We Asked NCDOT to Enforce Its Own Warning
The state’s road authority already said the quiet part on the record: four Flock live-video cameras sit in or beside the state right-of-way with no permit, and that “may be in violation of GS 136-18(10).” So we filed a complaint asking NCDOT to finish what it started.
On September 3, 2026, DeFlockILM filed a formal complaint with the North Carolina Department of Transportation over four Flock Safety “Condor” live-video cameras operating on or beside state-maintained roads in New Hanover County with no encroachment agreement. The complaint asks the Department to do two things: determine, pole by pole, whether each camera stands inside the recorded state right-of-way, and — for any that does — use its authority under N.C. Gen. Stat. § 136-18(10) and § 136-93 to require Flock to obtain a permit or remove the device. (Read the complaint and enclosures.)
Update — September 4, 2026: NCDOT acknowledged the complaint the next day and referred it to its encroachments unit for review. In an email from the Department’s Meredith Vick: “I have sent this to our encroachments unit and we will proceed to look into this. We will let you know once we have a response.” That is the enforcement lane the complaint asked the Department to open; we will publish its determination when it arrives.
We are not inventing the theory. NCDOT stated it first. In its response to our public-records request (#783351104621), the Department confirmed it has issued no encroachment for any Flock Condor in the county, that it asked Flock to submit encroachment agreements for the live-view cameras, and that Flock has not done so — then warned that a device placed in the right-of-way without approval “may be in violation of GS 136-18(10).” The complaint simply asks the Department to act on its own words.
Two points keep this clean. The Sheriff’s plate readers are permitted — NCDOT issued five encroachments for those, four to the Sheriff’s Office and one to the State Highway Patrol — so this is not a complaint about paperwork the county already has. And the March 31, 2026 data-sharing MOU between NCDOT and Flock is not an encroachment; it governs access to video, not the right to plant a pole in a state road. NCDOT said as much: Condor encroachments must be issued separately from the MOU.
The four located cameras sit at Haven Place on NC 133 (Castle Hayne Road), two on S. 17th Street (near Greenlawn Memorial Park and The Pointe), and on S. College Road (NC 132) across from the Firestone store. We asked the Department the one question its response left open — is each pole inside the recorded right-of-way? — and requested the same roadside-safety review (breakaway-pole and clear-zone analysis) it applied to the permitted plate readers. The complaint also flags a denied Gordon Road application and the Wrightsville Beach cameras NCDOT already said “should be denied.”
This is the lever we have described before: a permitting violation does not turn on the privacy debate. It turns on one fact — is there a permit? If the answer is no, a structure unlawfully in the right-of-way is a structure that can be ordered removed. (The full record behind the filing: the Sheriff got permits for his plate readers; his Condors have none, and NCDOT’s own Flock deal.)
The County already knows exactly how this works
This is not a hard process for New Hanover County when it wants to use it. In the summer of 2026, dozens of unpermitted benches — built by the local Democratic Socialists of America chapter, installed at Wave Transit stops, some painted with political slogans — went up in and around public rights-of-way. County Commissioner Dane Scalise contacted NCDOT on July 31, 2026, asking that the County be allowed to remove them. Less than a week later, on August 6, NCDOT cleared roughly twenty benches from state-maintained rights-of-way, citing non-compliance with its bus-stop guidelines, safety hazards, and liability. The City of Wilmington pulled the rest from municipal property the next day.
We take no issue with removing an unpermitted structure from the right-of-way — that is the rule, applied as written. Which is exactly the point. A wooden bench with a slogan drew a commissioner, a call to Raleigh, and removal in six days on safety-and-liability grounds. Four vendor-owned surveillance cameras that can pan, tilt, zoom, and follow a person — standing in the same right-of-way, flagged by NCDOT itself as a possible § 136-18(10) violation — have drawn no such urgency. Same right-of-way. Same statute. Same safety-and-liability logic. The bench was hauled off in a week; the camera still watches the road. So why does New Hanover County enforce the rules selectively? Our complaint asks NCDOT to apply the standard it already applied in August — this time to the cameras.
Sources: DeFlockILM complaint to NCDOT, September 3, 2026 (with enclosures); N.C. Department of Transportation production for public-records request #783351104621; N.C. Gen. Stat. §§ 136-18(10) and 136-93. On the bench removals: Port City Daily (Aug. 6, 2026) and WECT (Aug. 10, 2026). NCDOT’s statements about the cameras are quoted from its records production. General information for public discussion, not legal advice. Corrections: mark@deflockilm.org.
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