The Bend Police Department has made good on its intention to shore up its internal policy on automated license plate reader technology with Senate Bill 1516.
As more law enforcement agencies adopt surveillance technologies, both government leaders and the pubic are calling for more scrutiny and oversight. Part of that scrutiny involves who gets access to the data. Yet in reviewing Bend PD’s updated Policy 428, questions remain surrounding the mandated end-to-end-encryption and when Bend PD will begin posting its monthly audits for public review.
In 2022, Bend PD signed a contract with Axon, a surveillance company, for body cameras, tasers, a cloud-serviced datahub called Evidence.com and about 70 in-vehicle Fleet 3 dash cams equipped with automated license plate reader technology. The department launched the AI-powered dash cameras in 2023.
For just as long, Bend PD has set an internal ALPR policy for itself that details the permitted uses and safeguards of the technology. Without secure data systems, people’s information can end up in the wrong hands.
When Gov. Tina Kotek signed Senate Bill 1516, a law establishing the state’s ALPR framework on March 31, law enforcement agencies needed to make policy updates accordingly. The much-more-detailed version of Policy 428, which Bend PD published in mid-May, includes broadened safeguards around privacy, accountability and civil rights protections. Policy 428 also reiterates that Bend PD is the sole owner of the ALPR database and that its information may not be shared or sold to a third party.
SB 1516 also mandated that ALPR vendors release 30-day and quarterly audits, which law enforcement agencies must be published within two days of receipt. Yet the public can’t review Bend PD’s audits — which will include the name of the agency making the query, the reason, and the date and time — because the department hasn’t yet received any audits from Axon.
In contrast, the Sunriver Police Department has been publishing monthly ALPR audits to its website since March, through its vendor, Flock Safety. The department operates four stationary ALPR cameras at entry-and-exit points along Highway 97. In May, 26 ALPR queries, all made internally by SRPD employees, involved incidents of theft, wanted persons, hit-and-run accidents and numerous DUIIs.
Bend PD officials told the Source the department is working with Axon to develop a long-term solution that automates the delivery process of 30-day and quarterly audits.
Bend PD Capt. Nick Parker, who oversees the department’s ALPR program as the Support Service Division captain, says he feels “pretty good” about the policy he helped co-author. In particular, he points to the section that highlights how ALPR technology won’t be used; namely, in surveilling activity protected by the First Amendment or aiding federal immigration enforcement and out-of-state abortion investigations and prosecutions.
“We felt it was important to make very clear: Here’s the way we’re going to operate ALPR. It doesn’t leave any questions about what we’re using this for,” Parker said. “We want to be transparent about how the wrong folks aren’t getting our information and that we’re utilizing our information in the most appropriate way.”
Additionally, Bend PD’s ALPR policy acknowledges that some ALPR records may be conditionally disclosed under Oregon Public Records Law. Requests must identify an approximate place and time, but license plate numbers, vehicle characteristics, faces and other identifiable features will be redacted before disclosure.
Since SB 1516 became law, local privacy advocates have shared their thoughts on surveillance technology during Bend City Council and Deschutes County Board of County Commissioner meetings. One area of concern is that Axon doesn’t meet the new law’s end-to-end encryption standard. According to the legislation, current contracts with ALPR vendors that don’t offer end-to-end encryption are allowed to run their course, yet any contract add-ons or new contracts must ensure end-to-end encryption.
Jonathan Westmoreland, a local privacy advocate who publishes the weekly newsletter Signals & Safeguards, urged the City of Bend to look for a surveillance vendor other than Axon that will leave the encryption keys in the hands of the City.
“How can you have a law where you’re requiring something where there’s no definition of what you’re requiring,” Westmoreland told the Source last month. “What good is a bill if the key requirement is left undefined?”
That’s a roadblock the City of Bend ran into last month when the city manager considered adding on to the current contract with Axon for stationary ALPR cameras along entry and exit points along Highway 97, the Source reported.
The City of Bend’s five-year contract with Axon expires in July 2027. Earlier this month, Deschutes County Sheriff’s Office Interim Sheriff Ty Rupert forewent ALPR technology when he solicited a $2.4 million contract with Axon for tasers, body cameras and conventional dashboard cameras. Rupert said he’d heeded the public’s concerns around the surveillance technology, since the Source reported that federal immigration authorities violated Oregon sanctuary laws when they queried the Bend PD’s ALPR database — maintained by a different vendor, Flock Safety — 279 times in June 2025.
Sen. Floyd Prozanski is a Eugene Democrat who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee that workshopped the bill. Reached by phone, Prozanski says he’s not concerned that Axon hasn’t begun sending Bend PD its audits, yet steps toward compliancy should be underway.
Since SB 1516 became law, privacy advocates have expressed frustration with the sparsely articulated end-to-end encryption mandate. Prozanski said he’s open to a work group in a future legislative session to further define E2EE. A strict definition would preclude vendors like Axon, which retain a database access key for scheduled maintenance, from doing business in Oregon when its current contracts expire. But that doesn’t bother Prozanski.
“I think that’s a marketing issue for the vendors, as to whether they want to be in the Oregon market that has these restrictions,” Prozanski said. “If a vendor wants to be a player in the state, they must meet the criteria. But personally, I don’t see vendors walking away from this market share.”
Also noteworthy is the standard of entering license-plate data onto a hot list, which flags suspect vehicles that alert an officer of a recent spotting. For an officer, whether internal or from another state department to add to or query a hot list, reasonable suspicion (more than a hunch) or probable cause (which is a 51% scale-tip toward reasonable doubt, for example) must be articulated. Hot list data not tied to an investigation or prosecution is deleted after eight days, unless there’s justification for re-entry. Aggregated license plate data is deleted after 30 days.
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