Rick Bella is one of the more feeble Oregonian cut-n-pasters. And as ignorant as they come. Therefore, I suspect that he remains clueless that this blog scooped him big-time.

And get this:
"HB 2710, sponsored by Reps. John Huffman and Gene Whisnant, both R-Salem, would prohibit armed drones and require police to obtain warrants in all but emergencies before using them to gather information."

Rep. Whisnant is from Sunriver, and Huffman from The Dalles. But they do frequent Salem some days, and yes they both are "Rs", so Bella did get somethings right.

I'm not sure the "Assignment Editor" for the "o" should tolerate this kind of behavior. I wonder if he knows any good lawyers?

Someone needs to follow up the story now with information to ease concerns. When many hear "drones" they only think of armed flying patrols or spy planes. Fact is, one could envision real uses such as help in locating lost hikers, a missing child, to scan damages from a natural disaster, etc....The cost for one may hopefully be provided by a benefactor, but making application for it's use by the Sheriff seems forward-thinkingto me.

The Oregonian is a culture unto itself. They dwell in an ivory tower that is out of touch with reality. As they shuffle around their nearly empty building, wondering why there are only one fifth of the employees that were there a few years ago, they don't connect their own actions with the abysmal economy they have helped to perpetuate.

Good luck to them as they move into the digital age. They will be white noise in the background and nothing more.

Agree with Gibby 100% here. The vast majority of Clackamas County is not urban - it's the Mount Hood National Forest.

Every time one of those damn yuppie city-slickers from downtown Portland goes "up into the woods" more than likely they end up in Clackamas County. They get lost, they call for help, they don't dare bother bringing a GPS device or a satellite tracker, so then the taxpayers have to pay for a massive search and rescue effort involving U.S. Army helicopters and dozens if not hundreds of men and women who have to all risk their lives to find those stupid idiots.

If a drone with FLIR cameras will save time and money - I say order 1,000 of them. Because God forbid those Portlanders (OK, they aren't all from Portland, but you get the idea) can't accept personal responsibility and either accept the risk, or not take the risk.

If this drone was intended for search and rescue operations, why didn't the sheriff's office just say that?

No, their PIO said they are "...interested in seeing if they'd be useful to give us a view of our training exercises from above." He lists the second possible use as "for public relations, flying at the Clackamas County Fair and Rodeo or other public-safety demonstrations." The last possible use he mentions is to some day, eventually, conceivably. fly over a crime scene.

The Clackamas County Sheriff's department is right up there with Portland police in abuse of power and rogue cop issues. Wise up people.

I have an idea for those drones.... instead of putting our water underground or creating pipelines from Canada to Mexico, we have open aqueducts and reservoirs guarded by drones that zap the tinklers!