NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF) — Metro Council will once again take up a proposal to bring license plate readers to Nashville.
If passed, any department of Metro government could acquire license plate recognition technology, but they'd have to meet a strict set of requirements.
There have been several bills regarding license plate readers that have come up for consideration by council in the past year, but all have been shelved due to various concerns, like that they could be used to racially profile.
This proposal would allow the readers to collect information for investigating and prosecuting criminal offenses.
This includes violent crime, persons engaged in street racing, recovering stolen vehicles, detecting civil traffic, or parking offense and assisting in missing persons cases like Amber and Silver Alerts.
Also, law enforcement would need to confirm visually that a plate matches the number and state identified in the alert, before taking any action.
They would also have to check to see if the alert is still active.
Data would only be kept for 10 days unless the information is being used to prosecute a criminal offense.
The bill goes through its first reading at Metro Council's meeting on Tuesday, which begins at 6:30 p.m.
