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Flock cameras will be discussed at the September Kosciusko County Council meeting after they were brought up by council members during the Kosciusko County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office presentation on their proposed 2027 budgets.
The Sept. 10 meeting is at 6 p.m. in the old courtroom of the Kosciusko County Courthouse. Public comment will be taken.
According to basic information online, “Flock cameras are specialized outdoor cameras made by Flock Safety that function as Automated License Plate Readers. Mounted on poles along public roads, neighborhood entrances, and commercial areas, they automatically photograph passing vehicles and log data for law enforcement.”
As part of his budget, Prosecutor Brad Voelz included the purchase of Axon Justice software for an estimated $20,000 for the first year, including the implementation of the program. Because of that cost, he said they cut the budget in other places so the increase to it is only “slight.”
“It’s a tool for receiving and sharing data we get for discovery,” he said. “We’ve taken preliminary steps with a representative from Axon, and we put together a committee. We’ve had meetings, we’ve had presentations. We can answer any questions you have about that.”
Council President Tony Ciriello noted Voelz had a $5,000 increase for equipment for the Kosciusko County Narcotics Enforcement Team (NET 43), among other items. Voelz pointed out NET 43 expenses were kind of sprinkled throughout his budget. Overall, he said NET 43’s budget was proposed at the same as last year.
Councilwoman Rachael Rhoades asked if the $20,000 would be the same cost for Axon Justice year after year. Voelz said it’s $20,000 this year, including $5,000 for “onboarding,” and then the subscription will be about $15,000 annually.
Councilwoman Kimberly Cates asked Voelz if Axon would make his department more efficient or more effective.
“I’m trying to not overstate this. Extremely more effective. To the extreme,” he responded.
Kathy Groninger, Council vice president, asked how Axon Justice would help his office.
“Back in the old days, when you would get a felony case, you would get a manilla folder on the case. And every once in a while, you would get a VCR videotape and you were like, ‘Oh my God, there’s video! Are you kidding me?’ You’d pop it in the VCR, look at it and it would be 15 minutes long,” Voelz said. “With the advent of body cams and dash cams and in-car cams now, the extent of data you receive is exponentially greater than what you used to get.”
To review a run-of-the-mill felony case, it used to take about a half hour to read the reports and watch one video. Now with the technology and body cams, he said, it takes about 24 hours to review a report, and that’s just if there were four officers on the scene.
“It’s our obligation to consume all that data, to review all that data and share it with the defense in every case. We have to share everything that we receive, and these are all things that we receive now,” Voelz said. If they fail to share everything with the defense, the case could be dismissed or worse.
“This technology automatically pulls in all that data, automatically organizes it and allows us to send it. More than that, is that Axon is the industry leader and it is not restricted only to Axon cameras. So, there are more than 20 law enforcement agencies that work in this prosecutor’s office, and each one might have a different camera system. Axon has proprietary licensing that they can access any other camera system,” Voelz explained.
He said it’ll take them down from 24 hours to review footage to an hour.
Councilman Will Stockdale asked, if the Prosecutor’s Office gets Axon and the office becomes much more efficient, would he cut staffing or start enforcing more? Voelz said if they get Axon, he’d be coming to the council for two or more full-time staff.
Cates made a motion to approve the prosecutor’s budget presentation, but it failed for a lack of a second.
Rhoades asked for more clarification about Axon Justice. “As far as the cameras that are in this system, I think there’s a lot of questions in the room around Flock cameras. So could you just provide some clarification for all those, I think, who are hesitant to ask the question.”
Voelz responded, “First of all, I will tell you that that’s not in this budget. So, it’s not in the county council budget. Anything about Flock cameras is in the Infraction Deferral budget.”
Stockdale said there was one in the NET 43 equipment fund. It was used to purchase Flock cameras for NET 43 this year, he said.
Voelz said NET 43 is a multi-agency organization and they have their own budget which resides within the prosecuting attorney’s office budget. “Very likely, yes, NET 43 purchased a Flock camera through their budget, which is housed in the prosecutor’s office. Very likely, yes,” he stated.
Stockdale then said when the Prosecutor’s Office applied for a grant in 2024, his office told the County Commissioners if they weren’t down with Flock cameras, they wouldn’t put them up. “If they were having concerns nowadays, would you take them down?” he asked.
“Absolutely. Your call, 100%. It’s your decision whether or not to fund the cameras. If you do not fund them, then we would have no choice but to take them down,” Voelz replied.
Stockdale asked the rest of the council if they would like to talk more about the cameras and make a decision at Tuesday’s budget presentations. Or, he suggested, the Prosecuting Attorney’s Office could come back before the council at a meeting and they could have a hearing on it “just to get the misinformation corrected and understand what the capabilities are, whether we want this in our community.”
Ciriello said Monday’s and Tuesday’s meetings were about budgets, not decision making on whether or not they keep Flock cameras and things like that. He said what Stockdale brought up was discussion better suited for a council regular meeting where they could have public input if they needed to.
Stockdale asked if they could have that meeting next month, and Voelz said he would “love to.”
While NET 43 bought a Flock camera in 2026, Ciriello said they didn’t know what equipment NET 43 was going to purchase in the 2027 budget because they didn’t break their budget down by expenditures. There’s $5,000 in the equipment line of the budget, but Ciriello said he didn’t know if that was enough to purchase a Flock camera.
The council discussed how to approve the budget presentation or whether to table it because of the concerns regarding the cameras and Axon Justice. The council has until October to make any changes to budgets and adopt the budgets.
Voelz said they did need to get moving on the Axon Justice software. As for the discussion on the Flock cameras, he said, “I think it’s an important discussion this council should have. It’s an important question that all of us should answer. We’re excited about it. Like you said, to get rid of the misinformation about the capabilities and technology and all the guardrails this county has put in place to make sure it’s legitimate and responsible use.”
Voelz reiterated that the Axon Justice “was absolutely necessary” and his office was prepared Tuesday to answer any questions the council may have about it.
It was pointed out by Cates that Axon had nothing to do with Flock.
The council discussed tabling the one budget, and Voelz noted there was Flock contained in the Infraction Deferral Fund, another one of the prosecutor’s budgets.
Stockdale made a motion to table the prosecutor’s budget, which was approved 5-2 with Cates and Ciriello opposed. They also tabled the Infraction Deferral fund.
After going through the other Prosecutor’s Office budgets, Voelz asked about Axon Justice because he was really interested in moving that along. He asked if he had the council’s permission to continue the negotiations. Stockdale said if he moved forward “with or without the Flock camera piece of it,” then he would say yes.
Cates said the biggest concern was about the Flock cameras because they’ve been brought up by the public to Council members and they need to do their homework on it.
Voelz said in the county general budget, if he promised the Council that he would not buy a Flock camera through that line item in that budget for 2027, could he go ahead with the Axon Justice, and council members said yes.
Rhoades made a motion to approve the prosecutor’s office budget presentation in the county general as presented with the exception of the line item for equipment not be used to fund any Flock camera purchases without council approval. The motion passed.
Ciriello had Voelz put on the Sept. 10 council agenda for Flock camera discussion. Voelz said he would put together a panel.
