In an effort to reduce the roughly 1,200 false alarms answered by the Charleston Police Department each month, the city will fine alarm owners responsible for four or more false calls, starting Sept. 1.
The Charleston City Council on Tuesday night approved the measure, which was proposed by the police department.
Police Chief Greg Mullen said that he hopes fines will prompt people to be more careful about accidental alarms. Summerville, among other towns and cities, found that fines quickly reduced the number of false alarms, particularly from companies that trained employees to avoid alarm system mistakes.
Mullen said the city will work to educate alarm owners and alarm companies and said much of the problem could be solved if more alarm companies would notify police after learning an alarm was tripped accidentally and cancel the police response.
The fine will be $50 for the fourth through sixth false alarm in a year, and $100 for each one after that. Each year, starting Jan. 1, alarm owners will get three false alarms before the fines kick in.
This year, alarm owners will get three "free" false alarms during the last four months of the year after the ordinance takes effect, then start with a clean slate in 2009.
"We don't want anyone to stop using alarms," Mullen told City Council. "We think alarms are good." Comparing alarms to automobiles or guns, the police chief said alarm owners need to use them responsibly.
Charleston's fines for false alarms:
0-3 false alarms: no fine
4-6 false alarms: $50 each
7 or more: $100 each
Looking to crack down on the number of false security alarms triggered in Darien's homes and businesses, the Board of Selectmen
(BOS) unanimously recommended the addition of a security alarm system ordinance for the town during its meeting Monday evening.
The ordinances presented to the BOS were based on similar ones passed in 2001 regarding false fire alarms.
Presented by Police Commission Chairman Paul Johnson and Assistant Town Council Ed Schmidt, the ordinances proposed to the BOS consisted of fines in the amount of $100 to the owners of alarm systems each time they are falsely triggered and necessitate a police response to the location.
However, at the request of Selectmen Callie Sullivan and Linda Santarella, the fines were adjusted to a rising scale of $100 for a first offense, $150 for a second and $200 for each additional offense over the course of a calendar year, in order to send more of a message to repeat offenders.
"The goal here is to cut down on the number of false alarms," Johnson said. "That's what we're trying to do and that's the real reason for the ordinance.
The commission had been content with the $100 fines, he said, but was supportive of the selectmen's changes as well.
A carbon monoxide scare in Alburtis,
PA, and a death in a neighboring hotel has led Borough Council to enact an ordinance requiring residential facilities and the owners of rental properties to install detectors for the potentially deadly gas.
Alburtis appears to be the first area municipality to adopt an ordinance requiring carbon monoxide detectors since a man died following exposure to the gas at an Upper Macungie Township hotel. Upper Macungie supervisors also plan to adopt an ordinance.
Carbon monoxide is an odorless, colorless gas emitted by fuel-burning equipment, such as furnaces, water heaters and automobiles. It can be fatal in large quantities.
The Alburtis ordinance, approved last week, requires apartment buildings, hotels, day cares, long-term care facilities, group homes and dormitories to install the detectors. Also, facilities capable of hosting a public assembly of 100 or more people, such as restaurants, theaters and meeting halls, must install detectors.
Alburtis council was prompted to adopt the ordinance, which takes effect Nov. 15, because of recent events in the area.
''It started a bit back when the hotel in [Upper Macungie] had a problem,'' Council President Steven Hill said.
A guest at Best Western in the Kuhnsville section of Upper Macungie was killed in January by carbon monoxide poisoning when, investigators said, a construction canopy along an exterior wall of the hotel blocked the deadly gas from the hotel's propane-fired water heaters from escaping through a vent.
Philip D. Prechtel, 63, died, and his wife, Katherine, was sickened. One other hotel guest, two employees, two police officers and three ambulance workers who responded to the scene were taken to hospitals.
Hill said the borough had its own recent scare when a carbon monoxide alarm went off at a local apartment building. Firefighters responded and the scene was declared safe, but the building's furnace was determined to be malfunctioning.
''We have a couple of old apartment buildings,'' Hill said. The ordinance ''just seems like a good idea.''
Buildings that do not contain fuel-burning appliances and are not attached to a garage are exempt from the ordinance. The new law will not apply to private homes.
In Upper Macungie, supervisors in February directed the township solicitor to draft an ordinance requiring detectors in commercial buildings and in all new homes. Existing homes would be exempt unless the owner does major renovations.
Township officials recommend that all homeowners purchase the detectors, which cost about $20.
The Consumer Product Safety Commission has recalled 3,000 fire alarm control panels manufactured by Gamewell-FCI of
Northford, Conn., due to alert failure.
The sounder on the panel's main circuit board can fail to alert when there is a malfunction.
The recall, involving the 7100 series, was sold by authorized distributors nationwide from May 2007 through November 2007 for between $900 and $1,800.
For additional information, contact Gamewell at 800-274-4324.
This webinar will feature a presentation from Nebraska’s Lt. Governor and State Homeland Security Advisor, Rick Sheehy. He will address his state’s homeland security priorities and how both federal and state policies impact Nebraska’s security initiatives.
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register.
The Kannapolis (NC) City Council held its second regular meeting April 28 at the Kannapolis Train Station.
All council members were present. Councilman Richard Anderson gave the invocation.
Among items of business before the council were:
• Members voted unanimously, without further discussion, to approve an amended version of the burglar alarm ordinance introduced at the April 14 meeting.
The new ordinance requires owners of all homes and businesses with burglar alarms to get a permit from the city at a cost of $20 per alarm.
The law also requires owners to keep up-to-date contact information on file with the Kannapolis Police Department, and sets a schedule of warnings and fines for false alarms sent by automatic alarms and monitoring services.
Police Chief Woody Chavis told the council last month that false alarms account for hundreds of hours of wasted time for officers each month.
The ordinance was changed to remove a clause requiring a $20 annual fee for alarm permits after concern from commissioners that the yearly charge would create an unfair burden.
The Louisiana Life Safety and Security Association
(LLSSA), a chartered chapter of the National Burglar & Fire Alarm Association
(NBFAA), has announced that the LLSSA’s standards for a statewide, registered apprenticeship program have been approved by the Louisiana Department of Labor’s Apprenticeship Division.
“We feel that we have now crossed a major hurdle toward a true career path via registered apprenticeship in the state of Louisiana,” said Ron Foreman, LLSSA apprenticeship chairman. “Our state is in dire need of a trained employee labor pool, and this new workforce initiative for our industry will go far to meet that need.”
Foreman credited the work of the NBFAA and the original donors who contributed to the development of the first apprenticeship program advanced by the California Alarm Association for use in that state. “This accomplishment would not have been possible without the support of the NBFAA and the work of Art Webster, apprenticeship program consultant, and the courses developed by California,” Foreman explained.
Heather Stefan, state director of apprenticeship for Louisiana, stated, “I am thrilled to welcome LLSSA into our apprenticeship community here in Louisiana. I have every confidence that this will develop into an excellent program because it is clear that the organization understands and embraces the fundamentals of registered apprenticeship and recognizes that this is the premier training vehicle for developing our workforce. This speaks very highly of LLSSA’s dedication to their members and the workers in our state.”
Ron Petrarca, NBFAA Apprentice Committee chairman, added, “This is just one more step towards having apprenticeship programs in every state. Everyone in our industry understands the need to expand the labor pool, to attract the very best technicians and to provide a mechanism to introduce and train on new products, technologies and applications. Our hope is that all of our chapters will follow Louisiana’s example and provide a foundation that allows technicians to advance in their profession and improve the ability of the industry to recruit, train and retain the very best technicians from a competitive labor pool.”
“We are very gratified to be able to take advantage of the national guidelines and obtain passage in our state,” said Mark Lagarde, LLSSA president. “When NBFAA received approval in September 2006 from the U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Apprenticeship (OA) for National Guidelines for Apprenticeship Standards for the occupation of Protective Signal Installer (Fire/Life Safety & Electronic Security Installer), we knew the LLSSA would not be far behind in working to develop a program for Louisiana.”
According to the U.S. Labor Department, the standards approved in 2006 serve as a model for developing local apprenticeship programs registered with the OA or State Apprenticeship Agency/Council for all occupations listed in the guidelines. The purpose of the National Guideline Standards is to provide policy and guidance to employers, employer associations and their local affiliates in developing Standards of Apprenticeship for local approval and registration.
NBFAA’s apprenticeship program has its roots in a program developed in California. Beginning in 2000 — when a state law mandated that technicians be enrolled in a state-approved apprenticeship program — the California Alarm Association and the California Automatic Fire Alarm Association joined forces to develop a comprehensive and relevant training and education program.
The California program offers traditional classroom training, but the goal from the beginning was to make the related theoretical training available online with a comprehensive distance learning program.
“Ever since NBFAA was able to obtain approval of a federal apprenticeship program, our goal has been to work through our National Training School (NTS) and our state chapters to create the administrative and delivery systems to make apprenticeship accessible to technicians in every state,” said George P. Gunning, NBFAA president.
It's a situation that Charleston Police Chief Greg Mullen finds alarming.
Charleston police officers have been answering nearly 1,200 false alarms from homes and businesses each month, on average, with each call tying up two officers for about 20 minutes.
And more than 99 percent of the time, it turned out the alarm was set off by accident.
Over the past 11 months, those false-alarm calls have consumed more than 8,700 hours of police officer time, which is worth nearly $350,000 to the city, the police department calculated.
Mullen said he hopes the city can address the problem by fining people responsible for more than three false alarms each calendar year. He says the threat of fines in other towns and cities has successfully cut down on false alarms.
Summerville has had a similar ordinance for years, and it is credited with cutting the number of false alarms nearly in half the year after it was passed.
'It's really worked out well,' said Summerville Police Lt. James Bateman, who tracks fines issued by the town. 'Even though our population has grown and we have more businesses with alarms, the number of false alarms has gone down.'
As Mullen proposes, Summerville allows three false alarms each year. After that, Summerville levies a fine of $30 for the fourth false alarm, $50 for the fifth and sixth, and $100 after that.
'We have had several people who got bills in excess of $2,000, but they only had that one year,' Bateman said. 'The habitual offenders have all but stopped.'
He said businesses hit with big fines for repeated false alarms typically trained their employees better, resolving the problem.
In Charleston, the proposed fine is $50 for the fourth through sixth false alarm in a year, and $100 for each one after that.
'There are lots of reasons for false alarms, but the ones we are trying to prevent are the ones based on negligence,' Mullen said Wednesday. 'The ones we are trying to prevent are the ones where somebody goes in and forgets the alarm was set, and the alarm goes off and the alarm company calls the police.'
Burglar alarms also can be set off by electrical storms, and Mullen said people wouldn't be fined in those cases.
'We think alarms are good, but we want people to be more responsible,' Mullen said. 'We just want to stop wasting resources.'
Mullen said the department would work with alarm owners and alarm companies to reduce false alarms and plans to offer education classes for owners who have had multiple false alarms.
Charleston City Council is expected to decide on the proposed regulations when it meets on May 6.
The proposed ordinance won preliminary approve from council on Tuesday night.
The latest statistics compiled by NFPA show false alarm calls to the nation's fire departments dipped slightly in 2006, but overall calls continued to rise
-- topping 24.4 million for the year.
Medical calls to fire departments surpassed 15 million for that year, continuing a trend that is seeing fire calls decline and medical calls increase.
In 2006, U.S. fire departments responded to 2,119,500 false alarms, according to NFPA's new report. This total was 0.7 percent below the total of 2,134,000 false alarms the previous year.
System malfunctions decreased 3.3 percent in 2006 from the year before, to 721,000 (34 percent of all false alarms. Encouragingly, malicious false calls decreased 19.5 percent for the year, to 193,500s. Unintentional false calls (e.g., tripping an interior alarm accidentally) accounted for 850,000 false alarms, or 40.1 percent of the total. Other false calls including bomb scares were 355,000 (16.8 percent of all false calls), the report states.
Residents who have already written the check may not have noticed they paid twice as much as last year to protect their home.
For people who have a security system and live in Metro Nashville, the fee for having the system has increased 100 percent.
Shelley Duryee has been protecting her Green Hills home with an alarm system for years. She said she paid her 2008 alarm permit registration bill without even thinking about it last month and that she didn't notice the fee had doubled.
"It does seem kind of odd that I was charged twice as much," she said.
The outgoing City Council increased the residential permit fee from $10 to $20. For businesses, it jumped from $25 to $50.
"Yes, 100 percent. But it has been 18 years since the first fee was established, and it has never been increased since that time," said Metro clerk Marilyn Swing.
Part of the increase is due to false alarms, officials said.
"Very time consuming and very resource draining," Swing said.
Even systems that are not monitored by an alarm company or systems that were self-installed, the owners must still register the alarm system. Plus, if an alarm goes off and police show up and a resident doesn't have a sticker, it could be costly.
"The fine and court costs for not having a permit or displaying a permit can exceed $100," Swing said.
Looking at it that way, Duryee said she doesn't mind digging deeper in her pockets.
"I always thought it was really low, so I guess $20 doesn't faze me," she said.
The false alarm fee also increased from $50 to $75. Residents are also allowed three false burglary, robbery and fire alarms each in a year.
The permit increase is expected bring in $1.2 million.
When you are in the middle of a life-threatening emergency, how long do you think it will take Springs Police to get to you? Right now, it’s about 10 minutes on average. Cops said more and more, their resources are being tied-up in answering false alarms.
On April 23, 2008, police spoke at a meeting about changing the city ordinance. They want tougher rules on homeowners and businesses whose alarms go off, but when police respond, there's no emergency.
The proposed ordinance could mean steeper fines and implementing a yearly fee for all alarm users.
Police would also stop responding to every alarm. "It’s called Enhanced Call Verification. That would require alarm companies to call two numbers, like your home and your cell to verify if you want police to respond. If it’s a false alarm, it saves the user from a fee and it saves the officer from having to respond," said Deputy Chief Ron Gibson with Springs Police.
City Council has to approve this ordinance. That could happen sometime in June.
The last time the city cracked down on false alarms, police saw a 50 percent drop.
Danvers, MA, police are urging an increase in fines to commercial and residential property owners who do not seem to know how to maintain or operate their security systems.
“The goal is to eliminate these (false alarms),” said Town Manager Wayne Marquis, noting the safety factor involved when police and fire personnel race to a scene that, in fact, has no need for any attention.
The bylaw would charge residential property owners $80 for each false alarm after the first two, which would be free. Residential customers had never been charged in the past.
Commercial property owners would be charged $120 for each call after the first two. This is up from $25 for the third through 11th call, $50 for the 12th through 19th and $100 for the 20th and more, the chief explained separately.
With just 27 residences in town accounting for all the three-and-more false alarms, a fine might correct the owners’ behavior, Police Chief Neil Ouellette indicated.
Businesses cost the police even more time and money than residents, he said, with one logging 90 false alarms, another 49, another 31, 24, 23, 21, etc. Police must check every window and door, which can be a considerable number, and it costs the town money. Even more important, the community loses the police time on patrol or attending to community policing initiatives.
There was one company that had a false alarm every day at 8 a.m. “because of operator error,” Chief Ouellette told selectmen.
The bylaw is similar to one passed in Lexington last year, the chief said. It would require companies and residential property owners to get a permit every year, so that police can have an up-to-date list of the people to call when the alarm is sounded, something not readily available now. The permit would cost the same as it does now, $10 for residents and $25 for commercial owners, but it would be charged annually rather than one time.
Selectman Chairman Mike Powers worried about residents fabricating a reason for the alarm so that they won’t have to pay the fine.
“I would hope that wouldn’t happen,” the chief replied, emphasizing again that the goal is to educate and eliminate the false alarms.
Resident Bill Bradstreet, a former policeman who understood the problem, he said, also noted that large businesses just pass the cost onto the consumers and don’t really care.
The bylaw would allow the police or fire department not to respond at all, the chief said, and another clause would exempt the town from liability in the event there is an actual incident that needs attention.
Resident Sandy Lane was concerned about those residents who subscribe to an alarm company service.
“If there is no audible alarm or if the alarm company doesn’t notify us,” there would be no fine, he said.
In fact, if the homeowner calls right away to notify police it is a mistake, police won’t respond, the chief said, although he wasn’t sure about fire department policy.
Lane answered that the fire department responds even if the homeowner calls it off.
After the meeting she indicated some chagrin about the annual permit fee, even though it would be charged to her alarm company.
“They’ll just pass it on to me,” she said, noting, too, that even though $10 isn’t much, “it’s another $10.”
While Newport Beach, CA, has raised fees here and there over the years, the new study is the first time the city has taken a comprehensive look at how much residents should pay for what services in more than a decade, said Newport Beach City Manager Homer
Bludau.
“A lot has happened since then,” Bludau said. “Unless you really stay on top of [fees]
and look at it each year, it can easily get way behind after 10 years.”
The city’s costs to keep things running have jumped from $86 million in 2001 to $132
million in 2007, according to a study from the Newport Beach City Council finance
committee.
The study recommends Newport recover more of what it spends on police services, something Bludau doesn’t think would be a good idea.
“The police are never going to be something that comes close to paying for itself. We
don’t have police to make money,” he said.
Newport only recovers about 22% of its costs for police services, which is well below
what most other communities in California recover, according to the study.
Redlands recovers 79% of what it spends on police in fees for things like concealed
weapons permits and impounding animals.
Huntington Beach recovers 69% of its costs for police through such fees, according to the
study.
Based on the findings of the study, city officials also could look at lowering some fees,
said Councilman Keith Curry, also a member of the finance committee.
The study also recommends fees for things like security alarm applications and building
department appeal hearings.
Payson, AZ, police Sgt. Don Kasl said the majority of last year's false alarms could have been avoided and that an alarm ordinance passed in 2003 will now be enforced.
"Most of it (false alarms) is from people like cleaning crews and things like that," said Kasl. "They don't turn it off when they go in to clean and then we have to go see what is going on."
Some of the false alarms are the result of things like banners or signs that break loose and flap in the wind, setting off the alarm, Kasl added. In those types of cases, police usually ask the owner to come to the location to determine if anything is wrong.
After three alarms not due to a break-in or other criminal or unauthorized activity, police can charge the owner a fine.
"We don't start imposing fines on people as soon as they hook up an alarm though, we're not unreasonable, we give new (alarm permits) a grace period," Kasl said.
New alarms have 30 days to work out all the bugs and make sure the system is functioning properly, but after that 30-day period, fines can be imposed.
After three warnings, police send a letter with tips on how to avoid false alarms and fines, he said.
Kasl said there is a $50 fine for the fourth false alarm, which will increase to $75 for a fifth and $100 for six or more.
"The ordnance allowing imposition of fines was passed on April 24, 2003, but we didn't start enforcing it until last year," said Kasl.
In Indiana, Kendallville Police Chief Rob Wiley shakes his head and wonders why.
“If I was a business owner, I’d certainly have a burglar alarm,” he said this week.
Wiley recently sent letters to Kendallville business owners urging them to install security systems, deadbolt locks on doors and security lighting to deter burglars. Too many Kendallville business owners don’t heed the advice or don’t care enough to spend $100 to $200 on an alarm system.
Wiley planned to send out the letters before the recent series of business burglaries, not because of them. Between March 9 and 18, burglars broke into Vaughan’s Frozen Custard and Fine Coffees, 848 N. Lima Road, Si Senor restaurant, 838 N. Lima Road, The King Buffet in Friendly Village Shopping Center off U.S. 6 East and Maria’s House of Pancakes and Restaurant, 614 Fairview Blvd.
In each case the burglars gained entry through what the business owner thought was a secured door and went through offices, cabinets, cash registers and drawers looking for money. Police won’t disclosed how much was taken, but in at least one case it was substantial.
Why don’t business owners install alarms, deadbolt locks, outdoor security lights or arrange nighttime bank deposits of the day’s takings?
Police investigating burglaries and break-ins first notice the lack of security lights, giving criminals a darkened environment, and then examine forced entries accomplished with a simple screwdriver or crowbar.
“We advise business owners to take precautions like leaving an inside light on so patrolling officers can look for movement,” said Wiley.
In his March 26 letter, the police chief reminds business owners to take the following crime prevention measures:
• Install an alarm system even if it’s only one that makes an audible noise. It may scare off a burglar.
“This will increase our ability to catch burglars in the act,” he states.
In each of the recent burglaries, the businesses were on or near a major highway and close to other businesses. An audible alarm would have alerted passers-by.
• Secure doors, especially rear entrances, with deadbolt locks or strong bolts and latches. He recommends a metal plate be installed over the latch area to prevent someone from inserting a tool to push back the latch to open the door.
• Install adequate outdoor lighting so burglars can’t hide while attempting to break in.
• Leave some interior lights on. If police know the lights are left on at night and the lights have been turned off, patrolling officers will investigate the scene.
• Don’t leave large sums of money in the business. Wiley recommends business owners make bank drops during the day. Police will assist those making drops.
Kendallville police have investigated burglaries where a current or past employee divulges to someone else where money is hidden in the business.
Spring is traditionally a time when criminal activity increases because thieves are more active at night, said Wiley.