The Moline-Coal Valley School District Board of Education voted unanimously July 28 to approve a memorandum of understanding with the City of Moline to permit the Moline Police Department to site a first-responder drone dock on the roof of Moline High School.

The agreement would allow the police department to place a Skydio drone dock — a weather‑controlled, automated housing unit — on about 16 square feet of rooftop space on Moline High School. The dock and drone were purchased by the city; the district agreed to provide roof access, a small power supply and an internet port to connect the dock to the department’s systems.

The MOU matters locally because the dock would expand the police department’s ability to deploy an autonomous drone “beyond visual line of sight” under an FAA agency authorization, covering roughly a three‑mile radius from the high school, the police presentation said. That coverage, combined with a dock at the police department, is intended to extend response coverage across much of the city for a limited set of emergency uses.

Chief (Moline Police Department) described the dock and operation in detail to the board. “This is the item that I’m asking for approval from the Board of Education to place on top of Moline High School,” the chief said, describing the dock as temperature controlled and able to open and launch a drone in about 20 seconds. He said the drone’s on‑air endurance is about 45 minutes and its range from the dock is approximately three miles. He gave the dock dimensions as about 31 by 37 by 55 inches and said it weighs about 229 pounds.

The chief told the board the police department already purchased two docks and will pay for installation and conduit work; the city will also handle maintenance and return the roof to its original condition when the arrangement ends. “We already paid for the drone dock and the drone inside of it. We'll pay for the installation,” he said.

Legal and operational limits were emphasized in the presentation and during board questions. The chief said Illinois law bars proactive, general surveillance by public safety drones and that deployments generally must be tied to an emergency 911 call, a natural‑disaster response, a search warrant or other narrowly defined circumstances. He also said the department has obtained FAA authority to operate beyond visual line of sight for the program and noted the department must report drone deployments to the state’s attorney’s office.

Board members asked about public outreach, student and staff awareness, training and operational oversight. Dr. Erin Savage, superintendent, said the district would prepare talking points for school principals and planned at least a district‑level briefing before any media outreach. The chief said the department intends to begin training command staff first, noted it already has 11 FAA Part 107‑certified operators for its existing manually piloted drones, and said the program’s agency certificate will allow in‑house training for additional operators.

The chief also described technical safeguards on Skydio drones, including obstacle avoidance, an automated “return home” feature and a requirement that a human operator manually toggle any recording on. “I would say the number 1 thing we cannot do is any type of proactive surveillance,” he told the board.

Board members and the police chief noted the program’s mutual‑aid implications: the department said it could assist other agencies under existing mutual‑aid agreements if requests and legal requirements are met, but it cannot self‑deploy to outside jurisdictions without a request.

The board approved the MOU by roll call (all members voting aye). The chief said the city council will continue its approval process: he previously brought the item to a city committee of the whole and told the board the item was scheduled for a city council agenda for further consideration. Next steps for the district include executing the board‑approved MOU, coordinating technical connections (power and a fiber port), finalizing the site installation plan and a joint communications plan for staff, students and the public.

Questions raised during the meeting that the board asked be addressed before any operational use included: public outreach to staff and families, clarity on who will have operational control, the exact chain of custody for recorded material, and precise deployment triggers under state law and department policy. The presentation materials and a draft MOU were provided to the board and reviewed by district and city legal counsel.

The board’s action appears to be limited to approving the district’s part of the MOU (roof access, power and network port). The Moline Police Department said it will continue through its own internal and city approval steps before placing equipment on the roof or making deployments from that site.

Direct quotes in this article are taken from the meeting transcript and attributed to participants recorded in the public meeting.