[Edit 2/5/21: Senator Lee never introduced this amendment. We’re not sure if he ran out of time, or he received too much pressure. We’ll keep an eye on things and let y’all know if we need to rally again. Congrats!]
Senator Lee is attempting to bring back his previously defeated Drone Federalism Bill.
Today the Senate will be debating amendments to the U.S. Budget bill. And Senator Lee is going to introduce his attempt at legal thievery of our rights to fly by adding an amendment that would give “States and local governments” the right to control (& likely tax) the first “200 feet above ground level”.
As every who reads this knows, that would devastate both our industry and our hobby.
Can you imagine what it would be like if every state, county, city, and tribe government had the right to tell we drone owners when and where we are allowed to fly? How about if they have the right to tax us or impose landing and launching fees.
Every politician in the country would set Google Calendar reminders to propose new taxes and fees as soon as the Senator’s bill allowed them to. There is a moratorium on when, but they can start doing just that in 4 years.
And what about what this perversion of our rights would do to our industry? What would it do to our daily preflight routine if we have more than one flight that day? What about the absurdity of additional paperwork and billing this will do to this industry?
Can you imagine having to keep track of each and every municipality you fly in that day, as well as what the state and county will be charging? How many new lines will this add to your invoice template. And that’s assuming your clients will even allow you to pass along that cost. How will you keep track of those new regulations? This would create the very “patchwork quilt of UAS regulations” that the FAA is concerned about.
And what can we do as a community? Reach out to your state’s Senator in D.C. Email them, call them, or if you’re close, visit them in D.C. or stop by their local office. They all have local offices. Even if they’re closed for COVID, find the local people and blow up their phone lines.
Do it today! Your livelihood or hobby depends on it.
Explain in no uncertain (but diplomatic) terms what this will do to this industry. Tell them to please NOT support this amendment. Ask them to personally approach Senator Lee on the floor of the Senate and tell him to STOP this amendment process. Tell them to kill Lee Amendment 256!!!
Quick recap:
- This will craft a myriad of new rules that would create a nightmare for drone owners;
- This is a precursor to taxes and fee that can increase business and hobby costs;
- With Remote ID, it’s unnecessary and duplicate regulations;
- Keep it civil and precise;
- Remember that nice goes a long way.
Go here, and find out how your state’s U.S. Senator and get busy!!!
Pass this along to EVERY drone owner you know. And to it today!!!!!
Please help DSPA stay on top of issues like this by joining or donating today
What are you even supposed to say to your senator??
Tell them to vote no against the amendment when its offered.Tell them it will create a myriad of new rules that will cripple out ability to fly. It will make it virtually impossible for drone service providers to know all the rules. Every time we do a job, we are setting ourselves up for a fine if a new rule is unknowingly passed. The current economic climate does not need more regulations for small businesses. Let the FAA do their job.
Just copy the following letter, making sure to sign your name at the end and replace _____ with the name of the senator you are writing.
To Senator ______;
I wanted to express my concern with legislation being introduced by Senator Mike Lee, I believe it is referred to as Lee Amendment 256. In part, as I understand it, it would give state and local governments the ability to control and regulate air space between 0 and 200 ft above mean ground level. Since there are already laws that regulate air space at this level, it seems that Lee Amendment 256 is targeting a very specific group of people.
To be quite fair, I am both a drone enthusiast as well as a commercial drone pilot, so I want you to understand why I am opposed to laws like this. I am very concerned what they mean to the future of our hobby and our ability to work in the marketplace.
Please allow me to outline my concerns:
1. This will potentially result in the creation of differing laws between states, counties, and even local municipalities. This would jeopardize our ability as pilots to conduct normal and legal flight operations. As drone pilots, we travel between cities and counties for races, film shoots, or even to offer training to other pilots. This legislation would put pilots at risk of unintentionally violating laws and would cause great hardship because of the liability concerns.
2. Legislation like this will likely be followed by local governments adding fees and/or taxes for take-off and landing operations. Most pilots are not equipped to afford extra fees. This hobby does not just teach people how to fly, but it also teaches people marketable electronic skills because we repair craft, we build new ones from parts, and we learn to program them to become flight worthy. Keep in mind that most hobbyists do not buy off-the-shelf built drones. Drone parts are not cheap, and adding additional fees on top of what we already pay out for this hobby for parts, insurance, memberships, etc. would drive many out of this hobby, and even out of the workforce.
3. The FAA recently introduced RemoteID laws that will require all UAS, including drones, to broadcast their GPS location as well as the Pilot in Command unique ID for tracking purposes. Laws like Lee’s amendment usually call out concepts like safety and accountability. RemoteID already provides this. Having multiple laws at differing levels of government make the laws extremely difficult to follow or even enforce. Lastly, as you very well know, competing laws add to the administrative overhead of legislating the laws. I would hope that you would be concerned with any action that causes us to pay more in taxes unnecessarily,
I realize that there are always concerns when it comes to drones and people’s perception of what they represent. I can speak from experience that all pilots I have flown with have nothing but the utmost respect for individuals. Most of us carry liability insurance to protect against accidental harm or property damage. In fact, for my MultiGP racing club, this insurance is mandatory and provided through our yearly membership to the AMA -> Academy of Model Aeronautics.
Sir, I urge you to stand against this legislation. In times like this, especially with the harm this pandemic has already caused people, there are not many hobbies like this one that afford people the ability to go out, practice social distancing, and find enjoyment out of life. We should be concentrating on opening up opportunities to allow people to enjoy life responsibly, not unjustly curtail their freedom. This hobby opens up opportunities just like this for the many people in our state and country.
With respect;
I have worked for Dept of Defense for 12 years under UAS, Unmanned Aerial Systems until going out on my own launching Skybornkreations Productions. This is only source of income for my family and a pilot is all I know. FAA does a fine job so this bill is pointless and not needed.
What is the bill number?
It’s not a bill, it’s an amendment to the budget bill. It’s amendment number 256.
Yeah I realized I was looking this up wrong. I sent messages to Senators Feinstein and Padilla, last night.
I think this is a bit over blown. Airspace waivers already sometimes need to be approved locally. And apps are already making airspace info so much easier that before. “Can you imagine….” Not really, there already apps for that that will just add another layer to their geofencing polygon. I also think that it is rich that we are worried about the local and state governments taxes us to death.
Airspace is approved locally, by the airport. It has nothing to do with the local government, it’s still the FAA.
If something like this were to pass, every city, town, and county would have their own airspace rules. And even with apps, you still have the issue if locales set launching and landing fees. And they can actually close the airspace.
This is about a lot more than simple airspace approvals.
First of all all every city, town, and county operates as the leisure of the state. They don’t get to make their own rules unless the state grants it. You also assume that every one of these communities somehow wants to kill off drone activities. This is rarely the case. Most times they just follow generally accepted guidance. Also if you don’t like it, you make a phone call instead of donating money to some lobby group in the hopes that they might represent your interest to the feds. I personally don’t wanna put all my eggs in the basket that suppressed the American drone industry for so long enabling the Chinese to dominate then once we were on board with them, pulled the rug out on us.
Hi Louis.
You mention “you make a phone call instead of donating money to some lobby group”. That is what we’re advising people to do. And if you are referring to us as the “lobby group”, that’s not what we are. We’re an advocacy group that reaches out to not only federal leaders, but state and local as well.
We don’t lobby (as a 501(c)6 we’re very limited in what we can do in that realm), but we do educate when the opportunity presents itself.
I am not claiming to be a legal expert, but I would assume that the powers of cities and counties are derived similarly (though maybe not exactly) as they are in California.
Counties and cities do not exist at the pleasure of the State. The California state constitution establishes that the state IS (not “may be”) divided in to counties that are legal subdivisions within the states. There are provisions for merging, dividing, or otherwise changing the boundaries, and how county governments are structured. Likewise the people within counties can establish cities by incorporation or under a charter. Cities and counties can use regulations and ordinances to conduct their municipal affairs.
It really isn’t that cities and counties can only do what the state permits. It’s would at least equally accurate to say cities and counties can do anything unless the Constitution or statutes says they can’t. As long as they follow the processes required by the constitution and state law, they have a lot of power.
The FAA’s sovereign authority over all airspace is hardest line of defense we have against state and local laws that could pretty much ground recreational drone flying and, possibly at best, make commercial ops more difficult and expensive.
I don’t think the risks of Senator Lee’s legislation are being overblown.
Emailing my Senator’s now!
Also, don’t just send an email but leave a voicemail at their office. Give a call to your DISTRICT office of your Senator especially, as it already demonstrates you are a constituent. Use social media as well to tweet to your Senator’s.
Compound your outreach! Let’s kill this thing
Thanks Michael. We look forward to our conversation as soon as we can set it up. Probably next week at this point. Luckily this amendment never saw the Senate floor. But there is always next time.
Emailing my Senator’s now!
Also, don’t just send an email but leave a voicemail at their office. Give a call to your DISTRICT office of your Senator especially, as it already demonstrates you are a constituent. Use social media as well to tweet to your Senator’s.
Compound your outreach! Let’s stop this bill
Anybody know what happened? They adopted the budget resolution early this morning after an all night vote-a-palooza… or whatever they called it. I looked through votes on what amendments were agreed to and rejected, and it doesn’t appear that S.A. #256 even came up. Did Lee withdraw it?
Hi Curtis. You must be psychic. I was updating this story as you posted this comment.
The amendment was never brought to the floor. We don’t know if he ran out of time (he introduced three others) or he got too much pressure from the UAS community. Either way, this is no longer an issue.
But we’ll keep an eye on Senator Lee (& others), and rally the troops again if necessary.
Thanks for your support in this!!!