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A House of Delegates bill that would put up “guardrails” for how automated license plate recognition technology is used in Virginia is headed to the Senate floor after it was resurrected and then amended in committee.
The Senate Finance Committee moved to report the bill to the Senate floor in a 11-2 vote, with one abstention, after it was re-referred from the Senate Courts of Justice Committee on Monday morning.
The bill, HB 2724, introduced by Del. Charniele Herring, D-Alexandria, passed the House of Delegates but was killed by the Senate Courts of Justice Committee in early February. It was later resurrected, or called back up, and postponed until a later meeting.
“The cameras are there already and we are in the dark, as a commonwealth, about where they are,” Herring said Monday morning. “Without this bill there are no protections.”
As it passed the House in early February, the bill would have allowed state law enforcement to install cameras on state roadways, keep data collected by automated license plate recognition technology, or ALPRs, for up to 30 days, and would establish an audit of law enforcement using the technology.
Herring noted that the audit requirement would promote transparency. It would provide information on the number of stops as a result of the cameras, and what queries were made for who. The audits would allow for the legislative body to have oversight into how the data is used to protect people’s privacy, she said.
The bill also limited the use of ALPRs for criminal investigation, to help find a missing or endangered person or to receive notifications related to a person with an outstanding warrant, a stolen vehicle or stolen license plate. As introduced, the bill was a recommendation of the Virginia State Crime Commission.
An amended bill gains and loses support
As the bill stands in the Senate, that 30-day period was amended down to 21 days in the Senate Courts of Justice Committee on Monday morning, and language was included that would have delayed the expansion of cameras onto state roadways. The bill is likely headed to a conference committee to rectify the differences if it passes the Senate.
The NAACP Virginia State Conference approved of the inclusion of a re-enactment clause in the amended legislation that would allow expansion of ALPRs to state roadways to be revisited in 2026.
“We urge legislators to retain this re-enactment clause to ensure that any future expansion is not considered until comprehensive regulatory guardrails are established and monitored across the Commonwealth,” the organization said in a statement.
Justice Forward Virginia, a nonpartisan advocacy organization that focuses on criminal justice reform, concurred.
“We would rather not have the cameras at all. But a bill without expansion to state highways is better than the bill was when it included the expansion,” said Rob Poggenklass, executive director of the organization.
Senate Majority Leader Scott Surovell, D-Fairfax County, predicted during Monday night’s Finance Committee meeting that the newly amended bill would be vetoed by Gov. Glenn Youngkin.
Those amendments caused law enforcement groups, such as the Virginia Association of Chiefs of Police, to rescind their support of the legislation.
Dana Schrad, executive director of the Virginia Association of Chiefs of Police, was a proponent of the legislation before it was amended down. She said the intent of the bill was to use data collected by ALPRs in criminal investigations.
“We found them to be a very effective tool in criminal investigations and interventions,” she said Monday morning.
The bill was reported from Courts of Justice and re-referred to the Senate Finance and Appropriations on a 11-3 vote with one abstention.
What are ALPRs?
Automated license plate recognition technology, also known as ALPRs or Flock cameras colloquially, capture the back of a vehicle, to include the make, model, color, the license plate, any distinguishing marks or bumper stickers, and potentially, a person inside of the vehicle. That data is then made into a computer-generated image that can be fed into algorithms to track vehicles.
That data is put into a network that could be shared across state lines, Poggenklass said.
Flock Safety, a corporation that specializes in ALPRs and other surveillance equipment, retains the data it gathers for a standard of 30 days, Poggenklass said. The data is assumed to disappear after then.
Poggenklass said he and his organization became concerned with the ability of other states to subpoena data collected by ALPRs in Virginia. He noted that the reporting and transparency requirements amended into the law does not fix the fact that the images will be able to be accessed by other states and the federal government.
“The problem is, they can issue that subpoena to Flock at its headquarters in Georgia and Georgia law would apply, not Virginia law, so whatever regulations we put on this data isn’t going to apply in other states,” he said.
Local law enforcement agencies were already allowed to use those cameras on city property and county property.
Monica Sarmiento, executive director of the Virginia Immigrant Rights Coalition, spoke in favor of the amended bill during the Monday morning Senate committee meeting. She argued that oversight regarding the current use of data collected by the cameras is self-oversight by law enforcement. She noted that the transparency and reporting requirements are “long past due.”
A history of ALPR use and legislation
Back in 2022, it was discovered that state law enforcement agencies had begun putting up ALPRs on state roadways.
“A lawmaker found out and wrote a letter to the attorney general asking, do they have authority to put these cameras up?” Poggenklass said.
In response to a request from Sen. Todd Pillion, Attorney General Jason Miyares’ office noted in an advisory opinion that the Commonwealth Transportation Board lacked the regulatory power to permit the installation of ALPRs on state roads. Miyares noted that the board would need to seek the authority to install the technology on state roadways from the General Assembly.
Pillion, a Washington County Republican who sits on the Senate Finance Committee, abstained from the Monday night vote.
Legislation regarding the use of ALPRs have been introduced during each legislative session since Attorney General Jason Miyares’ office issued its opinion in fall of 2022.
“The thing that has stayed the same through all three years, all three sessions, is the 30-day retention period,” Poggenklass said.