WA Legislative Efforts to ban Chinese Drones Senate Bill 5302
Does anyone have anything else to add on these efforts to ban Chinese made drones like DJI/Autel? I have a few points from last year's attempts to do this, but it is back again this year with this new senate bill. I need as much information as possible to combat the misinformation being pushed by the lobbyists like Skydio/Brinc to get their competition banned. Any resources you have to add to this below would be beneficial as I try to compile more data. Thank you.
Legislative Educational Bullets
● LEDA was founded by LEOs for the purpose of creating best practices and standards of training for the use of UAS in Law Enforcement across the nation
● LEDA has over 1700 LEO members and almost 1000 agencies nationally and puts on training conferences throughout the country.
● Between approximately 70-80% of our members are using some sort of Chinese made drone, be it DJI or Autel
● Drones are used in LE for the following purposes:
○ SAR
■ Drones are able to cover a huge area and in most cases are able to help teams allocate ground resources effectively and efficiently
■ Drones have been widely successful in locating lost/missing people around the nation recently.
○ Crash/Crime Scene Recon
■ Drones are an extremely effective tool for documenting fatal crash scenes and open air crime scenes, effectively opening up streets in a fraction of the time it would take most lidar scanners.
○ Tactical Deployments
■ Drones are flown into structures during search warrant applications for tactical teams before sending a human inside the structure.
■ Drones can search for armed/dangerous people and relay valuable information to the IC, potentially avoiding unwanted confrontations or use of force with volatile subjects
○ Exigent Person Searches
■ Drones provide an excellent modified air support for K9 search teams and ground teams and provide a point of observation that before only manned aviation could provide.
■ They also help avoid unnecessary confrontations between offices and suspects and help us shift our tactics if necessary to gain compliance from a fleeing or hiding suspect.
■ Drones are an effective tool to DE-ESCALATE potentially volatile incidents and reduce the number of lawful, yet unwanted uses of force.
● LEDA is Drone Agnostic and doesn’t push a specific drone platform over another. We just want our member agencies to be able to choose the best tool for their respective mission
● There is not a drone made by a US manufacturer that is comparable in capabilities or as cost effective as the two major Chinese drone manufacturers.
○ At this point, agencies would have to pay anywhere between 3-10+ times the cost of a DJI drone to get a US made drone that is less capable and less reliable.
○ Due their inability to compete in the marketplace Brinc and Sydio predominately have used, “Regulatory Capture,” in an attempt to remove their competition.
● If these bills were to pass in their current form, LEDA believes the unintended consequence would be the shuttering of UAS programs nationwide and it would take years to build them back up, leaving a huge void in the safety of our communities without that tool.
○ The costs (unfunded mandates) associated with the proposed bill.
■ For the WSP alone, this would be $3,000,000!
■ For small agencies it would just mean shuttering their program which would endanger lives.
● The other side of this unintended consequence is the fact that the US drone market is not set up to handle the amount of demand that would happen if these bills were to pass.
○ Thousands of public safety agencies would then have to shift their demand to US made drones from companies that don’t have the manufacturing infrastructure to meet those demands, creating another huge gap in service.
○ Florida Chair Torres-demand will drive prices up, US Dep of Interior 8-14 times more expensive and only 20% of the desired equipment of current DJI drones in a hearing they held with the hearing posted on Youtube: Blue sUAS Problems and Florida DMS Secretary Accused of Pimping for Skydio - YouTube
● No technical merit behind these risks, fearmongering. The legislation that is being proposed will do nothing to address the purported security risk.
○ Public disclosure laws and how we use a third party app to fly which is secure (Dronesense). Sometimes they will talk about “critical infrastructure” concerns and I point out that the FAA already bars flying over critical infrastructure and that police ops never fly over critical infrastructure.
● Our ask is that agencies be able to choose which platform best suits the needs of their agency and community in both capability and budget.
So here is a folder with a bunch of information that you can use when you speak with legislators about this topic. There is also video testimony to model when you testify in hearings. We encourage you all to engage as soon and as much as you are able, as sometimes these bills can grow legs and run really fast into passing. It's important to get ahead of it early, invite your legislators out to put on a dog and pony show demonstrating the skills and abilities of your team and equipment. Explain to them what and why you are using, as well as demo drones they're trying to pin you into and ask them up front, "If your child went missing, would you want us using the best equipment possible to find them, or would you want us using more expensive inferior equipment? Please visit this Google Drive folder often and use the resources within to help you understand how to combat the disinformation being promulgated by lobby groups. The folder also contains LEDA's current stance on legislative bills related to country of origin.