Number Of City-Leased Automated License Plate Readers In Lake Forest To Double

LAKE FOREST, IL — Local police are touting the effectiveness of automated license reader technology as they prepare to roll out more cameras around Lake Forest.

The license plate cameras, known as LPRs or ALPRs, capture images of the rear license plates to record the time and location of a vehicle.

Lake Forest and several other North Shore jurisdictions — including Highland Park, Winnetka, Glencoe, Northfield, Wilmette, Skokie and Evanston — are among the approximately 250 Illinois law enforcement agencies that use ALPRs operated by Atlanta-based Flock Safety.

Plate readers can then trigger an alert to police if a car or person linked to a particular license is wanted in connection with a crime — or, as in the case of a registered sex offender's plate detected near a school, even provide police with evidence of a crime.

Sgt. Philip Gualdoni heads up Flock camera implementation for the Lake Forest Police Department. According to city officials, he has helped "several" local homeowners associations to invest in Flock cameras for their subdivisions that can share data with the police department.

“In addition to its primary objective of preventing crime," Gualdoni said in a statement, "the technology has also helped foster partnerships between the police department and Lake Forest Homeowners Associations."

Last July, the Lake Forest City Council signed on to a five-year contract with Flock for nearly $120,000.

Police Chief Karl Waldorf said the leased cameras cost $2,500 per camera, per year, once installed.

"Over the past three years, several homeowners’ associations in Lake Forest have privately purchased LPR cameras from Flock Safety," Cmdr. Kevin Zelk said in a memo to aldermen at the time. "Almost immediately, these cameras began providing useful information that has helped the Police Department investigate crimes."

City staff said this week there are currently five city-leased Flock cameras in place around Lake Forest. Another five are due to arrive in the coming months, according to staff.

Waldorf told Patch the delays are due to the need for Illinois Department of Transportation permits.

The first ALPRs in town were leased by the Academy Woods subdivision and the homeowners association on Knollwood Road in 2022, with several other neighborhoods joining on since then, the chief said.

Flock cameras keep the plate records for 30 days unless they trigger an alert, police have said. They do not record images from inside vehicles, unlike cameras on the interstate or city streets for assessing tolls and traffic tickets.

Last month, a study authored by Flock Safety staff with oversight and validation from professors at Texas Christian University and the University of Texas at Tyler analyzed data from a representative sample of 123 of Flock's more than 4,000 client agencies.

“Not only is Flock Safety actively supporting independent inquiry but has also been fully transparent and accessible during every stage of the research process," Johnny Nhan, professor of criminology and criminal justice and associate dean of graduate studies at Texas Christian, said in a statement. "As a researcher who is scrutinizing this technology and its real-world usage, I have been impressed by the company’s academic approach that fully supports the peer-review process."

The white paper suggested a positive effect of Flock technologies on clearance rates, which warrants further examination looking at specific crime types and statistical comparisons, according to the authors.

"This study was intended as an initial exploration into a gap in our current understanding of ALPR technology’s use by and efficacy for law enforcement," it said.

The January 2024 paper, "Flock Safety Technologies in Law Enforcement: An Initial Evaluation of Effectiveness in Aiding Police in Real-World Crime Clearance," also notes methodological issues — like the fact the offense of motor vehicle theft is not officially "cleared" unless someone is arrested, so when ALPRs lead police to an abandoned stolen car, it will not improve the clearance rate.

"There is also a significant underlying causal inference to be tested in light of our findings: having established how much crime has been solved with the assistance of ALPR devices at 18 these agencies," it said, "it must be established that these are crimes that otherwise would have remained unsolved in the first place."