“The law expands the state’s definition of invasion of privacy to include sending a drone over private property to make a recording or take photos,” as BBC News reported. It was passed as Assembly Bill 856 and introduced by Assemblyman Ian Calderon, D-Whittier.

Wielding the veto

Just weeks ago, Brown had refused to sign yet another bill that would have extended trespassing law to include similar activity. The bill, Brown warned, “could expose the occasional hobbyist and the FAA-approved commercial user alike to burdensome litigation and new causes of action,” the Los Angeles Times noted.

Three other drone-curbing bills vetoed by Brown “would have prohibited civilians from flying aerial drones over wildfires, schools, prisons and jails,” the Times reported separately. “The governor rejected those and six other bills that would have created new crimes or penalties for misconduct including using bullhooks to handle elephants, allowing explosions in drug labs and removing GPS tracking devices from paroled sex offenders. Brown said in a veto message that there are already laws available to deal with any problems addressed by the bills.”

In his veto statement, Brown complained that the drone bills fell into the pattern of “finding a novel way to characterize and criminalize conduct that is already proscribed. This multiplication and particularization of criminal behavior creates increasing complexity without commensurate benefit.”

Legislative frustration

The author of the three bills, state Sen. Ted Gaines, R-El Dorado, made his dissatisfaction plain in recent remarks to the press. “I think it’s dumb,” Gaines said, according to Southern California Public Radio. “Aren’t we supposed to be protecting the public? If I’m an elected official — he’s the governor, I’m a senator — isn’t one of our key roles that we play in public service to protect the public, and certainly Cal Fire employees?”

The discovery that hobbyists’ drones had interfered with firefighting this summer had fueled the push for criminalizing that activity. “The U.S. Forest Service has repeatedly posted reminders warning people that a collision between a hobbyist drone and the low-flying aircraft and helicopters used to fight wildfire could cause damage to the aircraft and injuries to the pilots and people below,” Ars Technica reported. “Despite the warnings, drone sightings keep happening over wildfires, causing the U.S. Forest Service thousands of dollars in aborted flyovers.”

But the private use of drones raised broader concerns including the safety of commercial aircraft. “A couple years ago, it was 200,000, so it is increasing geometrically, and I think it was a mistake for the governor not to see ahead into the future in terms of the chronic aspect of drone use, in the wrong way, in the state of California,” added Gaines. Along with Assemblyman Mike Gatto, D-Glendale, Gaines had hoped to increase the penalty for interfering with firefighting to $5,000 and up to six months in jail “if the drone interference was ruled reckless and intentional,” Ars noted.

Analysts sympathetic to the legislation suggested that lawmakers were justified in their impatience with the federal government’s pace in crafting drone regulations of its own. “In the state of California, it is already a misdemeanor to ‘engage in disorderly conduct that delays or prevents a fire from being timely extinguished’ or to prevent emergency responders from discharging their duties,” noted Justin Peters in Slate. “Legislators’ attempts to get specific are a function of frustration, both with drone operators whose actions too often defy common sense and with a federal government that is taking its sweet time to come up with comprehensive regulations for an industry that desperately needs them.”

Deflating anxiety

“Drone technology certainly raises novel issues that merit careful examination. This bill, however, while well-intentioned, could expose the occasional hobbyist and the FAA-approved commercial user alike to burdensome litigation and new causes of action,” Brown noted in his veto statement, as the Los Angeles Times reported.

Amateur drone enthusiasts have recently taken heat for interfering with emergency responders and posing a hazard to air traffic. But a recent study conducted by hobbyists’ advocacy group the Academy of Model Aeronautics challenged that blanket judgment. “Hobbyists who scrutinized reports to the FAA of alleged close calls with drones found that pilots reported near misses in only a small fraction of the cases,” as USA Today reported. “The study found that of the 764 close-call incidents between drones and other aircraft, only 27 were actually described by pilots as a ‘near miss,'” with pilots taking evasive action just 10 times.

The governor also cautioned that the legislation’s height restriction would criminalize drone use “whether or not anyone’s privacy was violated by the flight,” the Orange County Register observed.

State Sen. Hannah-Beth Jackson, D-Santa Barbara, took the defeat stoically. “I am obviously disappointed that the governor vetoed my drone privacy legislation, but pleased the bill launched an important discussion on our privacy and private property rights and drones,” she said in a post to Facebook, according to Wired.

Industry advocates, on the other hand, showed little restraint in hailing the move. “Brendan Schulman, the vice president of policy and legal affairs for drone maker DJI, called the veto ‘a huge victory for drone innovation,'” Wired added.

Big implications

Fearing a slippery slope, prominent names in news media also jumped into the fray, warning Brown of insurmountable difficulties if he signed the bill into law. “The groups, including professional organizations like the Society of Professional Journalists and outlets like CNN and the parent company of the Los Angeles Times, said in a letter Thursday to Gov. Jerry Brown that this restriction will make it incredibly difficult for reporters to use drones for newsgathering purposes,” The Hill reported. The would-be hurdles threatened “the public’s right to receive news,” the letter cautioned, especially during the early moments of breaking news coverage.

Although Brown’s decision was also seen as a big win for companies like Amazon and Google, which are poised to incorporate drones into their businesses, neither of those tech titans have come forward with comment. Significant questions remain as to how they could proceed with possible innovations like drone delivery of packages under current FAA regulations.

Legal uncertainty

The government agency recently turned its attention to laying out strictures that could govern a more drone-heavy future. “The Federal Aviation Administration has proposed rules for commercial drones that would restrict flights to below 500 feet,” as the Wall Street Journal reported. “Above that level is generally reserved for manned aircraft. Under those rules, the bill would have left commercial drone users just a 150-foot ribbon of airspace over much of the state. If companies wanted to fly lower, they would have needed to get permission from dozens of landowners for some flights, which could be a logistical nightmare.”

Brown’s decision increased the likelihood that Washington, D.C., would move faster than Sacramento in getting new rules and guidelines through. “The Federal Aviation Administration is moving toward finalizing rules for drone use, and the National Telecommunications and Information Administration is leading stakeholder discussions to develop best practices for using drones,” The Hill observed.

In the meanwhile, according to the Journal, the FAA has insisted that its regulations preempt state law, a stance that likely tees up judicial intervention. Some 17 states have passed laws of their own setting limits on drone use.

By Chris Reed

The Federal Aviation Administration’s announcement that 11 air control towers in California will shut down on Sunday, April 7, because of sequestration cuts to the federal budget is offered up by the administration as unfortunate but inevitable. But a Los Angeles Times account was refreshingly tart about what’s really going on:

“Critics have questioned whether the closures were necessary or part of a tactical gambit to gain leverage in Washington’s ongoing budget battles. The contract tower association’s executive director, Spencer Dickerson, said in a statement that ‘aviation safety shouldn’t be politicized.’

“Many smaller airports operate without control towers, with pilots using radio communications to coordinate movements in the air and on the ground.

“Still, local officials responsible for airport operations in Southern California’s busy airspace said the FAA’s decision is worrisome. Los Angeles County Supervisor Michael Antonovich chided the government for a ‘politically motivated decision.’ Shutting down towers would have little impact on spending levels, he said, but a big impact on public safety.”

The Times’ insinuations are welcome. Does anyone truly believe that the Obama administration is dealing with $85 billion in cuts in a  $3.6 trillion budget in a way that reflects best management practices and a desire to maximize safety?

Nah. In the White House’s never-ending attempts to demonize anyone who doesn’t want spending to go up now and forever, we’re seeing scary decisions by the Federal Aviation Administration — decisions that could lead to fatal crashes and accidents.

Wouldn’t a federal wage and hiring freeze make a lot more sense than shutting down air control towers? Of course.

The California-style twist to the federal sequester

Here’s the context to the FAA’s decision that doesn’t get the focus it should. Federal employees aren’t losing their jobs — just contractors:

“The U.S. will close 149 air-traffic control towers run by contractors at small- and mid-sized airports beginning on April 7 as a result of automatic budget cuts at government agencies.”

That’s Bloomberg’s lead to its March 22 story. So public employees are insulated from the consequences of government budget chaos.

How very California of Washington.

By Chris Reed

President Barack Obama’s re-election has led some California small-government types to pull back on their criticism, perhaps thinking that the Chicago Republican must be doing something right if he can win the Golden State’s popular vote by 23 percent with the state economy in such terrible shape.

But the California electorate’s conclusions can’t hide the wreckage from Obama’s years in the White House. He’s been one of our worst presidents, a smug faculty-lounge smart guy who has no understanding of or sympathy for the private sector — as well as being the epitome of the liberal big-spender who thinks you can print borrowed money for years on end with little consequence. And on the management front, for all his political savvy, the president’s administration is loaded with examples of incompetence and wastefulness.

Case study: the Federal Aviation Administration. When the stimulus bill’s $800 billion was being spread around, the FAA was insanely wasteful, according to an internal probe released in August 2009:

“Officials in the U.S. Department of Transportation have allocated millions of dollars in stimulus funds for small airports, even though the projects did not qualify for funding under the criteria established by the agency. The findings were uncovered by the Transportation Department’s inspector general, whose August 7 advisory reported that 50 projects were given money despite the fact that they scored less than the minimum required 62 on a 0-100 scale created to determine eligibility for federal stimulus funds. Inspector General Calvin Scovel III said the Federal Aviation Administration chose low-priority airports for stimulus money so that every state got at least some of the funding.

“One example cited in the IG’s report was the new airport in the remote Alaskan village of Ouzinkie on Spruce Island, population 167, which received $14.7 million even though it already had a gravel airstrip, landing area for sea planes and access to cargo barges. Ouzinkie averages 42 flights a month.

“An airpark near Dover, Delaware was given $909,806 to design (rather than build) a runway because that was Delaware’s only ‘ready-to-go’ project.”

Before that report came out, Pro Publica and CBS News also had this stomach-turning scooplet:

“The Federal Aviation Administration has now allocated all of its $1.1 billion in stimulus money for airport improvements. But the complex set of rules laid out in the recovery act has led to some counterintuitive results.

“The biggest winners aren’t the busiest airports. And more than $100 million is going to airports that have fewer than one flight an hour—airports that cater to recreational fliers, corporate jets or remote communities.”

Prudent cuts? Nah! Let’s endanger people!