Ceaser Williams: On The Vine: What will our homeland look like? Ceaser Williams, The Kansas City Star
Apr. 29 Hey folks! I ll be stepping in for this week s edition of On The Vine. I spend most of my time at The Star covering gun violence as a public health issue. But lately, I ve also been thinking a lot about that other public health crisis we just can t seem to escape: COVID-19.
I was lucky enough to get my second dose of the vaccine a few weeks ago. Suddenly, all this tension and stress I didn t even realize I was carrying was lifted off my shoulders.
With the pandemic still worsening, drones were a way of policing at a distance, said Rahul Sidhu, an officer in Redondo Beach, near Los Angeles, which started a programme similar to the one in Chula Vista just after the virus reached the US.
“We’re just trying to limit our exposure to other people,” he said.
But the use of the drones against civilians has raised some concerns among civil rights advocates. For example, some say the drones could easily be used to identify people.
“Communities should ask hard questions about these programmes. As the power and scope of this technology expands, so does the need for privacy protection,” Jay Stanley, a senior policy analyst with the American Civil Liberties Union’s Project on Speech, Privacy and Technology told
Officers say the drones will help limit human contact, a key in the Covid-19 pandemic
20 December 2020 • 7:10pm
Police in the US are preparing to trial the use of drones to respond to emergency calls
Credit: LUCA PIERGIOVANNI/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock /Shutterstock
Police forces across the US are trialling the use of drones to respond to emergency calls, sending them out to follow suspects on foot and in getaway cars, as well as helping in rescues.
Chula Vista police department in Southern California was the first in the country to trial a programme called Drone as First Responder, hoping to save millions on the cost of helicopters and pilots.