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St. Paul PD's Flock portal shows zero plate reads but 669 searches
Reduced TransparencySt. Paul PD's Flock transparency portal (transparency.flocksafety.com/st-paul-mn-pd) is still online. Its "last updated" date is November 1, 2026. The portal reports 0 unique vehicles detected over the last 30 days, so St. Paul's own cameras collected no plate reads in that period. It reports 669 search sessions by St. Paul users over the same 30 days. It still lists 1 camera location and 7-day data retention. With no plate reads of its own and a 7-day retention period, St. Paul PD would hold no current data from its own cameras. Its searches would therefore draw on data from other agencies in the Flock network. The portal still lists 53 organizations as having access to St. Paul PD data. They include the Ramsey County, Hennepin County and Anoka County sheriff's offices, the Paul Bunyan Task Force, and the University of Minnesota PD. Context: on August 26, 2026, the mayor and police chief announced that the city's two city-owned Flock cameras would be removed. The portal does not show whether the remaining listed camera is still installed or switched on. Its zero read count is consistent with a camera that is not collecting.
What does this mean?
The agency now discloses less about its license plate readers than it did before. That can mean camera locations withheld from the state BCA roster, metrics or policy details removed from its Flock transparency portal, or counts that go blank or stop updating. Some of this information is reported under Minn. Stat. 13.824 and some is voluntary, and withholding is not by itself a sign the cameras were removed or that the law was broken. It does make it harder for residents to see where the cameras are and how they are used. The underlying records can still be requested under the Minnesota Government Data Practices Act.
More from St. Paul Police Department
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St. Paul PD stopped sharing with Winona PD
Stopped sharing with an agencyWinona PD (MN) no longer appears in the list of organizations granted access to Saint Paul Police Department data on its Flock transparency portal. Surfaced between portal snapshots of 2026-10-07 and 2026-10-08.
What does this mean?
The agency removed a sharing partner, narrowing who can search its plate data. This can follow a policy change, public pressure, or a contract decision. - Active ·
St. Paul PD stopped sharing with Duluth PD
Stopped sharing with an agencyDuluth MN PD was removed from the list of organizations granted access to Saint Paul Police Department (MN) data. It was deleted from the list entirely rather than tagged [Inactive]. Everything else on the portal is unchanged from the previous snapshot (2026-10-04): 1 fixed LPR location, 7-day retention, the same hotlist sources (NCMEC Amber Alert, FBI National Hotlist, MN BCA), and the same policy text. The change occurred sometime after 2026-10-04 and was detected on 2026-10-07. Duluth PD's own portal was not checked, and Duluth does not appear on the Paul Bunyan Task Force sharing list in either snapshot, so no corroborating portal is known. The portal does not say which side ended the sharing. Source: https://transparency.flocksafety.com/st-paul-mn-pd
What does this mean?
The agency removed a sharing partner, narrowing who can search its plate data. This can follow a policy change, public pressure, or a contract decision. - Active ·
St. Paul PD stopped sharing with Maple Grove PD
Stopped sharing with an agencyMaple Grove MN PD was removed from the "Sharing Network Data With" list on the St. Paul PD transparency portal. It was present in the portal snapshot of 2026-09-25 and absent on 2026-10-04. Maple Grove's own Flock portal still loads and shows as active, so this appears to be a change to the sharing relationship, not Maple Grove leaving Flock. The portal does not say which side ended the sharing. The same removal appeared on the Spring Lake Park PD portal.
What does this mean?
The agency removed a sharing partner, narrowing who can search its plate data. This can follow a policy change, public pressure, or a contract decision. - Active ·
St. Paul PD stopped sharing with Itasca County Sheriff's Office
Stopped sharing with an agencyItasca County MN SO was removed from the list of organizations granted access to Saint Paul Police Department (MN) data, taking the sharing list from 57 organizations to 56. It was deleted from the list entirely rather than tagged [Inactive]. Everything else on the portal is unchanged from the previous snapshot (2026-09-23): 1 fixed LPR location, 7-day retention, the same hotlist sources (NCMEC Amber Alert, FBI National Hotlist, MN BCA), and the same policy text. This is the third monitored portal to drop Itasca County SO in the same window — Paul Bunyan Task Force (logged 2026-09-24) and Spring Lake Park PD (logged 2026-09-25) both removed it as well — which points to a change on Itasca County's side rather than three separate decisions. Itasca County's own transparency portal is not monitored (it has no known Flock portal), so it is not confirmed whether it left the Flock network entirely or only ended these sharing agreements; the MN BCA roster separately shows Itasca County SO's disclosed fixed ALPR locations changed to "N/A" around the same time, which may reflect the same underlying change but comes from a vendor-neutral source and is logged separately. Source: https://transparency.flocksafety.com/st-paul-mn-pd
What does this mean?
The agency removed a sharing partner, narrowing who can search its plate data. This can follow a policy change, public pressure, or a contract decision. - Active ·
St. Paul PD stopped sharing with Todd County Sheriff's Office
Stopped sharing with an agencyTodd County MN SO was removed from the list of organizations granted access to Saint Paul Police Department (MN) data on the St. Paul PD Flock transparency portal, taking the sharing list from 58 organizations to 57. It was deleted from the list entirely rather than tagged [Inactive]. Everything else on the portal is unchanged from the previous snapshot (2026-09-05): 1 fixed LPR location, 7-day retention, the same hotlist sources (NCMEC Amber Alert, FBI National Hotlist, MN BCA), and the same policy text. The change occurred sometime after 2026-09-05 and was observed on the live portal on 2026-09-22. (The 2026-09-22 monitor alert itself captured a blank page load; the portal was live and fully rendered when checked directly the same day, so this entry reflects a direct comparison of the 2026-09-05 snapshot against the live portal.) Source: https://transparency.flocksafety.com/st-paul-mn-pd
What does this mean?
The agency removed a sharing partner, narrowing who can search its plate data. This can follow a policy change, public pressure, or a contract decision.