{"id":163122,"date":"2026-02-20T22:17:10","date_gmt":"2026-02-20T22:17:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/163122\/"},"modified":"2026-02-20T22:17:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-20T22:17:10","slug":"orlando-city-council-to-vote-on-6-8m-police-drone-program-monday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/163122\/","title":{"rendered":"Orlando City Council to vote on $6.8M police drone program Monday"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Credit: Courtesy of Skydio<\/a><\/p>\n

Orlando City Council on Monday will vote on whether to amend the city\u2019s existing contract with defense manufacturing company Axon to allow the police department to purchase 11 new drones from the company as part of an effort to respond to 911 calls more quickly.<\/p>\n

The drone program, building on a pilot program of the Orlando Police Department, would cost the city $6.83 million over the next eight years, or $759,322 annually, according to city documents. The initial term of the city\u2019s contract with Axon would be four years, with an option to renew it for another five years after that.\u00a0<\/p>\n

According to a city memo<\/a>, Axon\u2019s Skydio<\/a> drones would be used as part of a \u201cDrone as First Responder\u201d program within the Orlando Police Department, specifically its crime center. The drones would be dispatched by a federally licensed, sworn police officer pilot in response to 911 calls that are believed to be life-threatening, involve major property damage, or be otherwise time-sensitive, according to Bungalower<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Orlando Police Department, per city documents, has an existing multimillion-dollar agreement with Axon for body-worn cameras for its officers, in-car cameras for police vehicles, and taser devices. According to a Feb. 3 memo<\/a> from OPD Chief Eric Smith, sent to the city\u2019s chief procurement officer, David Billingsley, Axon\u2019s drones \u2014 unlike those made by Axon competitor Brinc \u2014 \u201ccan respond directly to our body cameras and 911 calls as they come in.\u201d<\/p>\n

The goal is to have a response time to 911 calls of under three minutes, according to the memo, so drones can provide information to OPD even before an officer is able to arrive on-scene. The amended contract between the city and Axon would allow for the department to purchase the drones, as well as accessories (such as drone parachutes) and \u201congoing support,\u201d per the memo.<\/p>\n

Smith\u2019s memo to the city\u2019s procurement department indicates that OPD had also reached out to Flock Safety, a controversial police technology manufacturer<\/a>, but notes that Flock \u201cfailed to provide us with a product to evaluate\u201d \u2014 hence the decision to move forward with Axon\u2019s product.<\/p>\n

Orlando Weekly reached out to the city and OPD for more information about this proposed drone program, but did not immediately receive a response.<\/p>\n

A controversial \u2018eye in the sky\u2019<\/p>\n

Police drone programs have sparked privacy concerns in other parts of the country. According to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit civil liberties watchdog group, police drone programs can, in practice, lead to the oversurveillance of neighborhoods<\/a> that generate higher concentrations of 911 calls and end up \u201ccollecting information on anyone who happens to be in the drone\u2019s path.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Skydio, the drones can be integrated with Axon body cameras worn by officers so that officers can request a drone at the push of a button. The drone would be dispatched to the officer \u2014 offering a live video feed of its journey from above \u2014 from a dock location, although it\u2019s unclear from city documents where in Orlando those dock locations would be placed.<\/p>\n

As of December Skydio\u2019s drone products are in use by more than 1,000 law enforcement agencies<\/a> across the country, according to the blog DroneLife, including the Orange County Sheriff\u2019s Office<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Related Stories<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Don\u2019t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\tSmarten up, y\u2019all. Jesus.\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

The autonomous technology hasn\u2019t been welcomed by all, however. According to Spectrum News, Skydio drones have been at the heart of a roughly year-long back and forth<\/a> in Syracuse, New York, over civil liberty and privacy concerns voiced by critics. \u201cThey should not be approved for remote use without a lot more clarity and articulation of appropriate limits on their use,\u201d one resident told the Syracuse City Council in October.<\/p>\n

Drone technology has also been flagged by watchdog groups over concerns they\u2019ll be used to surveil vulnerable populations<\/a> like immigrants and people seeking abortion care. These concerns come at a time, of course, where abortion access has become severely restricted legally in GOP-controlled states like Florida, and the Trump administration is partnering with local law enforcement agencies<\/a> like OPD to detain people accused of being in the country illegally.<\/p>\n

The \u201cdrone as first responder\u201d program first originated<\/a> in 2019 in Chula Vista, California, according to the American Civil Liberties Union, which released a critical report of DFR programs in 2023. The use of drone technology by police departments, it notes, was made easier through a deregulatory move<\/a> by the Federal Aviation Authority in 2016.<\/p>\n

According to the Washington Post, the FAA further streamlined<\/a> the process of developing a DFR program for law enforcement this past spring. Agencies are required under federal regulation to get a waiver from the FAA in order to use autonomous DFR drones, the Post explained, since the drones don\u2019t need to be in direct view of an officer for it to be used.<\/p>\n

Police departments, including Orlando, like to tout this kind of program as an effective way for them to have \u201ceyes in the sky<\/a>.\u201d Law enforcement leaders have described it as a \u201clifesaving\u201d technology. A police lieutenant in Laredo, Texas, told the Post their department equips drones with Narcan so that the drone can drop the opioid overdose reversal medication off suspected overdose cases where time is, critically, of the essence.<\/p>\n

Civil liberties advocates, however, have cautioned against allowing surveillance technology into communities without guardrails for exactly how and under what circumstances they will be used.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s important that we don\u2019t sleepwalk into a world of widespread aerial surveillance, that communities think very carefully about whether they want drone surveillance, and, if they decide to permit some operations, put in place guardrails that will prevent those operations from expanding,\u201d the ACLU report notes.<\/p>\n

Subscribe to Orlando Weekly newsletters.<\/a><\/p>\n

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