Mahoning is Flocked

Mahoning Township is the proud host of the busiest shopping complex in the south Carbon County area, boasting locations for major brands such as Lowe's, Walmart, and McDonald's. We can't blame them for wanting to keep the area safe with all that activity, but they need to understand that ALPR systems are not the way to go.

Right now, the Lowe's inside the township has two Flock cameras watching its parking lot. These cameras are likely installed by the Lowe's store, not the Township itself. The township does have a camera watching those who dare shop at Walmart, though, and another close by on Fredericks Grove, the quiet road that intersects Walmart's entrance. I find it rather odd to put an ALPR here; why not use that $3,000 per year to secure a place people actually go?

On July 16, I received their response via US Mail. Interestingly, the response included, "Mahoning Township does not have any intergovernmental cooperation agreements, interlocal agreements, or memorandums of understanding with an of the municipalities listed." This claim is demonstratively untrue as Lehighton provided me a copy of the license agreement. In their response to my second Right-to-Know request, they instead cited an actual exemption, one that states the record cannot be released for security reasons. Not only is Mahoning Township simultaneously claiming the record does and does not exist, they are claiming the release of such a record would jeopardize public safety or safety of the hardware even though Franklin and Lehighton released the same records without these concerns.

Mahoning Township also declined to produce documents relating to access controls, security audits, data sharing agreements, and location records. These seem pretty standard to have records of for such a powerful surveillance tool. They're essentially saying that they don't know who can access the cameras, why people are accessing the cameras, or where the cameras even are. Granted, they do state for the location records "We do not maintain any records that identify the physical installation locations. They are maintained by Flock." However, even if the records are maintained by Flock, the Township is still responsible to collect and present those records to me upon request as per the RTK.

Mahoning Township also denied a third Right-to-Know request entirely, a request for information about their Flock system. This request is one that Franklin Township partially answered, so it's interesting for Mahoning to deny the release of records that Franklin deemed was okay. At least they responded via email instead of US Mail this time, though.