The Carlsbad City Council voted 4-1 Tuesday to expand its license plate reader program across the North County city.
Thirty-five new non-descript black box license plate readers will be installed in 20 more locations around Carlsbad.
The expansion is expected to cost over half a million dollars according to the city.
The license plate readers scanned over 48 million license plates in the city in less than a year, and the readers directly contributed to 63 arrests, police said.
But the lone dissenting council member voiced privacy concerns.
“Those agencies that we’re sharing information to include task forces that we don’t know who the members are so when these authorized employees are gaining access, we don’t know specifically how that information is being used,” Councilwoman Cori Schumacher told NBC 7.
“We have very strict policies and rules and regulations for our employees as far as accessing the data. We conduct periodic audits to make sure that our employees are staying within the policies,” explained Carlsbad Police Captain Mickey Williams.
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While the city of Carlsbad tells NBC 7 there is no firm date yet, the city says installation should be complete by the end of the year.
