By: Joshua Rosenberg. June 10, 2026
NEW ORLEANS — The New Orleans City Council’s budget amendment vote on drones in April violated Louisiana’s Open Meeting Law, a legal advocacy group said in a demand letter dated Tuesday.
The April 16th vote, held by the City Council’s French Quarter Economic Development District (FQEDD), was antidemocratic in nature, the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) said in its letter. Unless the City Council redresses the situation independently, they may expect litigation, the group said.
“Unless voluntarily reviewed and reconsidered, repudiated, or recalled, action taken at the April 16 meeting on [the motion] invites litigation against the city to cure violations of Louisiana’s Open Meetings Law,” Kayla Vinson, Emily Early, Jessica Vosburgh and Adina Marx-Arpadi said in the letter. The coalition Eye on Surveillance (EOS) and the ACLU-Louisiana, among other organizations, also signed the letter.
In a 4 to 3 vote on April 16th, the New Orleans City Council’s FQEDD approved a budget item that would allocate $250,000 to a “drone as first responder” (DFR) program that the New Orleans Police Department (NOPD) would operate in the French Quarter. Public comment was curtailed to 10 minutes by Councilmember Freddie King.
Councilmembers Aimee McCarron, Matthew Willard and Lesli Harris voted against the measure. Councilmembers Freddie King, Eugene Green, Jason Hughes and JP Morrell voted in favor of it.
“Eighteen people who signed up to speak in opposition to the program were not allowed to make public comment at all, including many whose comment cards were timestamped before the cards of some of the people who did make public comment,” CCR wrote in their letter. “Residents experienced this as political repression,” CCR stated.
The French Quarter Management District (FQMD) – a nonelected, state-created body – voted in March to approve a budget amendment that would allow the New Orleans Police Department (NOPD) to purchase a drone that would operate in the French Quarter. The FQMD reports to the FQEDD.
“[Residents] hoped for – and were entitled to – a different, more open and democratic experience with this Council. While the FQMD is a state body, the City Council is directly accountable to the people of New Orleans. Residents of New Orleans who attended the April 16 meeting were deeply dismayed by the antidemocratic process used by the Council,” CCR said.
The $250,000 DFR program would allow an officer with the NOPD to dispatch a Skydio drone quickly to incoming calls, according to Police Captain Samuel Palumbo of the 8th District. The district includes the French Quarter.
At first, the NOPD asked for $740,000 for the drone program. But a private donor stepped in to cover some $500,000. That last point is of interest to CCR, per its letter.
“Many residents attended this and previous meetings about the use of drones to express their opposition to the use of drone surveillance in New Orleans, given the troubling potential use of drones in dehumanizing, unethical, and racist ways, and to ask questions that remain unanswered about the ‘other partners’ the NOPD has said will support the cost of the drone program,” CCR said in its letter.
Skydio is an American company based in California. The company aided Israel in its genocide in Gaza. Skydio “…gives Israel ‘short-range reconnaissance drones’ capable of navigating obstacles autonomously and [producing] 3D scans of complex structures like buildings,’ according to Anwar Mhajne, writing in the Cairo Review of Global Affairs.
“Community members and organizations demand fair, trustworthy, democratic processes, and community engagement that goes beyond appearances and requires real community input and power,” Eye on Surveillance told The Rosenberg Brief in an emailed statement on Wednesday. “As our political landscape, federally and state-wide, is plagued by authoritarianism, community silencing on behalf of local elected officials is unacceptable, and accountability to our local democratic processes is paramount.”
The City Council did not respond to a request for comment in time for this article’s publication.
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