Sheriff’s drones could start flying over Waikīkī as soon as March

Summary

Honolulu authorities are preparing for a potential expansion of drone policing in Waikīkī, where the Hawaiʻi Department of Law Enforcement says it wants drones to act as first responders as soon as March, as part of a statewide push to use modern technologies to address policing gaps.

Hawaiʻi Department of Law Enforcement director Mike Lambert said the drones would be flown over the tourist district to watch for crimes being committed in public spaces during peak busy hours, festivals and large events. Lambert said the drones also could respond to crime scenes and emergencies and transmit information back to officers in about 30 seconds, allowing arriving personnel to prepare for what they may encounter.

Lambert said the proposal would be different from earlier drone use by Honolulu police and the state agency. He said Honolulu police and the Department of Law Enforcement already use drones for special operations, including fireworks enforcement, but that Waikīkī would be the first time drones would be used as first responders.

Lambert tied the plan to staffing constraints, saying officials want Waikīkī to serve as a pilot site to see whether the additional safety measure could support tourism. He said the Honolulu Police Department vacancy rate is around 20% and the Department of Law Enforcement vacancy rate is around 25%, adding, “We have a shortage of officers. We’re trying to stem the gap through these technologies.”

The plan also includes operational features meant to help de-escalate encounters. Lambert said the drones’ video feed could prepare arriving officers to de-escalate by showing how many people are on scene, whether weapons are visible and who any potential aggressors are. He also said drones would be equipped with two-way speakers so drone pilots could announce that officers are en route, and he described the shift from arriving “with no clue” to arriving with situational information: “The old way was, ‘I’m going to a case and I literally have no clue what I’m going to see when I get there.’”

Lambert said the drones could deter people from committing crimes or scare them away while the act is underway, and said state officials also want to use drones on Hawaiian homelands. He said the department leases 12 drones from the California-based security company Skydio for about $30,000 per year and plans to install four launch pads in Waikīkī. Lambert added that adding the drones and other technologies—such as more automated license plate readers and ShotSpotters—would cost around $500,000 annually, which he said is about the cost of four full-time police officers, and that the goal is to “interlay technology to offset the 20% vacancies experienced by HPD.”

The Waikīkī Neighborhood Board voted to approve the drone program at its October meeting. Board member Rolf Nordahl said he is working with the Department of Law Enforcement on an agreement to house a drone launch pad on top of the Waikīkī Grand Hotel, where he is association president, and said he supports the program while asking that drones not take off over the hotel’s sun deck area to avoid startling guests.

Privacy concerns have also been raised by people inside the neighborhood and by outside watchdog groups. Jesse Woo, a technologist and AI policy counsel at the NYU Policing Project, said the programs need “authorization and transparent” guardrails and that it should be “up to the communities that are being policed and that are being impacted.” Jacob Wiencek, a citizen member of the Waikīkī Neighborhood Board’s public safety committee, said dense clusters of high-rises raise privacy and civil liberties issues, saying “I might not be doing anything wrong, but that doesn’t mean I want the government to, quote unquote, accidentally or purposely be looking into my condo unit.”

Honolulu officials and advocates have noted that drone use has been a repeated point of contention in Hawaiʻi and elsewhere. The article described earlier state efforts: in 2016, Hawaiʻi lawmakers introduced a bill that would have prohibited law enforcement from using drones to gather evidence without obtaining a warrant, and the bill did not advance to a full vote. It also pointed to later changes tied to fireworks enforcement, with a law passed in June allowing police drone video recorded over public space to be used to establish probable cause for an arrest if the act leading to arrest was committed on public property.

The Waikīkī plan arrives amid other technology rollouts by local agencies, including Honolulu police testing an artificial intelligence software program to help write police reports and the Hawaiʻi Department of Transportation launching a campaign to equip drivers with dashcams to monitor roads for infrastructure issues and reckless driving. In his emailed comments, Brandon Nakasato, an assistant chief in Honolulu police’s investigative bureau, said drones are “useful in many circumstances,” including “search and rescue, situational awareness, mapping, and other instances where they are not used for violations of privacy.” Lambert also said his department’s Skydio drones include facial recognition technology, but that he said he has not accessed that feature yet due to its controversial nature.