Council Cuts Fines For False Alarms Ordinance Encourages Classes, Not Punishments For Violators

The cost of a false alarm may be somewhat less alarming now.

On Monday, the Spokane City Council unanimously approved a plan to reduce the fines for bogus alarms and instead teach people how to avoid them entirely.

Council members Orville Barnes and Rob Higgins were absent.

Police officers rush to the scene of a screeching burglary alarm an average of 20 times a day - 600 times a month - only to discover it’s a false alarm. An officer discovers a burglary in process fewer than four times a month.

Police hoped stiff fines for repeat violations would cut down on the costly time-waster, but a 1996 law aimed at lowering the number of false burglary alarms wasn’t working.

The ordinance established a series of escalating fines for each offense after the first bogus alarm. Fines range from $25 for a second offense to $250 for a fifth.

The law also allows officers to ignore alarms from chronic abusers: those who tally six or more false alarms in a two-year period.

Police officials hope changes approved Monday make the law more effective. Under the amendments, a fine would be levied the third time an alarm goes off accidentally in a one-year period.

Alarm owners could avoid paying the first fine by attending a class put on by police and alarm companies that teaches people how to prevent accidental alarms.

Also under the changes, the penalty goes to a flat $50 regardless of the number of previous violations in a one-year period. The police chief could issue a nonresponse order after the seventh bogus alarm in one year.

The amendments require owners to register the alarms so the police officers know who to contact when an alarm sounds.

Capt. Steve Braun of the Police Department thinks the changes strike a middle ground by “not causing a big fine for (the alarm owner) and not being a big headache for us.”

, DataTimes