Santa Ana orders review of two license-plate reader contracts

Santa Ana’s City Council directed the city manager and staff on Oct. 20, 2026, to report within 30 days on the city’s two automated license-plate reader agreements. The report must cover contract options and costs, system effectiveness, outside-agency access to data and compliance with state law and police policy.

The direction concerns agreement A-2025-059 with Flock Group and A-2025-060 with Motorola Solutions. It did not change either contract or order the cameras turned off.

Report deadline, not contract deadline i

Staff must lay out the options and costs to terminate, suspend or not renew each agreement. The 30-day deadline is for delivering that information; it is not a deadline to end the contracts. The agenda requests cost estimates but does not set out an exit amount.

The report is also to include a one-year update on system effectiveness, which the council requested when it approved the agreements on May 6, 2025. That update had not been presented by Oct. 20, 2026—more than five months after its May 2026 anniversary. The new direction puts that overdue update alongside the questions about contract choices and data access.

Data access and compliance review i

Staff are to review outside-agency access to Santa Ana’s license-plate reader data, including searches by the Northern California Regional Intelligence Center. The requested compliance review covers California Civil Code Section 1798.90.5 and following, as well as Santa Ana Police Department Policy 436.

Requesting that review is not a finding that the city or another agency violated the law or policy. The council asked staff for information on the agreements, their performance and data access; the direction itself does not decide what the council will do after receiving the report.