The Safety and Licensing Committee met 03/26/2025. One of the items they took up was a request for the sole source purchase of the Axon Air/ DroneSense program. Per the memo, “Axon Air/DroneSense offers a range of features, including the ability to operate various sUAS both in-person and remotely, live streaming footage to officers and stakeholders, providing an operational map view of devices in use, ensuring deconfliction with manned aircraft, logging all flights for future reference, creating custom training programs, establishing a maintenance schedule, and managing equipment use and operator proficiency.” There were no other comparable programs, hence the need for the sole source request.
The total estimated cost of the contract was $42,000 and the length of the contract was timed to coincide with the Appleton Police Department’s current contract with Axon for body cameras which expires at the end of 2028.
The committee voted unanimously to approve the request.
I’ve prepared a transcript of the discussion for download:
Per Chief Polly Olson, the contract was mostly for software and was for new services that had not been available when the city signed its initial contract with Axon. The main feature that she highlighted was that it provided the capability for drone pilots to cast the footage of what they are seeing to cellphones, so Chief Olson would not need to even be in the city or present at the scene in order to see what is unfolding in an incident.
Alderperson Sheri Hartzheim (District 13) asked about the sole source nature of the request and wanted to confirm that there really was no other solution that was available or competitive with Axon. Chief Olson said that there were very few, if any, vendors who provided anything comparable to this and APD’s existing equipment/technology would not be compatible with those other companies. APD had gone with Axon for its other police camera needs so this would be compatible with that.
The quote listed the cost and the timeframe of the contract as being $42,322.16 for 46.5484 months. Chief Olson noted that the cost and length of time would be lower when the item was finally approved. This service would be added on to the existing contract that the city had with Axon and was timed to end at the same time that existing contract ended.
The committee voted unanimously to recommend the request for approval.
View full meeting details and video here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=1281678&GUID=DB3E08F6-2585-49BF-AC3B-77607BB208B8
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