Flock Camera Lawsuit Moves To Federal Court; City Attorney Won't Say What's Next
The license plate reader lawsuit jumped to federal court this week, and two council members still can't explain why that matters.
WAUKESHA — The lawsuit challenging Waukesha County's network of Flock license plate readers moved to federal court this week, and the city attorney's office declined six separate times on Tuesday to say whether the city plans to fight a motion to dismiss or let the case proceed on the merits, citing "ongoing litigation" each time in what observers described as an identical tone of voice.
The move from Waukesha County Circuit Court to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin came after defense attorneys filed new paperwork arguing the plate readers raise constitutional questions better suited to a federal bench. A memo circulated to the city council ahead of Monday's closed session, obtained by this publication, runs four pages and includes a glossary.
The glossary didn't fully take
Councilman Gary Puchalski, who has represented the city's 4th District for eleven years, asked twice during Monday's session whether "federal" meant the case was now more serious or less serious, a question city staff attempted to answer using a hand gesture before switching to a verbal explanation that ran nine minutes. A second council member, who asked not to be named because she said she still wasn't sure she understood the memo, told a staffer afterward that she had assumed "circuit court" referred to the court that handled the county's electrical permitting disputes.
City communications coordinator Denise Ulrich, 44, fielded questions on the city attorney's office's behalf and said the city was "confident in its position" without specifying what the position was, a phrase she repeated verbatim in response to four follow-up questions from this publication, two of which were about parking.
"We take the concerns around the cameras seriously, and we also take the concerns around people's concerns about the cameras seriously. Beyond that I'd point you to the filing, which is sealed."
— Denise Ulrich, city communications coordinator
The advocacy group weighing in
The Wisconsin Right To Justice advocacy group announced it is preparing an amicus brief for the federal proceeding, a filing that staff attorney Harlan Voight said the group began drafting "the moment we heard the word removal," referring to the legal mechanism that shifts a case from state to federal jurisdiction rather than, as one county supervisor reportedly assumed on a group text, a staffing decision inside the city attorney's office.
Voight said the brief will run roughly 40 pages and argue that the 19 Flock cameras installed around Waukesha County since March capture and store plate data for 30 days regardless of whether a vehicle is linked to any investigation, a detail he said "speaks for itself," before spending eleven more minutes explaining what it meant.
The cameras, mounted on poles at intersections including Sunset Drive and Grandview Boulevard, photograph roughly 14,000 vehicles a day according to a vendor estimate the county has not independently verified. The original state court complaint, filed in July, named the county sheriff's department and sought an injunction halting use of the data; it did not seek removal of the cameras themselves.
Council members adjust their talking points
By Tuesday afternoon, Puchalski had revised his understanding and told a reporter outside City Hall that he now believed federal court was "the one with the eagle seal," which is correct, though he added he still wasn't sure whether the judge assigned to the case had been appointed by the county or by "somebody higher up," a category he did not define further.
The city attorney's office did not respond to a request to clarify how long the federal proceeding might take. Court watchers not affiliated with the case estimated a ruling on the motion to dismiss could come within four to six months, a timeline city staff described internally, per a second memo obtained by this publication, as "workable," without elaborating on what it was workable for.
The council's next scheduled update on the litigation is a closed session on November 2, which Puchalski said he intends to attend "with the glossary printed out this time."