False Alarm Update: Tracy, Shreveport

TRACY, Calif

Police in the Northern California city of Tracy are looking
to duplicate the work of their brethren in nearby Fremont
and enact a form of verified response for burglar alarm
calls. The Tracy police department wants the city’s council
to establish a new policy where police would not respond to
alarms unless the alarm owner or alarm company with a key
can confirm to police that they will be at the site when
they arrive.

Police made the recommendation to the council during its May2 meeting according to The Record. The council of thecity, which lies between Fremont – where a verifiedresponse policy was established in March 2005 – andStockton. The council hasn’t stated when they plan to debateand vote on the proposal.

Under the proposed policy, police will end all response toan alarm customer if they fail to meet police at anactivated alarm twice within a calendar year.

The proposal would also establish an alarm permit systemwhere residential and commercial alarm users would need topay a $10 to $20 fee per year. After one response, policewould no longer respond to nonpermited systems.

Police also want the establishment of a set of false alarmfines.

In other false alarm news …

SHREVEPORT, La.: Police in the Louisiana city sayfalse alarms there have gone down 14 percent since passing anew alarm ordinance where the number of “free” false alarmswas reduced and false alarm fines were increased.
Shreveport police told television station KSLA that 79percent of alarm calls were false for the first three monthsof the year. This compares to a 93-percent rate for the sameperiod the year before.
In September, the Shreveport Council passed the newordinance that allows just one “free” false alarm in a yearand fined alarm users $25 to $100 for each false alarm afterthat.
The new ordinance has drawn criticism from alarm companies inthe area, including Bayou Security Systems, whose vicepresident is National Burglar and Fire Alarm Association(NBFAA) President Scot Colby.

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