Tallahassee City Commissioner Dianne Williams-Cox was asked at a September 28 candidate forum whether Amazon Prime Air’s planned drone delivery service should be regulated. “So, absolutely, it needs to be regulated,” she answered. A day later she texted the Tallahassee Democrat that her understanding is the state legislature has preempted it.
The city’s own lawyer had already told the commission it can’t. City Attorney Amy Toman put that in a September 23 email to Commissioner Jack Porter, who had asked whether Tallahassee could regulate drone deliveries. Amazon, meanwhile, has set a date for a public showing in the city: a Prime Air meet-and-greet with an MK30 on display, October 20 from 4 to 7 p.m. at the Donald L. Tucker Civic Center.
Williams-Cox named the city’s Flock license plate cameras as the lesson behind her answer. The commission voted on those cameras in August.
Tallahassee’s City Attorney Says Florida Law Rules Out a Drone Ordinance
Toman’s email cites Florida Statute 330.41, which vests the power to regulate drone operations in the state, except where federal rules say otherwise. Subsection (3)(b) bars any city ordinance on drone operation, airspace, altitude or flight paths. Toman wrote that drone delivery services are explicitly covered.
Under subsection (3)(d), the city keeps its general laws on nuisance, voyeurism, harassment, reckless endangerment and property damage, as long as they don’t single out drones. On the ground, subsection (3)(c) bars the city from withholding permits from a drone delivery service over where its drone port sits, which leaves it setbacks and landscaping. DroneXL laid out those limits when Amazon’s Tallahassee hub preparations surfaced on September 23.
Porter told the Tallahassee Democrat she knew the city was preempted because the city attorney said so. She said she wasn’t aware of the city’s involvement and didn’t know more than what had been reported. Commissioner Curtis Richardson and Mayor John Dailey did not respond to the paper.
Flock Is a City Contract. Amazon’s Drones Are Not
The commission can vote on Flock because the city pays for it. Tallahassee operates 80 Flock license plate cameras and 75 Vigilant cameras, and Commissioner Jeremy Matlow’s motion to end the Flock contract failed 3 to 2 in August, WCTV reported.
Amazon’s drones fly under FAA rules and a state statute, and neither gives the commission a vote. Williams-Cox said at the forum that she learned from the Flock issue, and that she made a motion to suspend the cameras over surveillance concerns.
The forum was a campaign event. Williams-Cox faces former mayor Dot Inman-Johnson in a November 3 runoff for Seat 5, and Amazon’s meet-and-greet lands two weeks before it.
Matlow Expects Tallahassee’s Tree Canopy to Push Amazon’s Drones Low
Matlow agrees the city is preempted from regulating drone flights. His objection is operational: he told the Democrat he imagines Tallahassee’s tree cover will make many neighborhoods hard to serve without flying dangerously low. He also cited complaints from other cities about noise, privacy and safety.
The MK30 descends as low as 13 feet over a yard to drop a package, a figure The New York Times reported and DroneXL cited in its guide to what residents can still do when Amazon arrives. How it does that under a live oak canopy is a question for October 20.
Amazon is billing the event, in Conference Room A at 505 W. Pensacola Street, as a free chance to see the drone up close and ask its team questions. At Amazon’s forum in Westborough, Massachusetts on September 23, which I attended, Amazon’s Tareq Wafaie told residents there is no opting out of drones flying over their property.
DroneXL’s Take
Williams-Cox reached for the wrong comparison. Flock is a surveillance network the city pays for and its police run, so the commission gets to vote it down. The drones aren’t camera-free either: Amazon’s own Prime Air page says they may record people, pets and cars near the drop point, as DroneXL reported when Amazon told Pflugerville the opposite. That is a privacy fight for Florida’s legislature and the FAA, and a city ordinance on routes wouldn’t settle it.
A Prime Air drone is a delivery aircraft flying under FAA rules, and Florida wrote its statute so a city council can’t regulate its flights or zone its drone port out of town. I think Florida got that right. Amazon says it will reach nearly 500 cities and towns by the end of 2026, a count of every municipality inside its delivery zones. I don’t see how any operator runs a network across 500 sets of local altitude and route rules.
Matlow asked the better question. My guess is a drone that drops that low to deliver a package will meet a lot of Tallahassee oaks on the way down. Amazon has to solve that under FAA rules, not a city ordinance. If you live near the Mahan Drive warehouse, bring that question to the Civic Center on October 20 and ask for a route map.
Sources: Tallahassee Democrat, via Miami Herald, Florida Statute 330.41, WCTV, WTXL
DroneXL uses automated tools to support research and source retrieval. All reporting and editorial perspectives are by Haye Kesteloo. Read our editorial standards.
