As drone law lifts off, who rules Rockland's skies?

Note: An earlier version of this article was published in error.

For the past year and a half, Vinny Garrison's been running a growing business shooting aerial photos and videos across Rockland — everything from weddings to the cranes hovering above the Tappan Zee Bridge.

He's got a pair of drones — he calls them quadcopters — that he launches for jobs like real estate shots, and he just shot Clarkstown's fireworks display.

But the Nanuet resident's worried the county's new drone law could make him — and even hobbyists who fly radio-controlled devices — law-breakers.

The measure passed the Rockland Legislature in June and will go into effect sometime in the next few months. County Executive Ed Day harshly criticized it but didn't shoot it down.

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The devices will be limited to the user's private property, and private or public property with permission of the property's owner. The law also prohibits the use of drones within 100 feet of the jail, government buildings, schools and houses of worship.

The law was drafted by Rockland Legislator Jay Hood Jr. after Sheriff Lou Falco said he'd heard reports about drones being used to smuggle contraband and weapons into jails around the country.

Apparently any local police department will be able to enforce the law. Two calls to Falco about how his department, or any other, might handle an unmanned aerial vehicle that's gone astray, weren't returned this week.

Garrison says the new restrictions are vague and unnecessary because of existing laws and Federal Aviation Administration regulations.

If he's taking aerial photos for a real estate job, his quadcopters inevitably hover over a neighbor's property, or maybe the Hudson River. Are these violations, he wonders?

"What if you're flying recreationally? You're basically criminalizing their hobby … it doesn't delineate between commercial and non-commercial users," says Garrison, who runs Flying Films NY.

Hood has brushed off criticism of the law's intent.

"I believe it should cover anything that flies by remote control because anything that flies in the air is inherently dangerous if flown around people or property," Hood told me last month.

The growth of drones' popularity may be outstripping the government's ability to regulate them. The FAA has adopted interim guidelines and a final version could be ready by year's end, said John Flynn, an assistant chief with the Yonkers Fire Department who's conducting research in this area as it relates to homeland security.

Flynn believes Rockland can't regulate airspace without consulting the FAA and governments themselves can't launch unmanned aerial vehicles without authorization.

Hood disagrees.

"It is our belief that we are allowed to regulate aircraft under 55 pounds," he said in an email. "There is a question of whether we can regulate commercial use of drones, however there are regulations already in place that require permission from the FAA to fly drones for commercial purposes."

Hood continued, "This law will go into effect and if someone chooses to challenge it in court, that court can decide its validity. I am OK with that, I believe it is a fair and reasonable regulation to require permission to fly over anyone's property not owned by that person."

As Rockland prepares for the drone law's liftoff (or touchdown), questions about whom it affects or protects are still, well, up in the air.

Robert Brum is a columnist and editor of The Rockland Angle .

Twitter: @Bee_bob