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Roswell moves forward with drone-as-first-responder pilot after council questions on data and cost
Summary
Roswell council advanced a trial agreement with Brink/Motorola for an automatically dispatched "drone as first responder" program after police and 911 staff answered council questions about dispatch criteria, data storage and retention, operator control and estimated post-trial cost of about $249,000 annually.
Roswell city officials voted unanimously at a committee meeting on March 10 to move forward to full council a proposal for a pilot program that would deploy automatically dispatched drones to certain 911 calls.
The initiative, presented by Police Chief James Conroy and 911 Director John Potrobosky, would begin with a six‑month predeployment and testing period followed by one year of service at no charge to the city. If the city chose to continue the program after the pilot year, staff estimated an approximate ongoing cost of about $249,000 per year based on the number of drones and factors learned during the trial.
Conroy said the system would station three drone units around the city and automatically dispatch one to qualifying calls — vehicle crashes, crimes in progress, missing persons, fires and fire-alarm activations. He…
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