questions about the timeline between the October misuse, the January request and the May disclosure.
What we know — and what we’re still waiting on
What is confirmed, from the city’s own statements reported by News Center 7: the sharing feature was enabled beyond its intended scope, roughly 7,100 immigration-related search requests passed through the system, required approvals and notifications were skipped, the cameras have been bagged since May, and an outside law firm is being hired to investigate. What is not yet public: the firm’s name and timeline, whether any Dayton data was actually returned in those searches, and whether commissioners will vote to restart the system, rewrite its rules or end it for good.
The investigation lands in a Montgomery County where law-enforcement practice is already under a microscope, as NewsForce247’s coverage this week of a countywide vehicle-theft and burglary investigation showed, and Dayton residents are weighing the costs and benefits of city services on several fronts, as in our report on Dayton’s tight rental market.
What happens next is the independent investigation itself. Commissioners say they want its answers — who knew what, and when — before deciding the Flock program’s future, and the cameras stay covered in the meantime. NewsForce247 will update this story when the firm is named or the commission sets a date to take up the program again.
Photo: PrettyFlyForaGemini, CC BY-SA