Salt Lake City Council weighs limits on license plate readers
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As Salt Lake City looks to expand its use of automatic license plate readers (ALPRs), the City Council is drafting rules governing how the technology can be used.
Why it matters: Residents and critics have raised concerns that ALPRs could infringe on privacy and allow data to be shared with federal agencies, including ICE.
Catch up quick: The City Council tabled the approval of a $224,000 federal grant for license plate readers in December after residents voiced concerns about expanding the technology. The council will consider the issue again next month.
State of play: ALPRs have been lauded by police departments as a public safety tool to help solve crime.
- Case in point: The technology was used last year to identify a man who was convicted of stalking former Mayor Erin Mendenhall, KSL reported.
How it works: Under a draft ordinance, license plate readers could only be used as part of an active criminal investigation, to apprehend a person with an outstanding warrant, locate a missing or endangered person or find a stolen vehicle.
- To avoid misuse, the police department would log all queries, conduct quarterly audits and post an annual compliance review on the city's website.
- Outside agencies seeking access to the data would have to sign an agreement with the city and follow the ordinance.
- The proposal would also prohibit facial recognition and targeting people who exercise their First Amendment rights.
What they're saying: Salt Lake City Council Chair Alejandro Puy tells Axios he hopes the draft ordinance will put guardrails in place.
- "The data needs to be well protected, and we have to have a good mechanism to audit and find misuse," Puy says, adding that the technology should only be used to assist with criminal investigations.
Zoom in: Matthew Tokson, a law professor at the University of Utah, who focuses on AI and criminal law, tells Axios there's been political pushback against extensive camera systems that track license plates around the U.S.
- "If you have enough ALPR cameras in a jurisdiction, you can really track where people go in their cars and maybe learn a lot about their lives," he says.
- Tokson says there have been instances of police officers using license plate readers to track their romantic partners and ICE agents using the technology to monitor protesters.
- How long data is retained is completely up to the government or municipality.
Zoom out: Since 2025, multiple U.S. cities have ended their contracts with license plate tracking companies after residents protested their use amid President Trump's mass deportations, NPR reported.
What we're watching: To prevent misuse, Tokson said, the city could track who accesses the system and why. It could also limit ALPRs to major roads and at entrances and exits to the city.
- If the city has too extensive of a surveillance system, it could be vulnerable to a Fourth Amendment challenge, Tokson says.
What's next: The City Council will hold a public hearing on the draft ordinance on Sept. 15, and vote on whether to approve the language on Sept. 22.