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MINUTES <br />CITY COUNCIL <br />NOVEMBER 22, 1989 <br />Fahey replied that the Council must rely on the Sheriff <br />Department~s judgment in determining false alarms. <br />LaValle again stated that he believed the $500 fee to <br />be too high. <br />Fahey suggested that the City look at what surrounding <br />cities are charging for false alarms. <br />LaValle replied that the City already did that in <br />February of 1987 when the original ordinance was <br />adopted. <br />Scalze noted that discussion at that time centered <br />around burglar alarms at homes going off continually. <br />The Sheriff's Department had brought this problem to <br />the City's attention. <br />Daryl Stafford, Electro-Watchman, Inc., appeared before <br />the Council and reported that there is a difference <br />between residential and commercial alarm systems. <br />Stafford pointed out that business alarms have more <br />public traffic to deal with. <br />Stafford felt that the language of the City~s alarm <br />ordinance was excellent, but felt the false alarm fees <br />too high. Stafford stated that the problem is that <br />when false alarm fees are too high, commercial <br />businesses will tell their alarm companies not to <br />notify the police in the event of an alarm. Then <br />business owners will go down to their store in the <br />event of an alarm, and eventually someone will get <br />hurt. <br />Stafford suqgested that there are various ways to <br />address the issue of false alarms, those being <br />establishing a false alarm fee at $50 and issue user <br />permits for alarm systems. If a system has too many <br />false alarms, the user permit can be pulled until the <br />situation is corrected. Service tickets could also be <br />issued whenever there is a false alarm in addition to a <br />$50 false alarm fee. Stafford reported that the City <br />of St. Paul uses the user permit method. If a business <br />has too many false alarms, the business owners must <br />appear before the St. Paul City Council and report on <br />how the system has been brought into order. Stafford <br />reported that the false alarm fines in most communities <br />range from $25 to $50 per false alarm. <br />Page 9 <br />