Public comments raise new concerns about Flock surveillance in Fort Wayne

Hey Locals,

If you caught Tuesday night’s City Council meeting, you might have noticed a small shoutout to The Local. During a Q&A between Flock Safety representatives and council members, Councilman Geoff Paddock (D-5) said he may have been the first person on City Council to learn about Flock cameras in Fort Wayne when a "journalist who puts a blog together” asked him about it earlier this year. That was our contributor, Jeff Blossom, who took the lead on pursuing the Flock camera story for us at The Local in February after we received several reader emails about it from our loyal subscribers. (Catch the original report with reporting by Jeff and Kara here.)

However, after briefly patting ourselves on the backs for bringing this (clearly popular) public issue to council’s attention, we learned during the meeting that there might be even more going on with Flock in Fort Wayne than we realized. And public comments at the end of Tuesday’s meeting – rather than Flock’s presentation or council’s questions – are what brought this to light.

So… what exactly did we learn about Flock from its presentation? Where does City Council stand on the issue? And what new information did local residents like you bring to light during the public comment session?

To gather this report, we contacted: Council members Russ Jehl (R-2) and Geoff Paddock (D-5), as well as the FWPD’s Public Information Officer Sgt. Jonathan Cutler (who we’re still waiting to hear back from). We also reached out to a few residents who spoke during public comment at City Council and are waiting to hear back.