City Council - Regular Meeting

See, I'm still a little bit.

Okay.

6 o'clock we will call our workshop to order.

BELIEVE IT OR NOT, WE DO HAVE SOME THINGS TO DO THAT ARE NOT ABOUT FLAT CAMPUS. SO LET'S KNOCK THOSE OUT AND THEN WE WILL GO THE OTHER DIRECTION. FIRST THING, ANYBODY HAVE ANY COMMENTS ON THE MINUTES FROM PREVIOUS MEETING, AT THE SPECIAL MEETING? we have been given the grant for the u.s department of transportation safe streets and uh it's about a 12 million dollar grant we have five years to use the money we have to pay 20 of it craig's gonna give us the big nuts and bolts but it's kind of been dialed back i'll let him talk about that so in about this time two years ago we were notified that we had been uh

awarded in a safe streets for all or ss4a implementation grant a total amount of 12 million ninety one thousand seven hundred thirty dollars required the amount of the grant federal funding is nine million six hundred seventy three three eighty four the city's match is up to two point two million four hundred eighteen thousand three hundred forty six typically the once the grants awarded there's agreements or back and forth looking at the application you know honing the scope of the grant and all that that normally takes about 11 months it took two years this time because we changed presidential administrations when the new administration came in they basically hit the brakes on all grants and so they just stopped we'd already started the process all the people we dealt with got sent away cut the federal highway administration's staffing by about 60 it's my understanding so finally about the beginning of this year things settled down and we started the process of working with them and kimley horn who if you remember we all retained to assist us with that worked on it one of the things they did do in that is they narrowed down the scope of the grant somewhat the original grant had four four basic components one was street signs another was street lighting Another was highway delineation. rumble strips, speed limit signs, interactive speed limit signs, things like that. And the final part was a safe routes to school pilot study, which would look at the roads and pedestrian traffic and everything around all of the schools here in Robinson. During the negotiations back and forth, the Highway Administration came back and basically on the street signs and the street lighting, they narrowed the focus down to the areas back up a little bit when the grant was first applied for there was a um a safety study that was completed by the mpo that uh looked at traffic accidents on major thoroughbred collectors and things in the city which kind of became the foundation for the grant identified traffic accidents in different locations of the city so that kind of Well, during the negotiation, they came back and says, well, we're not going to let you do streetlights citywide or signs citywide. They're going to have to be focused on these traffic corridors. So they've narrowed it down those corridors. Based on that, I don't anticipate we will expend the full grant amount. We're not required to expend it. But they will hone in and limit some of what we can spend it on. But the parts are still in there. It does basically limit any of the work. And I'll get down to that.

What are those corridors that they're talking about?

That's what I was getting at. So it's West Moonlight Drive from Shaper Road to U.S. 77. Old Robinson Road from State Highway 6 to U.S. 77. Robinson Drive from State Highway 6 to Lux Drive, Peplow Drive from North Robinson Road to 77 and Tate Avenue from South Old Robinson Road to South Andrews Drive. And again, that was based on the traffic study and everything that was done by the MPO where they were looking at traffic accident numbers and traffic numbers and everything over about a six, seven year period. And so that's what they honed it in on. Um, so there is the, there is a street inventory or streetlight inventory where basically. will go out select an engineering firm they'll come out they'll study see if we have adequate and make recommendations where we can approve that lightning there'll be a city-wide it's a city-wide sign inventory but it's really against to those make sure that the signs that are there are adequate that they have proper reflectivity and if not identify them there is also a component there to try to put the sign especially like on West Moonlight where you're going from 60 down to 50 to potentially put the interactive signs where it shows you your speed that you're going and things like that. And then the street light, it will be the street light installation, so the lights that's located and identify where we need more lighting, it will include that. Same thing with the signage. And then the last thing, as far as that part of it, is the sign upgrade, pavement delineation, rumble stripe, and speed feedback signs. One of the things we have talked about is we have several intersections, Moonlight, Lindale, Peplow, where we have that center suicide lane, New England 2, where we have the center suicide lane. And those of us that use those roads, if more than once you're coming up to make a left turn and somebody's coming at you across the intersection head on because they're wanting to make a left turn on the other side. So one of the things that we'll look at, we'll have to work with tests on that, is whether or not we can put raised medians in those areas to restrict so that people... have to get past that left turn lane before they can get into that center lane. There's not enough funding to do at the entire length, but we at least want to look at those four intersections especially. We tend to have issues there. And then, of course, the last component is the Safe Routes to School Study, and that will basically extend to half a mile around Robinson High, Robinson Junior High, Robinson Intermediate, Robinson Elementary, and Robinson Primary School. So this is the final step as far as the agreement. If you authorize me to sign it, I'll sign it. The five-year clock will start running. I do have an RFQ that I got from the MPO yesterday that I'll be updating to put out for design engineers. Design is included in this, but we do have to go out after the agreement is made. We have to then go out and select the engineering firm. So we'll have to go through that process, and we'll get the ball rolling on this. Questions?

So on our 20% match, we just passed our budget, so we're probably looking at 27, 28 for matching?

I mean, we have to match as we go, but so we can use the budget, we can use fund balance, and we can also use street bond funds. When we did issue the street bonds, we did include wording in that to cover some of this, especially the delineation, some of the things to improve roadway safety. so you know we have matching sources available but i would expect that most of the first year is going to be inventory and i mean the rfq process is probably going to take 60 to 90 days because we have to publish it for a certain period of time and then each engineering firm has to submit their credentials and we have to review it and interview them and make a selection and we have to negotiate with them and then bring them to you all for approval so So that will take some time. And then the inventories will have to happen before they can even start to do any kind of design. And then there are some things they've got to coordinate. They have to do their requirements, TxDOT requires that we're going to do any work there, some of it's environmental, some of it's highway impact stuff. So all that will have to be coordinated. But that's all funded through the grant. The next stop's aware that we have the grant.

You know, I exchanged some texts about striking on seventy-seven on the current project, but you mentioned that this might be able to.

so the the 2023 ss4a grant that was obtained by the mpo had five or six demonstration projects one of the demonstration projects is the intersection there at highway 6 loop 340 and 77 not just for that turn lane but one of the problems we have is people make that turn and then they immediately shoot four lanes with five lanes across the highway to san benito and things and so we that's a serious accident area right there.

And they wait until there's no traffic coming and they just shoot over. And they do a stop.

Basically, it stops some traffic right there. There's a separate engineering firm and they're working on a proposal. I think they're waiting for this project that's currently undergoing the pavement replacement before they move forward. And again, it's a demonstration. It's not meant to be permanent, but I think that's kind of Is this a potential solution that can then be installed? And if it is, then that's something we may be able to do with this funding, unless TxDOT's willing to do it.

Is this one that 23 also include the clover leaves onto 70? No.

No, the clover leaves are in the MTP, the 2050 MTP. Okay.

So we've got 24 years to go.

It takes that plan 25 years in advance. But the problem is for years Robinson was not involved with the MPO, so none of our projects were on the map. We now have about five different projects on the map. I was on the MTP steering committee this last year, so we got four or five Robinson projects on there, which also includes converting 77 from a – rural highway section to an urban where it would turn everything from the north city limit down to moonlight would become a curb and gutter, median in the center, sidewalks, the whole thing. It originally planned a date. Did they reschedule with you on the MPO presentation on the business 77 corridor? They were going to come and make a presentation and they changed their date. They reached out to you, the MPO? So they haven't changed or updated it? know there was they had a tentative date and then they reached out and said we want to change that date but david harrell is actually on that group that's working on that but that that's a whole separate thing that's definitely something that this will address here that's more driving development future along the highway

So you anticipate that this grant will help us on the current street plans that we have going forward.

Could that save us some money? The whole thing is designed to improve safety in these areas identified in the rebuilding some roads.

So would this help us in the rebuilding of these roads to Or the reconstruction we're doing.

Yeah. So we're reclaiming or repaving some of these roads, but this is more designed to the safety side of it.

So it's not really going to save us any money on our projects. As far as lighting is concerned, there's a lot of unlit areas.

Well, again, the lighting will only pertain to the areas. So everything, there's an attachment A in the grant that's there, and it lists each component and which areas on it. And like I said, the original grant was intended to cover a much larger scope, but administrations changed and the new administration really tightened down. In fact, there was a period of time we really expected we were going to lose it. They were just going to pull it all back, but they ended up not doing that. They did pull a lot of various grants that had already been awarded back, but they did not pull back the assets for it. But this is something you really think our city needs, then? Yeah, I mean, these are areas where we see significant highway issues in there. And the thing is, some of them are TxDOT roadways, but TxDOT is not going to spend the funds to do it. Right. We're the ones, our police department are the ones that are out there working the accidents, and our residents and our people coming to a business here are the ones that are having those accidents. Thank you.

Any other questions? No. Everybody in agreement because we're going to put this on the consent? Yes. Okay. Next, we have a... change order for the water treatment plant yard piping uh you want that or is that greg and the engineers i can start on it it's all greg's fault not this greg greg hobbs yeah we we briefed you all earlier in the year about our algae issue

in our Reservoir 1A, and it's not gotten any better, and it's created challenges with the project. And so we've run into having to make some changes. We've also lost a pump, and even though we have new pumps going, they're months away, and we're having to rent a temporary pump to have backup and things. So all these adjustments we're having to make to work around and reorder the project is pushing some costs up. So that's why this change order is here. It is pushing above the original contract part. Greg is here. Get into the weeds.

Does anybody want to get in the weeds? Or into the algae?

Yeah. I mean, just so one of the components is actually separate. We'll talk about that next. But we had to make some alterations to the intake structure. Part of that was we're going to change the backwash system. They came up, I think, with a more efficient way to do it. But we had to make some changes in there so we could drain water back. down times, but also if we need to hook this temporary pump up that we're going to rent to have on site in case we lose our current. Because if we lose our current pump, we're in a lot of trouble because we're right now drawn straight into the river to tree. And then there's a lot of costs being driven by the algae. Just we've had to resequence the project and do some of those things. So that's what's there. But they're all here if you have any questions about any specifics.

Anybody else have any questions? Everybody good with the change order? Okay. Then, like you said, there's a second component of this, of funding two of these Sonic Pure Pulsar ultrasonic systems. So let me tell you, let him tell you what they are.

You want to kind of describe what the Sonic Pure stuff is?

Yeah, we went into an agreement to rent a couple of them for six months to give them a trial and see how they work out for us. But they float on top of the reservoir, and they have a solar panel that keeps them generating. They send out the high-frequency pulse into the water, and it's supposed to kill the algae. So we were in such desperate need at the time. We were trying anything just to get the ball rolling and try to get the algae cleaned out. But we're hoping it may be a long-term solution to prevent future algae blooms from occurring.

Right now, we're doing it on a trial basis, you're saying.

It's a rented deal for six months. At the end of the six months, you can return them or you can purchase them.

I noticed you get 50% of the rental fee back. So we don't know enough about it to make a decision. It would be nice to save $8,000. You know what I'm saying? If we're going to buy them anyway, because we're only going to get half of that. So it would be about $7,650 is what I saw. So should we consider buying them rather than renting them?

The rental agreement was for six months. You would have had to have gone into it from the start with purchasing them. But we signed a six-month rental agreement. All right.

How long will it be in use then?

Probably three months in, I'd say.

What's your pro, con? Still don't know? What do you think?

Well, I've had some conversations with some algaecide people who usually they're opposed to that kind of stuff because they want to make a living with their own application, but they've heard good things about it, so they're even right.

I mean, what are you saying?

Well, the algae itself seems to be reducing because it's not clogging our clarifiers anymore. Okay, well, that's...

Do we have to purchase more for additional reservoir?

If it works out, we're going to need to look into putting two on the 1B, yes.

We've also even talked about potentially putting fountains on each one to keep the area better and keep some of the algae under control.

Typically, you just put it around your intake and try to keep that area algae as free as possible.

Thank you, Greg.

Any other questions? Once again, everybody okay? Yes. Okay, so that will make life easier. All of those things will be on the consent agenda. And the only thing for our regular agenda will be the slot cameras. We got about five minutes. before we need to adjourn and have time for everybody to turn in their cards and let everybody else come in before we start a regular meeting. So in that five minutes. Today there was confirmation that there is no more grants.

License plate readers.

License plate readers. Yeah, the term is license plate readers. Let's not call it license plate readers.

I understand that's any license plate readers, right? Yeah, so not just flog any brand. It cannot be used for widespread readers anymore.

So that conference call today finally came because when he and I met this afternoon, we still hadn't, there was a statement made, but there wasn't anything official yet. So that has become official. Does anybody have anything they want to say here at the table? about this before we adjourn and go up everybody will have an opportunity to speak i'm gonna let everybody out here they came they took the time to come we're gonna love to speak and then when it comes time before we vote everybody all of y'all will have the chance to speak as well if you would like but is there anything you'd like in the five minutes i got sitting here it's up to you i'm five minutes or more so you can defer it's okay Okay. Anybody else at the table? Okay.

I just did like a, I contacted probably over 207 people and did like my own little pro-con list. So I was going to go over that when we have our meetings. That's fine.

You'll have time just like the public will have time. All right. All right. If nothing else, we're going to adjourn until 6.30. And those of you in the audience that want to speak and haven't turned in the card or gotten the blue card, please do so and hand it to the lady back here in the corner. Make me laugh or get started. All right, it is 6.30. We will call our meeting to order. We have a quorum, and we are very thankful to have our friend Jerry Freeman with us tonight. So if everybody will stand, we're going to open the invocation.

That's great. Father, as we come to this place tonight, I know that there are things in our minds and our hearts Father, sometimes those things are very personal. Friends who are ill, friends who are having surgery. Father, we ask that in those instances that you will be at work in those situations. Father, for those who are going through times of illness, times of surgery, times of recuperation, recovery, we ask, Father, your hand upon them. Father, we always have in mind our schools, our first responders, our teachers. We ask, Father, your continued blessing upon these. We pray, Father, that these who give so much of their lives, so much of themselves, we ask, Father, that you will especially pour out your blessing upon them. Father, for this city council, we pray for your wisdom. We ask, Father, for you to give guidance in a way that is best for the entire community, not just for personal whims or anything like that. Father, move them, direct them to look at what is best for you, best for this entire community, for all of us, Lord God. The issues, the struggles that we have, we lay before you. We ask, Father, for you to be at work in our lives, through our lives, as we give ourselves fully and completely to you. Thank you for who you are, for the work that you're doing in each of us even now. In Jesus' name.

The City Council invites citizens to address the council in any manner including items on the agenda except public hearings.

We don't have any public hearings tonight, so I'm going to skip that.

THE COUNCIL IS NOT PERMITTED TO TAKE ANY ACTION OR DISCUSS ANY ITEM THAT IS NOT LISTED ON OUR AGENDA. WHEN YOU SPEAK, PLEASE STATE YOUR NAME AND ADDRESS BEFORE BEGINNING YOUR COMMENTS. IS THERE ANYBODY HERE THAT HAS ANY COMMENTS NOT PERTAINING TO THE FLOT CAMERA? OKAY. WE WILL MOVE ON. THE CONSENT AGENDA. WE HAVE THREE ITEMS ON THE CONSENT AGENDA. approve the minutes from july 29 2026 and august 18 2026 approve the u.s department of transportation 2024 safe streets for all grants the sf4a authorize the city manager to sign the agreement we need to approve the change order number two for the water treatment plant yard piping Increasing the cost of the contract with bars from six million one of nine to thirty nine to six million three fifty two five oh five and thirty three cents and approve the funding of two sonic pure pulse are also done ultrasonic system I Make a motion that we approve the consent agenda a second all favor aye we're here tonight to take action on authorizing the city manager to sign a 26 27 motor vehicle crime prevention authority mvc pa grant award letter entering into a one-year agreement with flock safety to continue the city's automated license plate reader as i said in the beginning there are no more grant funds so um take that into consideration since everyone is here I want everybody to have the opportunity to still speak. You took the time to come. Everybody up here is going to get an opportunity to say something. Y'all are all going to get the opportunity to say something. I'll be as lenient as possible on your three minutes, but let's respect the fact that we got a lot of people to talk. And everybody's got families that want to get home, and we want to move on to something else. Be mindful. There are TV cameras in here. We've all seen what happens. So be as personal and as... what i want to say there be as passionate as you want to be okay okay be as passionate as you want to be you tell it you tell what you want to say we're all here to listen and we're all here to be respectful okay just like last time all right so with that i am going to uh i'm just going to pull i'm i know who's going last so um is this brent mccain yes sir you're uh you get to go

all right good evening my name is brent mccain i reside in bruce valetti um i'm here about the flock camera so flock cameras are not ordinary security cameras They photograph every passing vehicle, they read the plate, store where your car's been, and a searchable database. No warrant, no suspicion required. Across the Waco area, more than 40 of these cameras have gone up since 2024. And this year, the state's plate reader network grew from about 120 agencies to more than 200 in just six months. That is a map of where you are. your family and your neighbors go. It's built quietly and it's kept. So here's why that should worry us. The only thing standing between legitimate police work and personal stalking is a single text box where an officer types the reason. Nationwide, the Washington Post has documented at least 50 cases of officers caught using these cameras to track ex-partners and women they wanted to follow. And this is not far away in temple recently an officer was. Suspended and I've heard he was fired and there's a. Texas range investigation the audit work that time. But only after the search had already happened, then there's the security independent researchers took control of a flock camera in about 30 seconds. Others found more than 60 flock cameras streaming live to the open internet with no password at all, including footage of children at a playground. A flock does not even require police to use basic two-step login or authentication and stolen flock passwords have shown up for sale on foreign cyber crime forums two members of congress have asked the federal trade commission to investigate now and then texas dps found that flock itself broke the law operating in the state for years without the private license texas requires and the company was fined for it Evidence gathered while they were unlicensed may not even be held up in court. So I'm asking this council to do the right thing. Do not adopt or renew the FLOC contract, require a warrant or a documented case number for every single search with mandatory monthly audits, and demand a short data retention limit with no sharing to federal or out-of-state agencies. Dozens of cities have already canceled. We should think hard before we trust this system with our neighbors' movements. Thank you very much.

Good evening. I'm RJ Pace. I live at 3200 Sherco Road, which is in Waco. But let me make one thing clear. As a side hustle, because who doesn't have one these days in this economy, I do food deliveries. So Robinson residents love their food, too. So I'm subject to drive in this town. Also, let's be clear. Some things you do as a council does not just magically affect Robinson residents only. It affects anyone who passes through, whether it's once or many times, like in my case. If you recall, I spoke in front of you a few weeks ago. I know you remember, right? Of course. Here's a quick refresher since the meeting wasn't recorded. Correlation does not imply causation. Decrease in crime doesn't mean it was caused by the increase in camera usage. There was the article I pointed out about using cameras to cut catch trucks using roads that weren't supposed to. They weren't supposed to be on AKA the textbook definition of mission creep. You start with the intended purpose and then expand to what should be just regular police work. We've seen the abuse and like this gentleman before me said, it's already coming out of temple with an officer resigning. It's getting closer and closer to this area. That's the slippery slope. We must be careful to avoid spike. Cohen said this on Facebook and I agree. Almost everyone is against flock now. But if we don't abolish them soon, in a few years, most people won't care. Generation later, they'll think we'd have total chaos without them. So the time to end them is now. Tonight, you have a very important decision to make that affects... You have an important decision to make that affects Robinson residents and those of us in the greater Waco area who traverse your roads. I believe you see the right way to move about this. To those of you who are here that are our Robinson residents, more importantly voters, watch their vote tonight. I strongly encourage that if any of you decide to continue infringing on our privacy rights, get your name on the ballot and challenge them. Because at the end of the day, the Council doesn't work for police, city manager, or any staff. They work for the people. You said to be respectful. I already had this typed up. I end by saying this. If you decide to move forward with this contract, you should hang your heads in shame with your tails tucked between your legs. Remember who you represent. Think of them and outsiders like me. Thank you. God bless.

Next is Amanda Murphy.

Hello. My name is Amanda Murphy. I live at 1220 Kempner Park. And I'm not here to convince you guys today anything about flock. I've already emailed you each individually. I'm here to talk to the people of our town that are interested in getting rid of flock. we have created a petition a group of citizens and myself if you are interested in creating an ordinance to get flock and other alprs because other ones are coming up behind them like accent i'm sure you guys have all heard of them let's stop it now and it tracks we need 800 signatures you have friends that want to sign we want that signature that's it ben i'm not going to try your last name

Hello, everyone. I'm Ben Dieffenbach. I live at 222 Kettler Drive.

Some of you may have seen the email I sent earlier, so I just wanted to put that on the record.

And so at the last meeting, a couple members of the council said something to the effect that, you know, I have nothing to hide. And I wanted to point out that privacy is not about what you have to hide. It's about the information that other people can use for and against you. Everyone creates valuable information based on where they go, who they're with, their lifestyle, health choices, political, religious affiliation, and countless other topics every day. Every piece of information in isolation may seem harmless, but modern technology can process thousands of data points and then build a profile to allow outside forces to try and influence and control your life for their own gain. Of course, there are many devices we use every day that probably infringe on our rights a lot more than you would get with these license plate reading cameras, and those are bad, but just because one thing is bad doesn't mean we should allow another abuse to pile on top of that. I appreciate the information that was provided last week by the local police force and how trustworthy they have been in using the system so far, and it doesn't seem like we've had any abuses like have been reported in other places. But I worry that it's just a matter of time before there is a breach. Even the most morally outstanding person can have a bad day, make mistakes, and give in to temptation. The FLAC system is materially different from an officer with probable cause and a warrant following a suspect and documenting their activities. It's active 24-7, 365, watching everyone indiscriminately. In our system, we treat everyone as innocent until proven guilty, but this system effectively treats us all as guilty, and it's just a matter of finding the right keyword to prove that someone has made a violation about something. I want to remind everyone that laws are constantly changing, and what is lawful today could always change tomorrow. And the trustworthy people we have with access to these tools today may not be the same ones that have access tomorrow. And for these reasons, I believe that it is not in our best interest to continue using the system, and I hope you'll take that into consideration. Thank you.

Thank you. Brent Doty.

My home is at 620 Potomac Park. The use of automated license plate readers needs to end. At some point, we've got to respect the privacy of the law-abiding citizen. Government surveillance has to have limits. Now, I realize some may say that on occasion, use of the system may help apprehend a criminal. But quite frankly, that's inadequate justification. If we're going to use that as justification, why not take it a step further? Why not just put a tracking device in every vehicle? Monitor everybody 24-7. That would be even better for apprehending criminals. Even better. Just put a tracking device in every person. That'd really be good for it. And some are going to say, oh, that's ridiculous. That's too far out. That won't happen. Well, folks, I'm here to tell you, it wasn't that long ago that the use of an AOPR was considered outlandish and would never happen. We're on a slippery slope. We need to respect people's privacy. And we need to do the right thing, follow Governor Abbott's lead, and turn back. And if I could, Greg, I'd like to break with standard protocol for just a second.

Sure.

I'd like to offer up a compliment instead of a complaint. I intended to do this at the last budget meeting. I had to leave after the workshop. Couldn't do it. Greg, I thought you did a fine job with budget.

Thank you.

It's well done. So thank you for your time. Thank you.

My name is Cody Fielder.

I live at 1688 West Tate.

Um, I'm involved in cyber security. That's what I do. It's what I study. It's what I care about. Uh, and while I'm aware that and forgive me, because I only found out about this meeting about 15 minutes ago, so I'm really not that prepared while I'm aware that most people don't have much of an in depth knowledge of cyber security. It's something that affects all of us. um flock cameras are something that really infringe not only on our privacy but our ability to stay safe i have a daughter that's about to turn 15 and here in a few months she'll be driving and i'm worried that when she gets on the road as many problems as we've had with officers all across the state of using these cameras i'm not going to feel safe getting her a license getting her a car letting her drive around Aside from that, Benjamin Franklin said, those that would trade liberty for safety deserve neither. Now, Shaytree versus the United States, the court determined that even short-term surveillance counts as a search, violating our rights to warrantless searches and seizures. Meaning that even brief flock increase should legally require a warrant. However, as we all know right now, any officer can enter anything into a query with any justification, even if it's a comma or a period and get back any number of results. Carpenter v, United States says the police cannot bypass warrant requirements simply by pulling historical data. From 3rd party corporate databases. In this case, that's flock as a 3rd party corporate database that even if we discontinue the use of flock today. They are still giving our personal information to 3rd party organizations, such as insurance companies, out of state organizations and police departments. We saw this happen in 1.6Million queries and I believe it was a 30 day period. Griswold v, Connecticut. establishes that the Ninth Amendment grants us the right to privacy. That's been something a lot of people have argued about lately because nowhere in the Constitution of the Bill of Rights does it use the word privacy. However, this court case established that we do have the right to privacy, even though it is not specifically enumerated in the other constitutional amendments. Flock kind of violates that right, doesn't it? Onto vulnerabilities. This year, Flock was found to have five of the OWASP top 10 critical vulnerabilities. For those of you that don't know, I'm assuming as most of you, OWASP is the world's authority on the most critical vulnerabilities in cybersecurity that we have right now. And Flock cameras were found to have five of them, among 50 other critical security vulnerabilities. These include hard-coded Java key score passwords, Devices that ship without secure boot mode. DIP switches that enter device in a local diagnostic mode, which is not password protected. Diagnostic mode that provides root access to backend servers, where anybody with the know-how and about five minutes and $20 worth of hardware can get access to any data that Fog has on those servers. Custom firmware. can be easily installed through open USB 3.0 ports in the back of the hardware. And you can see those, if you look close enough, just driving down tape. Devices that are running outdated, non-updated Linux kernels. PCAP catchers that are unencrypted. This is wireless traffic going through the air that is captured and it's unencrypted. Anybody can execute remote code or DOS attacks on any of these devices. And most of these devices have been found to be included in specialized IoT search engines. These are search engines that specifically look for devices such as your cell phone, your fridge, if you have a smart fridge, that can be found on search engines. And in some cases, such as the flock cameras, you can actually view that live feed, even though flock tells us that it's still images only, multiple, Whistleblowers that flock if came forward and said, no, that's not true. We have live feeds. We can access them. Uh, other people can access them. So we know. Every bit of this is open on the Internet. Anybody can get all of it. Not just the police department, and I'd like to say that the police department is least of our worries, but I doubt it. I would hope that. with all the information and as much public pushback as the council has gotten on this topic, um, that the council would vote to end the contract and not, not renew the contract with flock. Uh, that is best case scenario. Um, if that's not what happens, like miss Murphy said, there's a couple of us walking around with these blue folders and we're willing to take signatures and we're still going to, regardless of how you vote. So that's all I've got to say.

Okay, is there anybody in the room that did not fill out a card that decided they want to speak before I call on the last person? All right, Rick, you're up.

My name is Rick Mooney. I live at 601 Lux Drive here in Robinson. Gentlemen, you all know my position on this, okay? We're not going to reiterate what we talked about the other day. The only thing I do want to... make known is that I think an ordinance concerning LPR or any kind of data tracking needs to have an ordinance put in place here in Robinson before we go with another lpr or any kind of any kind of community data that's that's picked up here so that's all i got okay i'm looking out for what's best for robinson don't care about it i don't care about temple i don't care about about waco okay they're our neighbors they need to they need to tend to their own fence okay okay um

At this time, I'm going to give all the council members an opportunity to speak. And since I have the gavel, I'm going to go last. And for no other reason than there's only two of y'all and there's a bunch of them, I'm going to start left. And we're going to go that way. Okay? So, Finn, you're up.

I'm going to stand up. Okay, hello, my name's Donnie Finn, place six. You know that the home plate readers are a big concern, and you know what's a big concern? We have AOC, Bernie Sanders, Ron Sedances, DeSantis, and Abbott all on the same side, and they all agree on it. So, you know, that's a big thing. I decided to do some collaborative work on my own concerning this topic with my vote coming about using a tool I've used when making decisions that affect my constituents and stakeholders of our fine town. I used this a lot when I was a high school principal and assistant superintendent, and I made a pro-con list. So I called over 200-some people, and I gave them the questions. I did a pro-con list. I asked several Robson residents about their opinion of the license plate readers. I asked, do you want Robson to keep these license plate readers? Two, give me a reasoning for this choice. And three, share a real-life personal example of how it affected you or someone you know. So you can, all the stuff you read online, you know, there's got to be. First, I'm going to do the cons first. First, the cons. Almost everyone mentioned evasion of privacy. There are zero examples of how it personally affected them or someone they know. Every example is from a news feed or a hearsay from places like Atlanta, Ohio, Pflugerville, Florida, New Jersey, and Arizona. The topic, AI and license plate readers, or flaw cameras, was even a front page story on the USA Today, Dallas Morning News, Austin American Statesman yesterday, and today, the front page of the Waco Trib, and even this morning on the Today Show on ABC. My wife watches that every morning. They had a thing on there about flaw cameras. Some people have concerns that the police department would misuse those cameras and sell information to others that was agreed to when the cameras and agreements were signed. I feel these views are based on new feeds and what is happening in other places across the country. First, I want to say I have a 100% confidence in our Chief of Police, Adams, and Lieutenant Chief Graves, that the entire police department can believe this nonsense. It's a non-issue, and shame on those that would even try to compare our department with anybody else in this country. So that kind of got me riled up a little bit. Now the pros. Most people did not care that they were there and basically said it was just a sign of the times. And we're being watched everywhere we go anyway. Some mention whatever Robson can do to make our town safer and that catching the bad guys is good. I received some personal experiences for pros. I had three people that had actual experiences how these helped them. One person mentioned that someone took out a row of mailboxes on a busy highway and the Robinson Police Department used these license plate readers to track down the person, gave them a ticket, and they made restitution for the damage. Another said that these cameras here helped track down a relative with a silver alert distinction. In addition, one person said their spouse works in the law enforcement near our town and that the cameras here locate a person trying to evade arrest from a crime that was committed out of town. So that was my thing I was going to do last week. I got to add something. Now, another twist was presented this week with Governor Abbott when he stopped all grant funding for these cameras. And that doesn't mean I'm going to do yay or nay anyway. But this is surely a game changer, and I'm sure for all towns across the state. So if you look across the state, everybody's, I think Woodway did yesterday, right? I think Woodway did yesterday. And so that is a very slippery slope, like you said. And I agree. And we'll see what happens on the vote. Thank you so much. And I'm ready.

All right, I'd like to thank everybody for coming and voicing your opinion. It's always good to have our citizens' input. My position from a week ago hasn't really changed. I was not in favor of these last week, and I'm not in favor of them now. This has been an issue that has been Discussed in many circles and I'm a part of for a considerable amount of time as a matter of fact when I was at the Republican State Convention it ended up being the number 10 legislative priority, so we're not unique in this area to being Concerned about these issues one of the things I mean I'd also like to reiterate, I do think if you were going to have these things and trust a particular police department with them, our police department would be the one to do that. I think the chief runs a very tight ship. I think we're small enough that those things we can avoid a lot of the issues that we've seen elsewhere. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't do it. It is a very useful tool, you have to admit that, for law enforcement. But freedom's hard, and it costs you things. And it's gonna cost us a little bit of safety to have the freedom of not having these things tracking our every movement. And so, for me, I vote for freedom.

So I'm probably not going to be as elaborate as these two down here, and I know you've got something prepared too, so I'm going to be the easy guy here. Listen, a year ago, we had the opportunity to utilize a grant, right? So what that means for us is City of Robinson, not much money coming out of our pockets. The whole purpose and the intent was to help our police department and help watch our citizens and keep them safe and protective. Throughout the year, there's been a lot of things come up, especially here recently, even over just the last two weeks, just in the last week from when everyone came to speak to us before. grant or funding has been pulled more information coming out about rules regulations you know how the industry is being regulated so all of that's new information so that that changes the whole atmosphere and perspective of not only the flock I know we keep saying flock but but we have to look at everything across the board to your point looking at ordinances if we went with something other than flock It's still something we need to look at. But one comment I do want to make. Last week, and I can't say for verbatim what was said or who said it, but there was a comment about why would we make things easier for our police force. And I thought that was kind of silly. If you look at construction workers today, we use nail guns instead of just hammers when appropriate. We use power tools when appropriate. Why force someone to use tools or outdated equipment if we have better means and that's what we need for our police officers to continue to help continue making our community safe and watching our citizens as these things come come available it is our job and due diligence to ensure that we are respecting both the police department and our citizens so thank you for coming out voicing your opinion we do sit up here and we do represent you as a community that is our job we have to put personal beliefs aside so I appreciate it. Keep it short and sweet.

Thank you. Mr. Master. I understand all of your feelings in this subject, but I haven't heard enough from the other side. This is what they call an implied consent. If you don't complain, you agree with what we have in place. That's what bothers me a little bit. We as a council, are responsible to provide safety for the citizens, whether it be an upgraded and efficient fire department or an upgraded and efficient police department. And we are responsible for providing them the tools that they need to get the job done to protect you, all of you out there. A year ago, we were given the opportunity to purchase the flock system. At that point in time, the issues that are presented now weren't there. I understand the uproar nationwide of why this system isn't the best it could be, probably never will be. There may be systems out there that are better. That's down the line. At this point in time, I have issues with the flock system, and I understand where you're all coming from. But just let me be clear. There's a whole other group of people who haven't said a word. They may agree with having the flock system here. That implied consent means an awful lot to us. We have 50 people here, but there's thousands out there that aren't coming here to say one way or the other. You may not like my opinion, but it's my opinion. And this is why I agree with them. I agree with you. My vote is probably against the flock system because it's not what we need, but we may need something better. Thank you.

Ready or not, it's Charlie's turn.

Thank you for that vote of confidence, Greg. I'm very grateful. I do love you, man. Do you have two timers for Charlie? I'm probably going to take the lead. I love the chemistry that we have in this council. We have a bunch of people that love this city. They love each other. They want to see the best outcome for our city. None of us up here get paid. There's this misconception that we're somehow going to make money by making decisions or whatever. This isn't big government. We are a democratic republic. in that we don't vote on everything we elect people to represent us it's a representative government right i said that last time i'll say it again and so your vote does count how many times have you seen where 10 votes is all it took or one vote people were one thing passed or didn't pass for very few votes so whatever you do please vote please show up thank you for showing up Most of the time, and some people complain that we said it, but it's true. 99% of the time it's us and that's it. So to see you guys come up, ladies and gentlemen, come up and be passionate about what you believe is a refreshing, it's refreshing to me because that's what we need in our society. We have too much voter apathy, no voter turnout. Sometimes people are elected with 10 or 20% of the votes. So please do your survey. And Donnie, you mentioned you did your own survey of 200 people. And I think what you said was that the majority of the people you surveyed said they didn't have a problem with it. Is that right? And three actual people that did have outcomes which were better because of the fly cameras. Let me tell you, I won't go into details. I did last week. You want to see it? By the way, somebody commented earlier, it wasn't recorded last time. It's recorded every time. You can see it on YouTube. You can see this meeting on YouTube. Everything is recorded. No more than three of us can talk at a time or it's considered a quorum. So we don't sit here and just, you know, try to come up to some kind of agreement about how we feel. Seven individual people that have one vote. And our goal, my goal, and I'll say it again, my brother Ricky, 46 years I've been in this city, I have one goal and one reason for being here, and that's to help our city be better. So with that said, let me say to you that we've had absolutely nothing but the best cooperation from our police chief, assistant chief, and our policeman. In fact, I felt absolutely no pressure whatsoever When all this was introduced a year ago, it was introduced as a crime prevention tool. It was not sold by them, but sold by the people that were saying, hey, you can have this free crime prevention. And it has. If you were here last week, if you weren't, just watch it. But Chief Adams gave statistics, real statistics for our area of how crime has gone down considerably. In my family, I had a situation where the person that was harassing one of my family members from out of town was actually caught because of the camera. Because swarming down, they weren't doing it. These things were happening. They were caught primarily because of that, and they were prosecuted because of it. So I have personal experience knowing that these things can benefit us. But I share your concern. I read the book 1984 and 1972 in high school, George Orwell. I know all about that. I dreaded this all my life. I don't like unnecessary intrusion into our lives. How do we balance this? I don't know, but I think at this point in time, it's not balanced. We don't have enough accountability by the people that control the data that they're accumulating. We're already seeing you know, the results. So as for me, I hope that there's a point in time that we can come to the place where these type tools can be utilized without invading our privacy. That's what I had to say to you. Thank you.

Mr. Rogers. All right. Well, since I'm going second to last, I won't need five minutes because I don't intend to read the points that I've already taken, you know, when I already spoke. So jumping in the deep end of the pool, I don't support this contract going forward for some very – Obvious reasons that were spoken today. I want to first thank everybody for speaking today last week every phone call I got every text email Facebook message all of that Goes into shaping decisions. I'm pro law enforcement. So I believe in tools that help us keep our community safe. No doubt about it And I do believe that license plate reader cameras are beneficial I do not like what I've learned about flock since probably the last month it's the data what happens to the data after our department has used it what's going on there that concerns me greatly if it were just our department using the data I would fight much stronger for this technology but chief also in a conversation with him stated to me that before last week's meeting he was already in favor of stopping the contract. So that made it really easy for me because, you know, I look to him for guidance on things that need for him to use in our community. This is not a hill for the city to die on. I think that's pretty clear. But this conversation did kind of stir up a broader conversation whether FLOC has violated civil rights. What does privacy mean? Mr. Steiner made a wonderful point last week about the different varying degrees of privacy. We hear some of the most strictest versions of that, that any surveillance tool camera is in violation of their right of privacy, all the way down to the least. I think about the youth in our nation who will film every minute of their life and post that on social media in a hurry. They're doing that for likes, comments, views. And when they don't get that, it kind of bums them out. It brings them down a little bit. Those people value privacy very low. So we have this varying degree of prophecy between each individual. If I asked everyone to write down what privacy meant to you, I promise you we'd have a whole bunch of different versions of that. Then there's this interpretation of what our Constitution says, and I've heard a lot of people state what they believe the Constitution says. I believe in the Constitution, so I'm always going to look to what it says, but also to what our Supreme Court has said about it. It's not favorable in terms of right to privacy, and I've heard a lot of good points. I think it's a shame that our Constitution doesn't mention privacy. We can quibble over whether liberty or privacy, what those words really mean. But I do think it's a question that needs to be asked and answered. That's not for this body to do. It's not for the City Council to do. I think that's something for Congress to enact the 28th Amendment that really defines what privacy means. Set that bar real high. I'm okay with that. I talked about the differences levels in everybody's prophecy. This conversation made me go back and think about what's my personal level of prophecy. I would have told you before, it's high. I will tell you my actions say something different. And I got to thinking of all the different ways it's been brought up that The end user license agreements, terms of services, all of the smart devices you've ever had, including your TV, your thermostat control, your vehicle, phones, all of those, Microsoft, Google, your Amazon account, eBay account, all of these things are collecting data about you. And I click the yes. I agree every time. And here's a really... bad indication of how low my view is of privacy, because I don't even read the terms of service when they update it anymore. I just click that button. And I would have told you I thought I had a really high view of privacy. And I think a lot of us are in that boat. Had a lot of conversations this week. The issue of privacy isn't for the Robinson City Council to determine whether flock violated privacy rights isn't for the City Council to determine. I think flock is due its due process. It needs to stay in court to defend its action and what it's doing with data. I think our Congress needs to act and create a 28th amendment that sets this bar for the future technologies that are coming, because this is, Amanda, I'm sorry, Amanda, right? You said it. There's more than this coming, right? There's already other options out there, some that don't share the data. I like that option better, but What's the next tool for law enforcement? What's this digital world mean? And we've got AI debates going. We've got data-centered debates going. If we live in a new world and data's big, we need to clearly define that, what privacy means. There are over 40 different acts that Congress has enacted that speak specifically to privacy, but every one of those are... specific sectors, healthcare, communications, all kinds, but none of them address it in the broad scope that we've talked about tonight. We see snippets of it in certain amendments, but we're still arguing about it. It's still not as clear. We're still having this conversation 250 years later. Actually, 235 years later, because the Bill of Rights didn't exist when the country was founded. So long story short, this conversation needs to continue. This is not a city of Robinson. issue it's a nation issue uh and it's not something this council can fix i just want to say thank you all again for coming out speaking if everybody that came here last week i i hope y'all saw how government works in real time because this council listened we've gone and had multiple conversations after uh everybody left we reconvened to now cast a vote on what we're going to do on this and your input mattered We talked about how there's some apathy and a little disillusion. I get it. I've been there, too. But I hope last week and this week and this conversation that we're having now restores a little bit of your trust in your government, your local government, but also this is how it's designed to work, you know, a petition to start an ordinance or some other form of guardrails for this type of technology. That's government at its best. And it takes you. The we the people is you. It's all of us as individuals, but it's you. So please continue exercising that. Don't let these rooms sit empty. I mean, everybody up here, as far as I can tell, wants to hear you.

Be involved in every issue. We'll have a better city, a better government.

I lied. I'm sorry. I told you I wouldn't be the longest. One last thing. So we have this, you know, I've heard quotes from founding fathers. I've heard statutes quoted, amendments quoted. Supreme Court rulings. And we have these misinterpretations. Our own understandings aren't as strong as they need to be. So my recommendation, there's a book series called The Foundations of Freedom. It's a collection of all the major writings on how our government was founded. It should be in everybody's house. Reading the Constitution, the Bill of Rights should be something that we should be able to quote. We speak and we defend for our rights, but can everybody in the room quote the Fourth Amendment? Probably not. I'm guilty of a lot of that. So I'm preaching. All right. So let's be educated on what the words and the documents actually say. And, you know, let's let's have honest conversation about how it applies. And if we want to change it, if we want to set a higher standard, there's a process.

Let's follow civil political discourse. That's what our country has to have. Civil, political discourse. And that's what this is. That's what you did. That's what we're doing. We're just trying to come to a reasonable conclusion for all of us. That's the way government is supposed to work. But it's got to be civil. You can be passionate without being angry and mad and mean and all that. You know what I'm saying? Know your facts and give them. But do it in love. Do it in the spirit of fairness and of caring anyway thank you and y'all do that by the way i'm not saying you don't do that i'm just encouraging you to do to do that civil political discourse

Charlie walked right into that because he said you can be passionate without being mad. I was going to say not according to KWTX.

Yeah, I kind of did this last time about something that I was talking about, and I was like, somebody said I pounded the table. I was not angry. I'm just trying to make a point.

My turn.

Your turn.

My turn. Your turn. I gave everybody here plenty, right? And I'm not. I'm not going to take a long time, but I am going to say some things that need to be said. I have made sure for two meetings now for two weeks that I've given everyone more than the opportunity to speak their mind because that is what we want to run this city government. I did not take this position to get up here and give you my feelings and vote the way that that i want to vote i'm i'm sitting up here to vote how the majority of our town wants to vote okay i wasn't given a chance by our local media last week to stay in the middle so that i could hear from everyone in our town kwtx made sure that they sensationalized a clip out of a two-hour story so that it looked like you got a false positive where I stood. And then I had to go and defend my family, my business. I was called a fascist. They talked about my granddaughter. I don't really, you know what, I have the thickest skin on the planet. And people can say what they say. I had a passionate conversation last week with a member of our community and it was a great back and forth he even wrote an incredible piece that he put out there to let everybody know again that we had a local tv station that sensationalized and used yellow journalism to get clicks and try to turn our city into a circus all the while he We sit in this room and had the best meeting that I believe I've ever had since I have been on this diocese in this town. I appreciate everyone in this room tonight and everyone in the room last week. Yes, I am concerned about our rights being trampled. Along the way last week, mine were trampled on. by a member of the state house who put a slanderous statement out, then deleted my comment where I was able to talk against what was put out there, then blocked me from his page, therefore taking away my First Amendment right. Because y'all know you can't block somebody from the public. page if you're a public servant. By the way, I'm still blocked. So, yes, our rights are very important. And as I said up here, I will always remember where we're at when it comes to the Constitution and how we're taken care of. In fact, I care so much I'm going to Washington in a week and a half to learn even more about what's going on. about where we're headed in every direction of this world that we're living in. And let's face it, we are living in some times that every week we really don't know how things are gonna happen, but the technology that we have, there's no telling what's gonna happen next week and what's gonna come up and what company's gonna come out with something that we're gonna figure out that we didn't know how it was violating us. My statement to you is that I will sit in this chair until my time is done, and I will make sure that when I make a vote and a commitment at this table, it will be on behalf of the city of Robinson and the residents here and what the majority of the people in this town want to do. Please know that you sat here and saw the same kind of meetings tonight that you saw last week if you were here last week. We want you to come. We want you to watch and let us know when you see things on this agenda that affect you. I don't think that after tonight's vote, we'll stop with the discussion on where these cameras go, any type of readers, the license plate readers. I do want to make sure that there is a... We have a resident... Mr. Evie, a band of professors that put out a podcast that he asked me if I would talk about, and I did. He put it out there. I'd welcome you to listen. There's going to be a part two. I'd welcome you to listen to that. But as I sit here and I finish, I want to make sure that unequivocally, I tell our chief of police that you are an incredible officer. You run your department with the integrity that most other cities wish they had. And we appreciate you and your officers and your commander sitting next to you. And we have the utmost faith in the fact that with or without these, Robinson will be a safe community.

Second.

All right, that's enough on my soapbox.

I MAKE A MOTION THAT WE DISCONTINUE THE USE OF FLUK TECHNOLOGY, THE CAMERAS.

ANYTHING ELSE I NEED TO SAY? SHE'S GOING TO GET TECHNICAL.

WELL, HELP ME OUT ON THIS, MISTY.

So while they're doing this, we want to make sure we do it right. So we always do it once.

I know what I want to say, but I think you've got to be technical to be legal. So here we go. the action that i make a motion on uh is to not authorize city manager craig lament to sign by the way he's a great city manager to sign the fy 20 26 27 motor vehicle crime prevention of 40 mbcpa grant award letter and enter and not to enter into a one-year agreement with flock safety fiscal year 2026 through 2027 to continue that and not to continue the city's automated license plate reader program all right so just to make sure that we don't have any any misinterpretations in here I'm gonna pull the council your vote is yes to discontinue

Right. Vote yes to discontinue or no if you disagree. All right. So let's start at the end. Let's start with Don.

I vote yes.

Yes. Yes. Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

All right. Motion is unanimous and carries. Flock cameras are discontinued in our city. thank you we appreciate you being here if we don't hear from you somebody said it last week I can say this because somebody said last week they said well if we don't show up that means we think you're doing a good job well I really appreciate that I would like I would like to make a pitch for all of us to go and follow our city Facebook page, City of Robinson's Facebook page. the young lady behind the computer over there and her department do a wonderful job of keeping our residents up to date on everything if if in two hours we find out a pipe burst or a gas main busted or somebody did something it's on there in a heartbeat the copy so that you don't have to go dig through i'm telling you i i want it to be easier to dig through the city website to find the council agenda so you can see it's kind of a pain but it's easy when they put it on there because they put the two pages on there and you can see the council meetings are every first tuesday and third tuesday of the month if you just take the time to read it hey i don't need to see you if you don't if you're not going to disagree with it okay if you think we're all up here doing a good job and you don't want to come that's fine But look at that agenda. Look what's on there. Get an idea. And if you see something that might affect you or you think we might need to hear from you, please come see us. These meetings are not long. Even with, I'm telling you, even with all this, we finish in an hour, okay? They don't take 20, 30 minutes, unusual. So I understand we all have things to do, but... but uh please give us your feedback we want your feedback we don't want to sit up here and do it for for and make a bad decision all right everybody got it anybody got anything they want to put on the future agenda while we're sitting here i've got two items yes one is i want to revisit the lady at bunker and whatever just to report on what we

What we found on that at some point. And then second, I would suggest that we have some people here with a petition that are concerned about a possible ordinance. I'd like to have a discussion about that.

Well, that will actually be brought to you at the next council meeting.

Okay, that's already on it. Okay.

Yeah, it was just delivered to the city secretary yesterday. Oh, okay. We'll get it. It already hit up tonight's agenda. Great. The wheels are moving. We'll tell you what actions, you know. I mean, it's just all that was brought to us so far is just that there are people starting a petition. There's not been an actual petition.

Well, I'd like a discussion about just a discussion about what a possible ordinance would look like or what. I mean, because there's a lot of very educated people on that subject that I'd love to hear their input on what an ordinance like that might look like. I don't know we need to take any action or anything at that point in time, but I would like to if that makes sense. If it doesn't, it doesn't.

So noted. Got it. Anything else? Good. Once again, thank you to all of you people out there sitting in the chairs. We appreciate you being here. And with that, it's 728. We're adjourned.