TACOMA, Wash.—In Tacoma, Wash., the city’s police department is no longer obligated to answer home security alarm calls.
Without making any comment on the false alarm issue, the Tacoma City Council in June unanimously repealed its ordinance regulating home security systems, which was based on complaints from the police department about the high cost of answering false alarms, according to The News Tribune.
As with many other cities, police there reported that 98 percent of alarm calls in 2001 were false. But, Police Chief Dave Brame said that, within two months, he would propose a way the city could reduce the number of false alarms as well as the cost of false alarms, the newspaper said.
Regardless of the repeal, Brame said, police encourage residents to use alarms, and pledged his officers would continue to answer them.
