Who flies surveillance drones in Yolo County?
What we do not know
Woodland Police
- The 2025 deployment table, once the 2026 report is published.
- The department's drone policy and its retention rules for footage.
Yolo County Sheriff
- The purchase record behind the 2022 request, including which model the $52,814 bought.
- How the report's nine purpose lines relate to its stated total of 51 deployments.
- How long imagery is kept under Policy 611, which this pass did not read in full.
- The date of the community engagement meeting the annual reporting cycle calls for.
- The current drone policy text, and how long imagery is kept.
What drones are
An unmanned aircraft carrying a camera, flown by a public agency. Where a state classes drones as military equipment, as California does, a public policy and a governing-body vote are required before an agency uses one.
How they work, why agencies buy them, and every county we have documented →
What you can do
Civic action
Show up
This technology is bought and renewed by boards, councils and committees that meet in public. We have not yet confirmed where each of them meets in Yolo County.
Go to the Yolo County hub →Personal protection
Protect yourself
Practical steps to shrink your personal data trail. Our guides publish at launch; until then, EFF's Surveillance Self-Defense is the best starting point.
Surveillance Self-Defense ↗