Travis County

Volunteers have mapped 588 devices in Travis County, 492 of them license plate readers, and 460 of the county’s mapped devices record Flock Safety as the manufacturer. Almost none of that hardware belongs to the county. What the Commissioners Court’s own record shows is a plate reader contract that has run since 2013 and reached the Court once, a founding seat in the region’s fusion center, a Sheriff’s drone program in its seventh year, and, in front of the Court right now, a $30 million proposal that would put a real time crime center over the jail’s cameras.

It also shows the clearest refusal we have found in Texas. In January 2023 a homeowners association asked to put six Flock cameras on three county roads. The motion to approve died because no commissioner would second it.

We read every Commissioners Court agenda and set of minutes the county publishes for January 2013 to September 2026, the minutes back to November 2010, and the agenda packets behind the items on this page: 2,262 documents. The minutes record each item’s motion, result, mover, seconder and vote.

The county’s plate readers

Contract 4400001622 has bought plate reader equipment since 27 August 2013. It began at $87,680 for a year and now stands at a cumulative $323,619.89. Six renewals were approved by the Purchasing Agent and never went to the Court; the only time it appeared on an agenda was April 2026, to move the contract from Vigilant Solutions to Motorola Solutions, and that passed on consent. The county plate reader contract has the details, including the $60,800 federal plate reader grant the Sheriff’s Office held in 2015.

The cameras the Court would not allow

On 10 January 2023 the Court considered a license agreement for six Flock cameras in county right of way in the Rob Roy on the Creek subdivisions. Commissioners argued about precedent, about hotlists, and about who gets stopped. The county department that brought the item said it had reviewed where the poles would stand and not privacy. One commissioner moved to approve, nobody seconded, and the request ended. Flock cameras in county right of way has the debate and the paperwork, including the county’s record that the Sheriff’s Office has a memorandum of understanding with Flock Safety that sends it hotlist alerts.

The fusion center

Travis County helped create the Austin Regional Intelligence Center in 2010 and has been a partner ever since. The Austin Police Department runs it for agencies in four counties, each partner pays an annual assessment set by a formula in the agreement, and the Sheriff’s Office is a founding member. Five agreements have come to the Court since 2016, including the one that brought the Fire Marshal’s Office in during July 2026. Every one of them passed on the consent agenda. The Austin Regional Intelligence Center has what the agreement says the center collects, who oversees it, and what the county’s share costs, which is the one number the record does not give.

Drones

The Sheriff’s Office has flown drones since late 2019, and Texas law makes it report what it did with them. Its report for 2023 and 2024 counts 1,304 flights, 263 criminal investigations aided and $41,136.18 in cost. The Court created a task force in 2017 to write county drone policies and to ask residents what they thought; we could not find an adopted policy or the feedback in its record since. Sheriff’s Office drones has the numbers and the gaps, including a flight log that gives the location of all 1,304 flights as “Travis County, Texas”.

The county’s own cameras

Travis County runs a countywide Genetec camera and badge system, and asked for $2,750,000 in the Fiscal Year 2025 capital budget to upgrade it, alongside $1,127,838 for a fourth phase of law enforcement cameras. Nothing in the record says how many cameras there are or how long recordings are kept. County security cameras has what the budget documents say.

What is being asked for now

The county’s technology department has asked the Court for about $30 million over four years to expand its Axon contract: body cameras and in-car cameras across eight county agencies, drone detection over the jail, American made drones for the Sheriff and the Constables, and Axon’s Fusus product to replace the jail’s camera system, which the request calls a real time crime center. The 2027 Axon request has the figures and what each piece does. The Court discussed it on 1 September 2026 and took no action. If it matters to you, the budget is where to say so.

What the record does not cover

The county is not where most surveillance in Travis County is decided. Austin runs its own police department, its own camera network and its own regional intelligence center seat, and Pflugerville, Lakeway, Manor, Lago Vista, Bee Cave, Sunset Valley and West Lake Hills run police departments that the EFF Atlas of Surveillance records as operating plate readers, drones or camera registries. We have not read any city council’s record.

Inside the county record, the questions that matter most to a resident are the ones the documents do not answer: how many plate reader cameras the county’s own contract covers, how long a read is kept and who can search it, what the Sheriff’s memorandum of understanding with Flock Safety allows, what Travis County pays the fusion center each year, and where the drones actually flew.