Draper residents pressing the City Council to cancel its Flock license plate reader contract may soon get backup from the state Capitol.

Utah lawmakers are drafting a bill to tighten privacy rules on automated plate readers, the same technology Draper police adopted in November 2025. The Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice Interim Committee met Wednesday, Sept. 16, to discuss new guardrails, and Sen. Cal Musselman, a West Haven Republican who chairs the panel, told KUTV the goal is regulation, not a ban.

"We are deeply concerned about it, and that's why we want to make sure we put really stringent guardrails," Musselman said in the Sept. 16 interview.

The bill would address what vendors and law enforcement agencies can share with each other and require out-of-state agencies to follow Utah law when requesting data, according to Utah News Dispatch. Utah law already limits plate-reader searches to active criminal investigations, outstanding warrants, missing persons and stolen vehicles.

The push comes after Gov. Spencer Cox said in August he was "deeply troubled" by findings from a Utah Civic Compact investigation showing that nearly 97% of searches in Weber County's Flock database came from out-of-state law enforcement. Cox asked the Utah Privacy Governing Board and the Utah Privacy Commission to review how local agencies use the cameras.

Christopher Bramwell, Utah's chief privacy officer, told the committee the review aims to separate what law enforcement is actually doing from what the system is capable of. He noted plate readers are also used outside policing, including by higher education institutions and the Utah Inland Port Authority.

Draper's Flock fight

The state-level action lands in the middle of a local dispute. Residents have pressed the Draper City Council to cancel the Flock contract at two consecutive meetings this summer.

At an Aug. 12 truth-in-taxation hearing, resident Christian Shank urged the council to cut the Flock system's annual renewal fee, according to council meeting records. Resident Ashley Collier said Draper taxpayers were funding the Flock system without public consent and called it an example of misspent money.

Six days later, at the Aug. 18 council meeting, resident Chase Kimball asked the council to put the contract on the next agenda for a cancellation vote, according to meeting minutes. Kimball said the cameras violated Fourth Amendment rights. Residents Scott Standage and Alberto de la Torre also spoke against the system, with de la Torre saying residents should have been asked for feedback before the cameras went up.

The council took no action. No Flock-related item appeared on the Sept. 1 council agenda.

Draper City posted a statement from Police Chief Richard Ferguson on July 23 saying the department is committed to using the technology transparently. Ferguson said every search is logged and subject to audit, and that the system does not use facial recognition.

The Utah Law Enforcement Legislative Committee, which represents police chiefs, sheriffs and prosecutors, said in a statement that it supports responsible use of the technology and believes Utah can protect both public safety and individual rights.

No date has been set for a committee vote on the proposed bill.