In Redmond, police drones can get anywhere in the city in 90 seconds or less.
They can be used to track suspects, trace fast-spreading fires and check traffic. Experts say drones make high-risk operations safer and more efficient.
But while law enforcement groups across the state add drones to their tool kits — including in Bellingham and Everett — the Seattle Police Department says it has no plans to do the same.
This is because of the city's surveillance ordinance, said department spokesperson Sgt. Patrick Michaud. Approved in 2017, a law says Seattle agencies need the City Council’s permission to adopt new technology that can record its surroundings — a process that takes months.
Yet drones still fly in the city. Instead of getting their own, Seattle police have been relying on King County's fleet.
When Seattle police first considered using drones in 2012, the age of controversial Flock cameras had yet to arrive, but when officers unveiled their plan at a public meeting, they still faced pushback from protesters.
The drone program was widely criticized by residents and city leaders, so much so that in 2013, then-Mayor Mike McGinn told police to cancel the program and return its drones to the vendor.
“We heard you,” Michaud said in an interview. “We backed away from that program, sold off our drones, made it very public that we were getting rid of them, and we haven't really approached it since then.”
However, the King County sheriff's office maintains a fleet of drones that can fly within Seattle city limits to help police. The sheriff's drone program was launched in 2022, but today the program has 35 drones and around 50 deputies certified to operate them. Publicly available flight maps show these drones have flown in Seattle more than 15 times since December 2025.
Under the county’s drone policy, there are six scenarios in which the aircrafts can be deployed. They're used to provide tactical support during emergencies, like natural disasters or encounters with armed suspects, which could put officers' safety at risk. They're also used to perform security checks, support search-and-rescue missions and document crime scenes.
During Seattle's summer World Cup games, for instance, sheriff's deputies used drones to secure the airspace around the stadium.
And hours after a mass shooting left three people dead at the Bite of Seattle food festival in July, a single drone zigzagged above Seattle Center, scanning the scene. It flew and landed four times between 9:01 p.m. and 9:50 p.m., likely stopping for battery changes. Michaud said the drone captured photos and video police could use to investigate the crime.
During a City Council public safety committee meeting on Sept. 22, police said they are considering tapping the sheriff's office to station drone operators at large gatherings, like sporting events. That way, deputies can respond quickly in case of an emergency.
While the plan is not fully developed, the mayor's office plans to work with Seattle police, other law enforcement entities, City Council and residents to explore the idea, according to Alex Hudson, a spokesperson for Mayor Katie Wilson.
Councilmember Bob Kettle, the public safety chair, said preauthorizing drone use at major events can help address unique security challenges.
Traditionally some of these major venues could have relatively low crime," he said. "But here's the issue … the fact that the major venues bring so many people together, it becomes a unique circumstance that needs to be addressed from a security perspective."
Kettle said city leaders intend to explore the plan in the first quarter of next year, weighing public safety and surveillance concerns.
"We do look to be comprehensive and have that balance where we sacrifice things on the public safety side," he said. "For example, we don't have facial recognition with our CCTV program. That could be very helpful for public safety, but we didn't use it because of the concern related to privacy and civil liberties."
Because the sheriff's office's drones are allowed to fly in Seattle only for specific emergencies, Kettle said his concerns with the program are low for now, but he's open to reviewing and updating the city's technology policies.
The drones are stored in deputies' vehicles, so they're prepared to assist promptly when an agency calls for help. Each emergency call is screened to determine whether flying a drone is necessary or appropriate, according to Sgt. Jason Stanley, who leads the King County sheriff's office's Air Control Unit.
When deputies capture photos or video, the sheriff's photography policy says they must be retained in evidence.com, a web portal run by Axon, a military and law enforcement technology company.
These drones appear to operate in a gray area when it comes to Seattle's surveillance ordinance.
The law says Seattle agencies directing non-city entities to acquire or operate surveillance technology on the city's behalf would also need the City Council's approval. But city officials, asked for clarification, said that rule doesn't apply when the Seattle Police Department calls in King County's drones.
"The City of Seattle Surveillance Ordinance only impacts City of Seattle departments," said Megan Erb, a spokesperson for Seattle IT, which oversees the city's use of surveillance technology.
Likewise, Seattle's Inspector General for Public Safety, Lisa Judge, explained since Seattle is in King County, the sheriff's office has "concurrent jurisdiction" to operate their drones.
They are "not bound by local Seattle laws and regulations," she wrote in an email.
Judge said the county’s drone program has not violated Seattle's surveillance ordinance so far.
“This is fairly new and any requests for drone support by SPD appear scarce and sporadic,” she wrote.
She said the inspector general's office will monitor how drones are being used to ensure people’s privacy and civil liberties are protected.
Stanley said the sheriff's office is aware of surveillance concerns.
“The Pacific Northwest is very privacy-focused,” he said. “It's super-important to folks in Washington state, and it's important to us as well.”
He said officer safety is one of the main reasons deputies deploy drones.
“If we can spend $1,000 or $4,000 or something like that on a little robot, and if it gets shot or destroyed, it's not one of our people that that's happening to,” he said.
According to Stanley, King County’s drone policy was also designed with the American Civil Liberties Union's guidelines in mind. The guide presents several recommendations on how law enforcement agencies can design their drone programs to minimize risks to civilians. The Federal Emergency Management Agency has also approved the county's drone policy.
“As far as I know, we're the only agency in Washington state that has a FEMA-approved drone policy,” Stanley said. “We have thousands of hours of flight time, and I'm not aware of any complaints with our drones.”
The drones are not armed or equipped with facial recognition technology. They also fly with cameras pointed horizontally to avoid capturing people or private properties until they get where they're going.
However, a policy expert with ACLU Washington raised several concerns around where and why these drones are flying.
“Drones might be deployed more frequently in certain neighborhoods, for example, in communities of color,” said Tee Sannon, technology policy program director at ACLU Washington. “That might end up meaning that certain communities are surveilled or tracked more than others.”
She said federal agencies and out-of-state actors have used surveillance to target vulnerable groups like immigrants and people traveling to Washington for reproductive or gender-affirming care.
Research from the University of Washington has connected license plate searches and technology like Flock cameras to immigration arrests by groups like ICE and Customs and Border Protection, prompting growing concerns over how local and federal law enforcement are using surveillance devices.
The King County sheriff's office follows the Keeping Washington Working Act, which means it does not share records with ICE or the Department of Homeland Security unless a court order mandates it. The law largely bars local law enforcement agencies from assisting federal immigration enforcement.
Michaud said Seattle police follow the same law, ensuring federal agencies can't access the department's records without a warrant.
Sannon also raised concerns about “mission creep”: when a technology deployed to serve one purpose winds up being used for something else.
“If a drone is initially supposed to be used for first response but then ends up being used for investigative surveillance as well, that can also be really concerning,” she said.
These questions come as law enforcement and first-responder agencies in and around Seattle scramble to invest in their own drones.
The Seattle Fire Department in July proposed bringing in up to three drones to help firefighters monitor dangerous conditions and get aerial views of fast-spreading fires.
The Washington State Patrol also uses drones. Police in Kent and Bellevue are researching and piloting the technology.
In Redmond, drones have been deployed in response to common incidents like retail thefts. A video that went viral on social media this year showed drone footage of a person who robbed a Target leaving the store on foot and running to a nearby Home Depot. Because a drone tracked the person's movement, police were able to arrive on scene and arrest them in minutes.
Redmond police Chief Darrell Lowe said the technology was a "return on investment.
“From the time the call came in to handcuffs on the suspect was less than five minutes, and that was because we had a drone overhead,” Lowe said.
Redmond's police drones also have thermal imaging capabilities which help them identify people and assist with fire responses.
Drone footage is kept for 30 days then deleted, if it's no longer necessary, in accordance with state law.
Lowe said the department has worked to strike “a balance between the community's right and need for privacy, versus the ability to identify, capture, and hold accountable individuals who commit crimes in our communities.”
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