In 1995, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department faced a situation that threatened its ability to provide police protection in a timely and cost-effective manner. With the growing popularity of burglar alarms, cops were responding to an ever-increasing number of alarm calls. Most of these calls, however, proved to be false alarms, wasting a tremendous amount of police time.

By working with the alarm industry, a private contractor and implementing a new burglar alarm ordinance, the city has been able to drastically reduce resources expended on false alarms without any additional cost to taxpayers.

Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department Deputy Chief Glen Mowrey spoke about the Queen City’s experience at the 89th International City/County Management Association conference in Charlotte in September. The city’s success is considered a national model.

In 1995, when it approached Charlotte City Council about the problem, the CMPD received more than 500,000 calls. More than 100,000 of these requests for service — 20 percent of the total — were burglar alarm calls. Of these, 98.6 percent proved to be false alarms. Nearly 70,000 officer hours were spent responding to alarm calls.

As bad as the situation was in 1995, things would only get worse in the future without drastic action. The number of alarm calls had more than doubled between 1990 and 1995 and was expected to continue dramatic growth in the future as the city’s population continued to grow and alarms became even more common in homes.

To further complicate matters for the CMPD, city council provided no additional funds to address the issue. Whatever solution the CMPD developed would have to be self-funding.

In 1995, the Charlotte City Council adopted an alarm ordinance after much public debate. It’s “still a sensitive issue” even now, said Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Chief Darrel Stephens.

The ordinance was aimed at reducing the number of alarm calls by holding users responsible for their operation. This includes a system of graduated fines for false alarms. As Mowrey noted, 80 percent of alarm calls nationally are generated by only 20 percent of systems. Many of the systems generating lots of calls are located in businesses, government offices, churches, and other institutional sites. The No. 1 cause of false alarms is user error.

Charlotte’s ordinance requires alarm system owners to register their systems with the city. Registration is free, but there is a $100 fine for failure to do so.

In Charlotte, the first two false alarms per year carry no penalty. The third, fourth, and fifth false alarms each carry a $50 civil fine. The fine increases to $100 for the sixth and seventh false alarms. Under the Charlotte ordinance, the eighth and ninth false alarms in a year each carry a penalty of $250. The fine is $500 for the 10th and all subsequent false alarms per alarm year. Alarm calls cancelled before the police arrive do not count towards the fines.

Charlotte has also instituted a “no response” policy. If fines are unpaid after 30 days, police will no longer respond to alarms calls from that location. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police, however, would still respond to 911 calls for assistance from a location on the alarm no response list. Mowrey noted that there are typically 2,000 to 2,400 locations in “no response” status at any given time.

Keeping track of the false alarms is a labor-intensive and costly process. The police department estimated that it would cost $4 million over seven years to handle the bookkeeping, with $800,000 coming in the first year.
The city required though that the CMPD find a solution at no cost to the taxpayer. To do so, the CMPD outsourced billing and tracking. It also agreed to share the revenues from fines with the contractor while paying nothing for its services. In the first two years, all fine revenue went to the contractor, while in the third and fourth year the city received 15 percent of fines collected. In the last three years of the seven- year deal, the city received 25 percent of fines collected.

After adoption of the ordinance, the CMPD saw a dramatic decrease in burglar alarm calls. In the first year, alarms calls fell by 30 percent and, with the effects of cancelled calls figured in, police response was reduced by 42 percent. Officers saved an estimated 19,400 hours of time.

In 2002, the CMPD responded to 60,692 alarm calls, 45 percent fewer than in 1995 despite the number of alarm systems having more than doubled. Without the alarm ordinance, the police department estimates it would have responded to 216,400 alarm calls last year.

Mowrey noted that since 1996, the police department has received less than one alarm per registered system per year, well under the national average of 1.5 calls per alarm. Ninety-two percent of alarm permit holders have never had a billable fine.

Also speaking at the conference was Chief Thomas Sweeney of the Glastonbury (Conn.) Police Department on “verified response.” Sweeney serves as co-chair of the International Association of Chiefs of Police’s Private Sector Liaison Committee. The PSLC has worked closely with the alarm industry to examine solutions to the increase in false burglar alarms.

Verified response is a radical change in how communities handle alarm calls. Under verified response, the police will respond only to human-activated or human-verified (hence the moniker) alarms. Instead of police, a private guard service initially responds to automated burglar alarm calls. If the private guards are able to determine that a crime has occurred, the police are summoned.

One of the potential benefits of verified response is quicker response times. In areas were police face heavy call volumes and response time is slow, a private guard service may be able to get to burglar alarms faster. Police, in turn, are able to get to their other calls faster as well. Because private guards cost less than police, false alarm penalties may well also be lower under verified response.

Verified response has generated a fair amount of national attention since Salt Lake City implemented it in 2000. Las Vegas, however, in 1991 became the first major city to adopt this response protocol. Los Angeles also recently considered switching to verified response. No North Carolina communities currently use verified response.

Salt Lake City’s experience with verified response has been positive through 2001 and more mixed in 2002. Verified response reduced by 90 percent police responses to burglar alarms and reduced police response times to other calls, Sweeney noted. There was no change in 2000 and 2001 in the number of burglaries compared to pervious years.

In 2002, however, serious crime was up 16 percent overall in Salt Lake City, including a 13.7 percent increase in burglaries. More troubling was a jump in the burglaries at alarmed premises. In 1999, only 23 burglaries occurred at locations with an alarm. In 2002, the number was 350.

“[Verified Response] is still experimental,” said Sweeney. While he would like to see more communities try verified response, Sweeney also noted that it wasn’t appropriate for every jurisdiction.

The PSLC, in fact, has identified a number of concerns and unanswered questions involving verified response. These include:

• How will the public respond to verified response?

• Does it deter crime in the long run?

• Will private companies be willing to provide this service? What volume and density of alarms needs to exist for it to be economically viable for them to do so?

• What standards should exist for the selection, training, and licensing of non-sworn responders?

• How will private security firms respond in low-income, high-crime, or high- risk areas? How can one assure that “red lining” does not occur, that private guards do not respond slower or with less enthusiasm in more dangerous parts of town?

Michael Lowrey is an associate editor of Carolina Journal.