Last September, Forest Park officials discovered that, in April 2024, a police detective had accidentally accepted over 200 data-sharing requests, including one from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The mistake allowed ICE to access the village’s license plate reader data for over a year.
With ICE’s presence increasing in the Chicagoland area this September, some Forest Park residents remain concerned about federal access to Forest Park’s six Motorola Solutions license plate reader cameras — which record and log license plates of passing vehicles and store searchable data.
They are “surveilling all of us, not just people with vulnerable immigration statuses,” Betty Alzamora previously told the Review about license plate reader cameras. Last month, the Forest Park resident created a petition to create ICE-free zones in the village and hopes to eliminate the cameras in Forest Park. Alzamora was a part of the effort that successfully did so in Oak Park last year after residents cited concerns with privacy and the potential to use the cameras for immigration enforcement, which violates state law.
Police Chief Ken Gross declined to comment on the village’s license plate readers, since he is retiring from his position on Sept. 30.
“I do not believe that it is fair to the Village of Forest Park Police Department for me to make any statements related to this hot topic technology or discuss my position on it since my thoughts are, in my opinion, ultimately soon moot,” Gross told the Review in an email. “I think this is a subject that should be discussed with my successor and/or Village Hall, as their answers have more long-term value at this time.”
Gross did say Forest Park’s license plate reader data has been stored for 10 years, but he recently requested to change it to six months.
Chief Designate Daniel Pater — who’s been with the Forest Park Police Department for 20 years and, for the last three-and-a-half years, served as a lieutenant leading the investigations division — said the license plate reader cameras are “paramount for investigations.”
The Forest Park Police Department uses the license plate reader cameras to track possible criminals that use the village’s main thoroughfares and that they help police to see patterns of crime.
The cameras “are definitely needed. They’ve helped identify offenders of cases. Without them, it’d definitely hurt our job,” Pater said.
Pater added that he doesn’t see many downsides of the license plate readers.
“They’re more beneficial than not,” he said. There’s also been cases where Forest Park police are pursuing what they believe is an offending vehicle, and license plate readers have helped confirm it’s not.
When it comes to federal surveillance of license plates, Pater said the police department is no longer sharing data with ICE and has put in place processes to ensure the data sharing that started in 2024 doesn’t happen again. Though Pater oversees Forest Park Police Department’s investigations, he did not say who was responsible for sharing the data.
“That was an oversight that was looked at and remedied. We ensure that we’re not sharing information or any license plate stuff with anyone without it being gone through and verified,” Pater said. “That situation was handled and administrators have figured out who can share and who can’t share.”
Though Forest Park police are unsure how many license plates were shared with ICE, “I don’t think any license plate readers in Forest Park were utilized by those agencies,” Pater said.
But that doesn’t mean local license plate data isn’t shared elsewhere, since there are cameras in surrounding communities that track cars as they pass by.
For example, River Forest has 44 license plate reader cameras and 75 street surveillance cameras
The Riverside Police Department stores data from its two license plate reader cameras for 30 days, which is decreasing for most records to seven days in January.
Alzamora — a volunteer advocate with PASO West Suburban Action Project, where she helps lead the rapid response team — previously told the Review that, last year when ICE came to the Chicagoland area, one of the first people that the team helped was located through cameras that capture license plates.
“I’m dead certain that was license plate reader data,” Alzamora said of how ICE found the person. Alzamora is an elected member of the Park District of Forest Park’s board.
Where are license plate readers located?
Forest Park has 22 street cameras — which record footage of public areas but don’t automatically scan license plates — and six Motorola Solutions license plate reader cameras. The license plate readers are located at Harlem and Randolph, Harlem and Washington, Harlem and Madison, Harlem and Roosevelt, Des Plaines and Roosevelt, and Roosevelt and 1st Avenue.
According to an interactive map on deflock.org, there’s a FLOCK-brand license plate reader camera on 1st Avenue just west of Proviso East High School and three Motorola Solutions cameras near 1st Avenue — one at Madison and 2nd Avenue, one at 1st Avenue and Green Street, and one at 1st Avenue and Quincy Street. There are also two license plate readers on the Eisenhower Expressway on either side of Des Plaines, which are property of the Illinois Department of Transportation.