Greene County, Ind. — Greene County Sheriff George Dallaire says a community survey showing heavy opposition to Flock license-plate cameras is not enough to change course. Linton News published his full reply on August 31. His opening line is the one that will travel:
> “Mr. Wence, I don’t call 324 people’s opinions clear and convincing, it’s 324 opinions.”
That sentence is the heart of the argument. It is also the weakest part of it.
Greeco.News previously laid out how the cameras arrived: County Council funding on December 16, 2024, Commissioner approval on January 7, 2025, three five-year agreements totaling roughly $430,000 to $434,750, pushed by the sheriff and Prosecutor Jared Holtsclaw. Council members Ron Lehman and Randall Brown voted no. The hardware is in the ground. The debate now is whether public resistance still counts.
What Linton News actually measured
Linton News, which first put the contracts under a bright light last November in “You’re Paying Nearly $500,000 for Greene County to Track You”, ran a local community poll and paired it with a WTHI-TV Channel 10 survey.
According to Linton News:
- Linton News poll: 419 total votes. 77.3 percent opposed the cameras or remained deeply skeptical. Another 12.6 percent would accept them only with tight limits — a seven-day data cap and a ban on out-of-county sharing. About 10 percent supported unlimited use.
- WTHI-TV poll: 74 percent said the technology made them feel “more spied on.” 15 percent said they felt safer from crime.
- Lawrence County: Resident Nikki Luallen’s Change.org petition demanding a ban on automated license-plate readers collected 518 signatures in a matter of days this August. Lawrence’s population is only about 45,000. Five hundred names there is not noise. It is a rural warning flare.
- Greene County: A Change.org petition to remove Flock cameras from this county was circulating as far back as November 2025, promoted alongside the original Linton News investigation.
- Statewide: Eyes Off Indiana’s petition for statutory limits on ALPR retention, sale, and audits passed 1,800 signatures by May 2026 and has since climbed into the thousands (the group has publicly cited figures in the 3,000–4,600 range as the year went on).
- Monroe County / Bloomington: The city allowed its Flock contract to expire in 2026 after months of public pressure, including an anti-Flock protest of about 300 people — the same size the sheriff now waves off. Monroe’s per-capita camera count dropped as a result. Greene’s did not.
- Owen and Greene organizers: Chad VanRyn of the Owen County Libertarian Party and Perry Shepard, former chairman of the Greene County Libertarians, helped organize an August 15 “Block Flock” protest asking residents to stand on public easements and hold signs in front of cameras. That is not a national NGO drop-in. That is neighbors.
The sheriff’s “324 opinions” figure is not a random handful of cranks. It is the opposition slice of that 419-vote local poll — the same people Linton News asked him to take seriously. He declined. Linton News then asked him to host a public open house so residents could hear his case and put questions to him directly.
The sheriff’s full response
Dallaire’s complete statement, as published by Linton News:
> Mr. Wence, I don’t call 324 people’s opinions clear and convincing, it’s 324 opinions. During my conversations with Greene County residents multiple time during any given week, I meet more residents who are not opposed to Flock cameras than those opposed to the cameras.
>
> I know people are divided on this issue, but this technology is not as intrusive as many are led to believe due to disinformation spread by anti-Flock groups. The number of things being stated are simply not true. We do not sell your information, we do not make any money from Flock, we cannot hack the vehicle or drivers’ electronic devices, we cannot clock your speed, we cannot see the driver, and we do not track you, we only see where a point on the highway you passed. The Sheriff’s Office intends on continuing to use this technology to help fight crime in Greene County.
>
> The one thing I find interesting in all these conversations about our rights is, no one ever speaks to the crime victims, or their families’ rights.
>
> Respectfully
>
> George Dallaire
Those last two paragraphs deserve a fair hearing. Stolen cars, missing persons, and wanted suspects are not abstractions. Flock data has been cited in a Greene County stop tied to a Marion County homicide warrant. Victims’ families have a claim on public safety. That is not “disinformation.”
What does not hold is the idea that a few hundred named, counted local opinions are too small to matter.
Three hundred votes is how rural counties actually work
Greene County has about 31,000 people. Local races here are not Indianapolis turnout. A few hundred votes decide council seats, commissioner races, and sometimes the sheriff’s office itself. Treating 324 recorded no-votes as a rounding error is not tough-minded law enforcement. It is a category mistake about how consent works in a small county.
If 324 people showed up to a public hearing, no county board would call the room empty. If 324 extra votes landed on a challenger in November, an incumbent would not call it a rounding error. The poll is not a scientific statewide sample. Neither is a hallway conversation “multiple times during any given week.” Both are impressions. Only one of them was written down.
The sheriff says he meets more supporters than opponents in daily life. That can be true of the people who approach a uniform. It does not cancel a 77 percent result among those who bothered to answer a public poll, or a 74 percent “more spied on” result on a Terre Haute television survey covering the same technology.
Southern Indiana is not a handful of Facebook comments
The “just 300 people” line also ignores what has already happened in the counties next door.
What the sheriff gets right — and what the contract still requires
Dallaire is correct that Flock units are not facial-recognition booths and do not, by design, issue speeding tickets or reach into a car’s electronics. Prosecutor Holtsclaw has said access is limited to sworn officers, searches require justification, and the five-year deals do not auto-renew. Those are real constraints.
They are also policy choices, not laws. A later council can keep the system, tighten it, or drop it. That is the point Linton News is pressing and the point this county has not yet answered in an open room.
When the cameras were approved, Dallaire told commissioners the system was “a great tool” and “well worth the money,” then added the honest caveat: “but we need to see benefits.” A year-plus later, the public is offering its own audit. Seventy-seven percent of a 419-vote local poll is not a court verdict. It is also not nothing. In Greene County, it is closer to an election than to a suggestion box.
Linton News asked for a town hall. That remains the simplest test. If support is as broad as the sheriff describes in private conversations, an open house should be an easy night. If 324 written opinions are “not clear and convincing,” the public is entitled to hear what number would be.
Source: Adam Wence, [“I Don’t Call [That] Clear and Convincing”: Sheriff Unconvinced by Survey Showing 77% Flock Opposition](https://www.lintonnews.com/i-dont-call-that-clear-and-convincing-sheriff-unconvinced-by-survey-showing-77-flock-opposition-full-response-of-sheriff-in-article/), Linton News, August 31, 2026.
ws, August 31, 2026.
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