DENVER — Denver City Council members face a vote this week that will determine whether the city keeps dozens of license plate-reading cameras or ends the controversial program — at least, for now.

After the original contract vote was delayed last week, several council members have seemed hesitant to approve the deal, leaving its chances unclear amid continuing concerns about the risks of surveillance technology.

“I don’t know that we need this tool,” Councilwoman Flor Alvidrez said Friday. “I don’t know that it’s actually helping.”

A contract with the city’s current provider for the license plate cameras, a controversial company called Flock Safety, will expire Tuesday. Mayor Mike Johnston’s administration proposed that the city begin a new contract for the service with Axon Enterprise.

If the council rejects the one-year contract — which would cost $150,000 and provide 50 cameras at a maximum of 20 intersections — Johnston’s administration has said the program will shut down. Axon’s network would have roughly half as many cameras as Flock’s.

“Losing this technology would weaken our police department’s ability to investigate homicides, sexual assaults, hit-and-runs and auto thefts,” said city spokesman Jon Ewing in an email. “In short, it would make our city less safe and would leave Denver as one of the only large cities in the country without a license plate reader system.”

Johnston’s office and the council have been at odds over the cameras for months after reports showed that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement had accessed Denver data in its efforts to carry out mass deportations. After the council rejected a contract with Flock over concerns about the company last year, Johnston’s administration extended the city’s relationship with the company twice more, calling it a vital crime-fighting tool.

Denver District Attorney John Walsh recently sent a letter to council members in support of the contract, calling the automatic license plate recognition, or ALPR, technology “uniquely powerful and effective.”

“In case after case, ALPR has been the key initial tool to identify suspect vehicles and suspects – often providing the only initial avenue for investigation,” he wrote.

The technology played a significant role in solving 16 homicide investigations in 2025, he said. The mayor’s office also credits the cameras for the recovery of more than 400 stolen cars and the removal of more than 60 firearms from the streets.

During a public hearing last week, the council heard an hour of public testimony about the new agreement with Axon, with 55 people signing up to speak. Forty-two of them were opposed, 12 were in favor and one person was neutral.

Councilman Kevin Flynn triggered an option that delayed the vote by one week. Now, the council will take its sole vote on the contract on Tuesday. The council is meeting a day later than usual because Monday is “Sí, Se Puede Day,” a city holiday renamed recently after a New York Times investigation reported sexual abuse allegations against César Chávez, the holiday’s former namesake.

Though the council normally votes only on contracts valued at over $500,000, Johnston’s office opted to bring the Axon deal through that process in an effort to be more collaborative.

Last week, the council asked some questions of Axon, the mayor’s office and the Denver Police Department. Several of them signaled they had major concerns about the contract.

“With the current person who is occupying the White House ... I don’t have faith that if we expand this, what happens (as a result). That’s why I’m concerned about a security breach,” council President Amanda Sandoval said.

Tim Hoffman, the director of policy for the mayor’s office, acknowledged those concerns during the meeting.

“We aren’t in the world that we were in a year ago. We aren’t even in the world we were in a couple of months ago, in terms of what we have seen out of this federal government,” he said of President Donald Trump’s administration. “What we have done with this contract is try to balance the very real benefit to public safety that it provides with the very legitimate privacy and civil liberty considerations.”

The cameras work by snapping photos of passing cars, capturing their license plates and any identifiable features — such as a scratch or a dent — and using that data to help investigate crimes like car thefts, hit-and-runs, kidnappings and homicides. The city now has 111 Flock-operated cameras doing that work.

In February, Johnston announced that the city would end its relationship with Flock because of the concerns raised by council members and residents. Johnston said Axon was chosen as a replacement because it doesn’t have a national database and has a high degree of data security.

Axon already contracts with the city for police officers’ body-worn cameras, Tasers and a livestream camera system called Fusus that uses hundreds of cameras throughout the city. The new license-plate cameras would have livestreaming capabilities as well.

Councilwoman Sarah Parady, one of the most vocal council opponents of Flock, cited the Fusus network as one of the reasons she still had concerns about the technology.

“They are integrated into so many other systems,” she said. “We are sort of trading what was basically a national ALPR company for a company that is not primarily focused on ALPRs, but is layering all of these different forms of surveillance — and we do not have all the information on that yet.”

Parady is one of the members of the city’s Surveillance Task Force, which Johnston’s office convened last year in response to the concerns over Flock. Some council members have said they want to see that task force develop an overall city ordinance related to surveillance before they approve a new contract for license plate readers.

“Even if the contract has some good provisions, those are not laws,” Alvidrez said. “Remedies are different when you’re talking about a contract, versus city ordinance.”

Alvidrez, who is one of a few key undecided votes on the contract on the 13-member council, said she was leaning toward “no” on Friday. Councilwoman Jamie Torres, another undecided member, said she was also more likely to vote against it.

“I’ve heard evenly from folks who want (Denver Police Department) to be able to solve crimes … and others who frankly just can’t get over the apprehension that was developed during this whole Flock era. That’s going to leave a bad taste in people’s mouth,” she said.

If the contract doesn’t pass, Torres said she would be interested in seeing the city try again after developing more protections.

Alvidrez said she would want to see whether not having the tool made much of a difference in crime solving in the city.

The council’s meeting is set to begin at 3:30 p.m. Tuesday.

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