HomeMy WebLinkAbout1984-05-22 - City Commission Workshop Meeting MinutesMAIL REPLY TO:
P.O. BOX 25010
TAMARAC, FLORIDA 33320
5811 NORTHWEST 88TH AVENUE TAMARAC, FLORIDA 33321
TELEPHONE (305) 722-5900
May 11, 1984
CITY COUNCIL WORKSHOP MEETING
EMERGENCY/BURGLAR ALARM SYSTEMS
There will be a City Council Workshop Meeting on
Tuesday, May 22, 1984 at 10:00 A.M. in the Council
Chambers at City Hall, 5811 NW 88 Avenue, Tamarac,
Florida to discuss a revised alarm Ordinance.
Public attendance and input is encouraged.
Carol A. Evans
Assistant City Clerk
P=CY OF Imo]-DLsqu)maTION ON BASIS OF HkOICAPPM ST.ATVS
AN MAL OMKRNnY DFLOYIIt
CITY OF TAMARAC, FLORIDA
CITY COUNCIL WORKSHOP MEETING
EMERGENCY/BURGLAR ALARMS
May 22, 1984
,Pape CALL TO ORDER: Mayor Kravitz called the Workshop Meeting to order at
1 10:00 A.M. on Tuesday, May 22, 1984 in the Council Chambers of City
Hall.
ROLL CALL: PRESENT: Mayor Philip B. Kravitz
Councilman Jack Stelzer
Councilman Raymond J. Munitz
Vice Mayor Sydney M. Stein @ 10:25
ABSENT AND EXCUSED: Councilman John J. Dunne
ALSO PRESENT:
Leroy Browne, Assistant to City Manager
Samuel"Stevens, Chief Building Official
Joseph McIntosh, Police Chief
Bernard Simon, Fire Chief
Patricia Marcurio, Secretary
1. Introductory Remarks - Mayor, Council and Staff
Mayor Kravitz said the prime purpose of changing the old Ordinance
is to keep false alarms at a minimum. Leroy Browne, Assistant to
the City Manager, said this workshop was scheduled for input from
the public and afterwards, staff will meet to make recommendations
to Council and will then implement what Council advises.,
He said they have invited a number of the recognized burglar alarm
companies to address several areas. He said the City Manager's office
is concerned about crime prevention, reducing false alarms and the
enforcement of the Ordinance in final form. He said some of the
inquiries they have had are from the FCN, the official publication
of the Burglar and Fire Alarm Association,and also the Security
Equipment Industry Association. He said the Chief Building Official
will comment concerning permits, design, wiring, installation
prewiring and final inspection. The Police Department will discuss
problems enforcing the Ordinance, the qualifications of existing
staff to inspect the alarms, the scope of the Police Department vs.
burglar alarm companies, the communication center impact, the
drain on the present resources and comment on fines and permit fees.
Samuel Stevens, Chief Building Official, introduced Pat Keiley, Chief
Electrical Inspector, to outline the inspections made and the permit
fees charged. Pat Keiley.said the inspection procedures now, dictated
by the Council and Burglar Alarm Committee, are minimal. He said it
is mechanical execution of work on the rough to see that the Burglar
Alarm wiring is not dangerously installed and on the final inspection,
to check the equipment is in and mounted properly.
Bernie Simon, Fire Chief, said the proposition of smoke detectors has
to be interpreted in the proper form; it is interior notification only
for people in the building. He said smoke alarms that are attached to
a proprietory company or an alarm monitoring device are for commercial
premises only. The best approach would be either a manual alarm or
the 911 telephone number. He said some cities have tried connecting
smoke detectors to an automatic notification of the Fire Department
and it has been disasterous. He said their present estimate for a
structural fire is $150 per run and most would be unnecessary because
of improper functioning. He requested they be used in the proper
context, NFPA-74, which only addresses the local notification of the
people with a loud noise which is a minmun of 85 decimals. C/M
Stelzer asked how many are connected to the burqlar alarm system
1 _ 5/22/84
/pm
Joseph McIntosh, Police Chief, said there are presently approximately
200 smoke alarms connected to the burglar alarm system. He said the
Ordinance was finalized in April, 1982, after it was rewritten 14
times. He said he stated numerous times that it could not be enforced
and this has been proven. He said one of the reasons is that the law
enforcement officer is charged with the responsibility of inspecting
alarm systems and he has no qualifications for doing this. He said
he has been told there are several unlawful systems which are pro-
hibited by this Ordinance such as vibrating, sensor -type systems.
He said the City needs someone who is qualified to be employed for
that purpose. He said there is a disruptive situation in the
communications center which has over 1,000 alarms that terminate at
the Police Communications Room and the Media Room is designed as the
policeman's lifeline. He said there are 2 radios and 5 telephone
lines and during a storm, it is most confusing. He said the alarms
should be in another room with someone else monitoring.
He said 2 years ago that was agreed to and it was put in the City
budget for Alarm Clerks to monitor the alarms, however, that never
happened and these alarms were.never;removed from the radio room.
Chief McIntosh said, in addition, the drain on the Police resources
is unbelievable since at least 2 cars must respond whenever an alarm
goes off. He said'in the last year there were 2,700 false alarms
and, during the 4 years he has been Police Chief, there have been
approximately 8,000 false alarms with no real alarms, therefore, 99
to 100% are false alarms. He ;said if these alarms were privately
monitored they could be screen6d:and the Police would not respond
to at least half. He said they have a number of uncollected fees
outstanding since the Ordinance states that anyone that does not
pay their fine in 30 days would have their alarm disconnected. He
said he cannot disconnect the alarm and there could be a liability
to the City if this were done and the home was later burglarized.
C/M Munitz asked the Police Chief if he would recommend the City
disassociate itself completely with any burglar alarm reporting and
go to the private sector and Chief McIntosh said the Police will
always have to be involved when a response is necessary.
V/M Stein entered the meeting at 10:25.
2. Service Points of View - Burglar_Alarm Committee Members and
all interested public participants
Allan Bernstein,Chairman of the Burglar Alarm Committee, said the
system as it exists does work. He said the primary purpose is to
deter burglaries and it has been successful in that respect since
a minimum number of homes equipped with burglar alarms have been
burglarized. He said the only reasonable measure of false alarms
is how many there are per 100 systems and, in that respect, Tamarac
has a good record. He said there is pressure from special interest
groups who lose revenue by virtue of the fact that Tamarac is
operating a highly successful system rendering service to its
residents without the normal monthly charges. He said the ways this
system can be improved are:
1. screening incoming calls.
2. doing -their own dispatching.
3. computerizing.
4. accepting cancellations when a car has been dispatched and
the homeowner reports a mistake by phone.
5, hiring an electrical inspector competent to inspect these systems.
Mr. Bernstein said the community can best be served by:
1. giving the Police the necessary manpower to operate the system
properly.
2. accepting fire and medical emergency alarms.
3. tests should not go into the Police Department.
- 2 - 5/22/84
/pm
Mr. Bernstein said he has submitted written memos as to the
technical upgrading he feels should be done and he feels the Burglar
Alarm Committee should be given more flexibility in handling the
cases that come before it as well as more power over installers.
He said there should be a 60-day break-in period on the new systems
before being connected to the board and he feels the legalities should
be worked out so that the City is held. harmless by agreements signed
by the homeowners in cases where cancellations are accepted by phone.
Lewis Breslin, member of the Burglar Alarm Committee, said the monitoring of
the burglar alarms should go to a private system. Vickie Beech, resident,
said this is a private function and should remain such. Lou Vladem,
President of the Woodmont Property Owners Association, said he agrees
that this should be a private sector problem since those that take
the burglar alarms should pay for the service. Bruce Hoffman,
resident, said the Ordinance is unreasonable since it causes a $50
fee for a permit as well as a yearly tax of $50 for the use of the
alarm system. He said the Ordinance requires that a homeowner have
his alarm inspected periodically by an independent contractor who
did not do the work. He said many contractors will not give a fair
appraisal of work they did not do. He said the present Ordinance
should be changed to provide:
1. a permit to install a burglar alarm should cost the same fee as
a permit for any electrical installation.
2. unless an alarm system is connected to the Police monitoring board,
no yearly use fee should be charged.
3. a yearly fee should be charged to people who do use the service
of the Police monitoring board and it should be based on the cost
of the operation.
4. the City should promulgate a Code for burglar alarm equipment and
its proper installation.
5. inspectors of the City's Building Department should be responsible
for the inspection.
Melvin Schwartz, resident, said he relies on a private company for
the operation. He said none of the surrounding cities have penalties
for responding to false alarms and he questioned the purpose of this
Pape Ordinance. Walter Rekuc, resident, said the false alarms are a
2 nuisance to everyone. He asked what is being done by the City to
properly report the addition to the tax rolls of the revenue these
burglar alarms produce, what is being done to collect .the taxes on
installations done in prior years, what is being done to enforce the
violations to the building Code. Bernie Hart, resident, said the
present system is highly successful and it should be determined what
percentage of the approximate 15,000 residential units in the City
use this system to warrant the cost to the City.
Lee Browne said there are certain facts that the present operation
consists of:
1. the Tamarac Police Department now directly monitors approximately
600 systems at no charge to the users.
2. the monitoring system (3 pieces of equipment) is owned by the
Woodland Home Owners Association.
3. the Tamarac Police Department dispatcher, upon receiving alarms,
calls the Broward Sheriff office 911 who dispatches directly to
the Tamarac Police cars.
4. the Tamarac Police Department responds with 2 patrol cars each
time they are dispatched, this is standard Police procedure.
5. many alarm users do not want their signal received directly by
the Tamarac Police Department because of no screening, $50 fines
are a major issue. Correction to be considered by incorporating
screening service.
6. insurance companies offer premium discounts with central station
monitoring.
He said an 8 day test was conducted which revealed that of 100% of the
calls received, 87-1/2% that were not dispatched, leaving a total of
12-1/2% in the errors which include both human errors and unknown
equipment, left an actual dispatch number of .3%.
- 3 - 5/22/84
/pm .
Leo Isaacson, resident, said he represents the Woodlands Home
Owners Association and he commended the City for undertaking the
burglar alarm systems monitoring. He said this could be solved
by having the alarm owner call the Police when there is a false
alarm requesting that they not respond. He said if the Police do
not respond when the correct code number is given half of those
calls would be eliminated. He said a homeowner should be required
to sign a release to the Police Department so that the City could
be held harmless.
C/M Stelzer asked what other cities in the area have a monitoring
system for burglar alarms and Chief McIntosh said some cities have
a monitoring setup but mostly for businesses not residences. C/M
Stelzer said he understands that it costs the City approximately
$100,000 to man this system and the income is roughly $85,000. He
said the income the City receives for false alarms is $30,000. He
said there are about 1,000 alarms in the City for about 15,000
homes, leaving the other several thousand residents to subsidize
the cost of putting the alarms in these 1,000 places and this is
unfair.
3. .Technical Points of View - Alarm Company Representatives with
Topics to Include:
1. False Alarms
2. Central Monitoring
3. Community Relations; regarding design standards, installations
and inspections and operations.
Terry Akins, representative of the Alarm Association of Florida and
an owner of a burglar alarm company which services Dade and Broward
Counties, said he has been asked by representatives of Wells
Fargo, Crime Control and an equipment manufacturer for the burglar
alarm industry who are also present, to speak on their behalf. He
said as an association, they are aware of the problems Tamarac is
having and they encourage their members to try to do certain things
to prevent or limit false alarms. He said they represent over 200
companies in Florida and they are an affiliate member of the National
Burglar and Fire Alarm Association. He said taking the alarm monitor-
ing board out of the Police Department is happening all over the
country because it is so costly and because of the liability that a
Police Department may incur if something should happen. He said his
company understands the business risk and are able to accept the
liability of monitoring a third party. He said they recommend this
because of the screening and also because the control the alarm
company has over their respective alarm sytems. He said there are
many companies that have installed alarms in Tamarac who are not
legitimate which might account for some of the false alarms. He
said he has a training school that is available to State Alarm
Association member companies with a public sector which invites
policemen, building and electrical inspectors, etc. He said it is
held in Orlando twice a year for 3 days in 2 segments and several
cities are using this program.
Mr. Akins said if Council wishes to take advantage of their expertise,
they will offer themselves as liaison between the alarm committee and
Council to help create an Ordinance. C/M Munitz asked what the
qualifications are to become a member to this Association and Mr.
Akins said the requirements are that the applicant must have been
doing business for one year, be a licensed company in the area and
competency and licensing must be submitted. He said their convention
this year will be held in Bonaventure and he invited Council to
attend.
Bill Platz, Manager of Wells Fargo Alarms in Miami, said 5 years
ago Wells Fargo had 41 alarm panels in Florida Police Departments
but today there are only 19. He said one reason for this is that
the alarm industry has the ability to monitor alarm systems externally.
He said Miami has a very strong Ordinance and they have a Burglar
Alarm Division which is part of the Police Department but works with
an alarm industry.
- 4 - 5/22/84
/pm
Mr. Platz said when there is a troublesome account, they negotiate
with the owner of the premises who is responsible to replace the
equipment. He said if the Police decide on the premises that the
alarm should not be rearmed, the owner is informed and if they turn
it on they are in violation of the Ordinance and will be arrested.
He said many fines are then being paid by the alarm company instead
of the user. He said Wells Fargo has approximately 71 commercial
accounts in Tamarac. V/M Stein asked Mr. Akins if it is his opinion
that Tamarac would have less trouble if a burglar alarm company were
used rather than the Police and Mr. Akins said it would lessen the
problem but not be the total answer. Mr. Platz said the average
charge is $240 per year depending on the City and this is less than
they are paying now. C/M Stelzer asked how much more it would
cost if a subscriber was hooked directly to the burglar alarm company
compared to the system now and Mr. Akins said the average cost
would be between $18 and $25 per month.
Sal Church, President of National Early Warning Systems, said they
manufacture equipment and do not install it themselves and the
trend is to have monitoring done by central stations. He said this
will not eliminate the problems but would diminish them and the
present system is going in the wrong direction. Tom Paluso,
General Sales Manager of Florida Crime Control, said many suppliers
in Tamarac are computerized and on a CRT screen they can access
complete knowledge of the account in question. He said several
of the alarm systems are getting older and false alarms will be
on the increase.
Tape Florence Bochenek, resident, said the main concerns of this workshop
3 are, first, the cost due to the false alarms and, second, the system
is only being used by 1,000 people in a City of approximately 35,000
who are paying for a system for the minority. Nick Camerano,
resident of Shaker Village, said the City should get out of the
alarm business. Shirley Blank, resident, asked if volunteers have
been considered as assistants in the monitoring of calls -for the
Police Department and she volunteered her help in this retard.
Harold Schneider, resident, said when he came to the City 7 years
ago, he was not aware that there was a fee of $50 for a burglar
alarm. He said his system is not connected to the Police Department
and he questioned why he must pay $50 per year. Larry Levine,
Woodmont resident, said the penalties imposed on alarm owners are
a deterrent to crime prevention. He said these people should not
be required to pay an annual usage fee but should be encouraged
to install alarms since they are known to be positive in nature.
Vickie Beech, resident, said Council should limit the cost of
running the City. Mr. Schwartz, resident, said instead of applying
the fine to everyone, the problems should be the only ones fined.
Bruce Hoffman, resident, said the Ordinance should cover separately
the alarm systems that go into a monitoring board and an alarm
system that does not.
C/M Dunne entered the meeting at 11:30.
Al Robbins, Woodmont resident, said for $47 per quarter he gets
continual service from the central station and he considers this
a bargain. He said he owns his system but subscribes to the service.
Dick Zonn, representative of Security Screens, said he installed
systems in the Woodlands area several years ago and at that time
the reason for the Police monitoring the system was that this
allowed a direct wire from their homes to the Police channel. He
said when the Police Department moved to its present location, it
became more expensive to have this system. He said this may have
just grown past the City's capacity. Lillian Feldman, President of
Woodlands Homeowners Association, asked if the City receives
additional revenue as a result of the false alarms.
- 5 -
5/22/84
/pm
Police Chief McIntosh said in the fiscal year 1981/82 they estimated
that the cost to the City was approximately $100,000 and the
revenue received was $56,000. He said this past year the revenue
received was $87,000 and the cost to the City would rise accordingly.
He said the City is losing money. He said these figures include
fines as well as fees.
V/M Stein asked why Tamarac should be in the burglar alarm business
when there are ways for the residents to hook into a burglar alarm
company. Mr. Isaacson said Tamarac is not in the burglar alarm
business but does provide security of a direct nature through its
Police Department which is quicker and more efficient. He said
with a private company monitoring the alarms, private industry is
making a profit from something that should be a Police function.
Amy Lew, resident, said she is more than willing to pay for education
but is not willing to pay for someone else's burglar alarm system.
Richard Bernstein, representative of Honeywell Protection Services,
said Underwriters Laboratory gives a higher rating for systems which
tie directly into Underwriter Laboratory approved central stations.
He said the only reason the cost would be lower to tie directly
into the Police Department would be because the residents are
subsidizing the cost and not being paid for by the users directly.
Alan Bernstein said there has never been a time that the residents
have subsidized the operation of the board in the Police Department.
The meeting was adjourned at 12:00 P.M.
A SISTA T CIT CLERK
This public document was promulgated at
$ - /,3 per copy to inform the general
and employees about recent opinions and
Council of the City of Tamarac.
6
a cost of $ / 4 n or
public and public officers
considerations by the
5/22/84
/pm