Wilmington Already Runs Plate Readers. They Just Aren’t Flock.

This week, marking one year as Wilmington’s police chief, Ryan Zuidema was asked about the automated license plate readers at the center of the fight next door, where New Hanover County just canceled its Flock contract. His answer, to WECT: the technology is “worth discussing” because it can help solve crimes, but “critical guardrails need to be in place before the cameras are implemented,” and there are no immediate plans. He added that Wilmington “doesn’t have a contract with Flock.”

That last part is accurate. Wilmington has no Flock contract. But the framing — guardrails “before the cameras are implemented,” as if this were a future question — does not match the department’s own rulebook.

Wilmington already runs plate readers

The Wilmington Police Department’s ALPR directive (.06.09), which we obtained through a public-records request and publish in full, is not a proposal. It is an operating policy for a live program. It describes fixed and mobile license plate readers, a hot-list system fed twice daily from NCIC plus custom entries, scan data retained for 60 days, and a STING Center that approves the hot lists. You do not write and maintain a five-page CALEA-compliant operating directive for cameras you have not implemented.

The vendor is Axon

The directive is explicit: hot-list data “will be submitted to Axon Enterprise.” Wilmington’s plate readers, and the STING Center’s real-time camera platform, run on Axon’s Fusus system — a different company from Flock, and the same company New Hanover County’s Sheriff uses for its 2,147-camera Fusus network. So “we don’t use Flock” is true in the narrowest sense — the brand — while the capability the public actually worries about is already here under another name.

And Axon isn’t licensed to do this in North Carolina. The state regulates the sale, installation, service, and monitoring of camera and video-analytics systems under Chapter 74D, the Security Systems Licensing Act. On August 28, 2026, the Director of the N.C. Security Systems Licensing Board confirmed in writing that Axon is “not licensed, no records on file.” DeFlockILM has filed a formal Chapter 74D complaint against Axon with the Board. Axon is also one of three Flock competitors the U.S. Senate’s Crime and Counterterrorism Subcommittee is now investigating over the collection and use of Americans’ data, with documents due September 16, 2026. So the plate-reader and camera system Wilmington already runs — and the one the chief says is “worth discussing” — is operated by a vendor the state’s own regulator says holds no license to sell, install, or service it here.

The policy reaches beyond Wilmington’s own cameras

The directive’s security rules “also appl[y] to shared data obtained by ALPR systems not operated by this agency,” and it sets a process for “requests for shared data access from other law enforcement agencies,” subject to the Chief’s approval. In plain terms: Wilmington’s own policy contemplates its officers using plate-reader data from systems the city does not run. We have not obtained a document naming a specific agreement with the Sheriff’s Office, and we do not claim one exists — but the policy leaves that door open, and the public is entitled to know whether it has been walked through.

If guardrails are the precondition, prove the ones you have work

To be fair to the chief, WPD’s existing program is not a wide-open dragnet on paper. The directive ties hot lists to NCIC and specific crime categories, bars using the system for regulatory motor-vehicle violations (expired tags, inspections), purges scan data after 60 days, requires supervisor sign-off for custom entries, and requires an annual audit. He may mean that a new, fixed, citywide network — the Flock kind — would need more. That is a fair distinction.

But the logic still bites, in three places:

1. Wrong tense. If robust guardrails are a precondition for plate readers, they should already govern the plate readers Wilmington operates today — not be held in reserve for a future expansion. You do not get to say “guardrails first” about a program that is already running.

2. A guardrail you can’t see isn’t a guardrail. Every protection in the directive is self-administered and self-audited. Section D.4 requires an annual audit — who searched the scan file, and every request for outside-agency data access — reported to the Chief. The public has never seen it. Until it is produced, “we have guardrails” is a claim, not a demonstrated fact. Next door, New Hanover’s guardrails looked fine on paper too — until the audit showed 470 “FreeForm” searches describing people, three of them with an officer typing a race into the box.

3. The quiet door. The same directive lets Wilmington tap ALPR data from “systems not operated by this agency.” So even a well-guarded Wilmington system can pull from a less-guarded outside one — exactly the seam a guardrail is supposed to close, left to the Chief’s discretion.

What we’re asking

Before Wilmington “discusses” adding more, residents deserve the record of what is already in place: WPD’s fixed and mobile ALPR locations and count, its annual ALPR audit (who searched, and any cross-agency data-sharing), and any agreement to access or share plate-reader data with the Sheriff’s Office or any outside network. We’ve requested it. When it arrives, we’ll publish it.

Wilmington doesn’t use Flock. It uses Axon. For a resident whose car is logged, the brand on the pole is not the point.

Sources: WECT, “Wilmington police chief addresses staffing, morale, violent crime challenges” (Sept. 14, 2026); Wilmington Police Department Directive .06.09, Automated License Plate Readers (CALEA 41.3.9), obtained by DeFlockILM.