False Alarm Responses Are Costly

Joe Gunn, executive director of the Los Angeles Board of Police Commissioners, spoke with MARCELA ROJAS about the LAPD’s policies concerning private alarm systems.

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The Police Department issues permits on any activity that would require police intervention. The alarm permit is a standard permit approved by the City Council years ago. Unfortunately, alarm companies [that sell the alarms] usually neglect to tell customers that they will have to get a police permit for their alarm systems.

Between 94% to 98% of calls [for sounding alarms] are false alarms. For the Police Department, this means you have to take a two-officer radio car out of the field to respond to a false alarm. That’s about 30 minutes, on average, that those officers are not working on more critical problems. We conducted a survey where we found that we lose 56 man-days a year responding to false alarms. This is the reason why we charge homeowners for false alarms. We give them two free false alarms and then after that they are charged $86 for each additional false alarm.

Now, we do give them an option to attend alarm school, which will waive the fee. What we’re trying to do in this hourlong class is educate them because most false alarms can be prevented by the customers themselves. It’s like getting a ticket. We’re hoping that they learn from this process how a false alarm can be avoided. Alarm school is free.

To show you the depth of the problem we have with answering false alarms, the Police Department collects between $5 million and $6 million a year from false alarm citations. That money goes directly to the city’s general fund.

Last year, the department lowered the priority of an alarm call because of the number of false alarms we get. If it’s a busy night, a police officer will get to an alarm call at the end of the night. And if it’s a false alarm, what difference does it make what time the officers get there? If it’s a real emergency, customers should call 911 to get a quicker response. We’ve just learned over the years that an officer’s time is better served out in the field.