Come this fall, Fort Lauderdale, Fla., will drop its burglar alarm registration program, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel reports. The law required those with home or business burglar alarms to pay a $50 registration fee and a $25 annual renewal.
The fee will be dropped from the city’s fiscal budget, which begins Oct. 1, because many residents refused to pay up. At a commission meeting, the city manager instead suggested increased false alarm fees, which currently are $50 for homes and $100 for businesses.
In the meantime, those who paid the fee will not be refunded, and the city expects to amass $250,000 in alarm registration fees until its September demise, the paper reports.
In other false alarm news …
ROANOKE, Va.: Police in Roanoke say they have seen a
sharp drop in the number of false burglar alarms since a
new alarm ordinance that assessed fees for false alarms
went into effect on Jan. 1.
Roanoke police Sgt. James Fazio tells The Roanoke Times
that they have received 1, 294 face alarms thus far in
2004 compared to more than 7,000 for all of 2003, and
expect a 50-percent reduction in false alarms before the
year is out.
Under the ordinance, a fee structure is in place that
assesses fines of between $25 and $150 for repeat false
alarm offenders.
