CANYON COUNTY, Idaho — A petition seeking to ban automated license plate reader cameras and other surveillance technology in Wilder has gathered enough valid signatures to move forward, putting the issue before the Wilder City Council.
The petition was launched by Wilder resident Tyler Cain after he raised concerns about Flock Safety license plate reader cameras installed around the city.
Cain says the cameras were installed through an agreement between the former mayor and police chief without public comment or a city council vote.
“I’m really excited about this moving forward because it’s going to give the voters a chance to actually have a voice in this,” said Cain.
WATCH | Hear more details about the petition below—
Cain says the petition is about more than removing the existing cameras. The proposed initiative would prohibit the city from operating automated license plate readers, predictive policing systems, and real-time facial recognition or biometric scanning in public spaces.
It would also require city council approval and a public hearing before new categories of surveillance technology could be installed.
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Under the proposal, surveillance data operated by the city would also have to be stored on city-owned servers within Wilder rather than on third-party commercial cloud servers.
Cain says the petition did not require a large number of signatures to qualify.
“I was somewhere around 15 valid signatures when I finalized it, so it’s a low number,” Cain says, adding that only 65 people voted in Wilder's most recent city election.
The initiative now moves to the Wilder City Council, which is scheduled to vote on the proposal Sept. 1. If the council rejects the initiative, the measure would go before Wilder voters in November 2027.
The petition comes after Wilder amended its agreement with Flock at a July 14 city council meeting. The amendment prevents Flock from using the city's data for product improvement.
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Cain says he sees that change as a step in the right direction, but says it does not address his broader concerns about the cameras.
“The cameras are still up. They’re still gathering data, and they’re still, you know, privatizing the data. And there’s still all of the civil liberty concerns, the privacy concerns.”
Cain argues the technology can do more than help law enforcement identify vehicles connected to criminal investigations. He says it can create a searchable record of where people travel.
“No one should be able to put the whole entirety of my movements together, and that’s what Flock is capable of doing.”
The Wilder City Council is expected to consider the initiative Sept. 1.
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