Suspended
Who approved this?
No approval document for this contract has been found yet. The records request guide shows which office holds it.
Hamilton County Sheriff Austin Garrett directed his staff to pause both the Flock license plate reader program and a separate Motorola license plate reader program, announced August 31, 2026 by NewsChannel 9. Local 3 News reported on September 4, 2026 that the office oversees roughly 70 cameras across the county without breaking that total down between the 2 vendors, so no Flock-specific camera count is given. Garrett said the directive followed several weeks of weighing concern about public data and the potential misuse of what the cameras capture. He said he still believes the technology helps fight crime and that command staff would address the data concerns before any restart. Garrett also called on state and federal leaders to take up the question. No county commission vote, contract amount, term length, retention period or start date appears in either source. This is Hamilton County, Tennessee, the county seat of which is Chattanooga.
Use suspended
Camera use is suspended. The contract itself has not been reported terminated.
Not yet in the sources: the contract amount, the camera count, and the approval date. The city or county clerk holds the approval file, and the records request guide gives the wording to ask for it. If you already hold the document, send it in.
What happens next
Renewals are decided in public. Residents can attend the meeting, speak during public comment, and write to the office above through official channels. The ACLU publishes a model cancellation resolution officials can adapt.
Sources
- NewsChannel 9: Hamilton County sheriff pauses license plate reader programs newschannel9.com
- Local 3 News: How local sheriff's offices are using Flock license plate readers (September 4, 2026) local3news.com
Last verified: September 8, 2026. Something wrong? Request a correction.
The record
The sources do not say who approved this contract. Hamilton County Sheriff's Office runs the cameras.
The status reads suspended.
2 sources back this record; each is listed with its date under Sources. Last verified September 8, 2026. The Tennessee hub holds the state records; the tracker holds them all.
Cite this record
Who Approved This, "Hamilton County, TN Flock Contract," whoapprovedthis.org, accessed October 8, 2026, https://whoapprovedthis.org/city/tn-hamilton-county/.
Related
Read on
- Knoxville, TN Expired
- Franklin, TN Active
- Blount County, TN Active
- Camera locations near Hamilton County: DeFlock (external, crowdsourced)
- Agency transparency portal, if published: transparency.flocksafety.com; aggregated at Eyes on Flock