The controversial, high-tech recording devices all over Church Hill

Earlier this year, weird black poles with solar panels atop them began sprouting up around the neighborhood. You’ve probably seen them. They clearly aren’t telephone poles, and they’re uglier than Church Hill’s historic street lights. Look closely at one of these mysterious posts, and you’ll see a black, softball-sized nodule beneath the solar panel bearing the logo of Flock Safety, a technology firm that purports to “[e]mpower law enforcement agenc[ies] to solve crime faster” with cameras, microphones, and surveillance software.

Contracts obtained by The Lookout via public-records requests show the city has spent approximately $400,000 on this program so far.

The Richmond Police Department has described Flock’s devices as a “force multiplier;” Virginia civil-liberties advocates have warned they’re part of “a system of mass surveillance gives enormous opportunity for abuse of unimaginable scale.” According to Flock’s “transparency portal,” there are 97 of its cameras (known to boosters and critics alike as “automated license plate readers,” or ALPRs) operating in Richmond, though neither the company nor the cops will say how many there are in Church Hill, or where.

“We don't want to give [out] all those locations,” said RPD Chief Rick Edwards in a phone interview Thursday with The Lookout. He said there are “certainly some” of Flock’s “Falcons” (the try-hard name for its flagship ALPR model; all the products have corny bird names) in Church Hill, but declined to give a total. “You can see them, so they’re not hidden. You’ll see them when you drive by.”

You may see Flock’s cameras as you drive by, but they’ll definitely see you. Then they’ll upload footage of your vehicle and license plate into a database that law-enforcement officials can search without a warrant. You can see how this might be helpful for tracking down criminals; you can also see how it might be abused by police acting criminally.

Within the core neighborhood, the eight Flock devices I’ve been able to identify firsthand aren’t cameras. They appear to be “Ravens,” the mics the company markets for “AI-powered gunshot detection.” I’ve mapped them here. (Let me know if you find one I haven’t mapped yet, I’ll update periodically.)

It may not shock you to learn that this private-public surveillance-technology partnership is controversial. For one thing, Flock systems cost a lot of money. The Lookout FOIA’d for contracts indicating the city has spent some $395,250 on the company’s tech so far, a figure Edwards confirmed.

There’s also the matter of privacy, and how much of it you’re entitled to when moving around our neighborhood and across our city. In February 2023, 15 Virginia organizations across the political spectrum published an open letter calling on the General Assembly to oppose bills expanding ALPR use in the Commonwealth, likening the technology to something out of 1984 or Minority Report and voicing skepticism towards “the long-term intentions of Flock Safety and other private companies who have solicited lawmakers in our great Commonwealth to build an expansive and seamless system of surveillance countrywide.”

Flock’s vice-president of external communications, Josh Thomas, did not respond to a request for comment on these criticisms. Seventh District Councilmember Cynthia Newbille did not respond to multiple requests for comment on the proliferation of Flock devices in Church Hill.

Several Virginia lawsuits are winding their way through the courts challenging Flock’s presence in communities. During the same week in October 2024, for example, a federal judge ruled RPD’s use of ALPRs did not violate Fourth Amendment privacy rights, while two Norfolk residents filed another suit challenging that city’s use of Flock’s technology. “This type of intrusive, ongoing monitoring of someone’s life is not just creepy, it’s unconstitutional,” lawyers for those plaintiffs argued in a release reported by The Richmonder.

RPD’s Edwards acknowledged the civil-liberties concerns about Flock’s ALPRs. “We have to balance that need for privacy that our community deserves with the real need of keeping folks safe and policing in a fair and specific way,” he told The Lookout, noting that when legislators in the General Assembly created “the rules of the road” for the use of Flock devices (which they’ve as yet failed to do), the department would adhere to them.

Edwards emphasized that the mics you may have seen around Church Hill are different from the cameras, and only designed to clock gunshots, not to listen in on the conversations of passers-by. “I think most people say, ‘Hey, if there's gunfire, the police should know about that,’” he said.

That may be. But whether Flock’s devices can actually do what the company claims is an open question. Scholars and activists across the country analyzing police departments’ own data from the mics have found cases across the country where the devices operate “well below their advertised accuracy rates,” as WIRED reported it in June 2025. Like, as low as 8% accurate in Champaign, Illinois, and 50% in San Jose, California. (Flock told the magazine its claim of 90% accuracy pertains to Raven systems “across the board,” i.e. averaged from its national customer base.)

A study in January 2024 found the impact of gunshot detection systems from Flock’s main competitor, ShotSpotter (which Virginia Commonwealth University uses) was marginal on both the frequency of gun-related crimes and how often police were able to solve them. In fairness, the study did allow that “[l]ess restrictive statistical models found some evidence of crime reduction in Richmond,” and that police here using the system showed improvements in shell recovery that “achieved statistical significance.” Which is better than nothing, if not transformative.

Edwards believes Flock’s mics have improved RPD’s response times to potential shootings and given them tighter perimeters to search when they arrive to them, all while the force remains understaffed. In his view, Flock is responsible for at least “a piece of” the city’s double-digit reductions in homicides and non-fatal shootings over the past two years.

Flock’s weird poles are pretty sturdy (I tested a few of them), but RPD’s chief insisted that the two-year program is anything but permanent. “That’s why we didn’t enter into a long contract,” he said. “We'll evaluate it over two years, and if it doesn't make sense, we won't enter into another contract and we won't expand the program.”

So keep an eye out for Flock on your block, neighbors, and start thinking about whether you want it to stay there.

Correction 12/9/24: A previous version of this story incorrectly named the city in Illinois where activists found Flock’s microphones were only 8% accurate. It is Champaign, IL. The Lookout regrets the error.

🚗 South of Broad has been humped

The Lookout counted four new speed humps south of East Broad Street this week, at the following locations:

• E. Franklin St. at N. 28th St.

• E. Franklin St. between N. 26th and N. 27th Sts.

• E. Grace at N. 23rd St.

• E. Grace at N. 24th St

It’s the considered editorial opinion of this here newsletter that more hard infrastructure to slow down stop-sign scofflaws and reckless speeders is The Good Shit™️. Would I have preferred protected bike lanes, curb bump-outs, and expanded sidewalks to provide safer multimodal transit access to Libby Hill Park and Bellevue Elementary School? Of course. But I won’t look a gift horse in the mouth, and if these speed humps had mouths, I wouldn’t look in them either.

I snapped the above photo of the E. Franklin/N. 28th hump on Tuesday morning; by Friday morning, none had yet been striped. Could be that the Richmond Department of Public Works plans to turn the nondescript mounds of asphalt at the intersections listed above (minus the mid-block placement on E. Franklin) into proper raised crosswalks, given their placement. Dare to dream. I wasn’t able to locate any plans outlining the work on a cursory search, so if you know where to find them, or have spotted other recently added humpage in the neighborhood, get in touch: [email protected].

📜 Possum Poetry

Possum Poetry is original verse written exclusively for The Lookout by Penelope Poubelle, the Lookout’s litter critter-at-large. If you spot roadside trash you’d like her to immortalize in doggerel, email a photo to [email protected]. All submissions anonymous!

🕯️ Church Hill is will be lit

Did you know the Ebenezer Scrooge-style hand-held candleholder thing is called a “chamberstick”? I did not until 30 seconds before writing this sentence. I do know that you don’t need one of those to feel the holiday spirit at the annual Church Hill Association Candlelight Walk. To wit: I attended last year with my wife, and we had a wonderful time with nary a chamberstick between us.

The walk is free to all and charming as hell, what with the candles and bagpipes and good cheer. I’m grateful to the CHA (in which, full disclosure, I’m a dues-paying member) for putting it on. If you’re around tonight, you should join! Basic details above, more info here.

📸 A Very CHill Photo

Want to share your Very CHill Photo from the neighborhood? Email it to [email protected] with your name as you’d like it to appear for publication, and the camera you shot it on.