City's new deal saves on false alarms

By outsourcing the management of a new burglary alarm ordinance to a Texas company, city officials say Jacksonville will line its coffers by more than $200,000 over the next five years and increase proactive police patrolling in the process.

Between 2001 and the end of 2007 the Jacksonville Police Department responded to 21,000 alarm calls - 99.5 percent of which were false, according to an analysis of the calls for service conducted by the Police Department.

Beginning July 1, residents who have three or more false alarms within a 12-month period will have to pay a fine, starting at $50. Ten or more false alarms will result in a $500 fee for each false alarm.

"The police are responding to some of the same alarms over and over again," Jacksonville Mayor Sammy Phillips said. "When you have police tied-up with a false alarm they can't be where they are really needed."

The contractor that won the bid to handle the alarm management system - PMAM Inc., of Irving, Texas - has a strategy to reduce the amount of false alarms over a five-year period, the length of its contract.

PMAM will provide all the services related to alarm management, absorb the costs and divide the revenue, according to its contract with the city. The estimated income from alarm management controlled by PMAM over the next five years is $337,970, with the city receiving 65 percent and PMAM receiving 35 percent.

There are approximately 3,360 alarm users in Jacksonville, according to city staff estimates. PMAM will be responsible for billing and collecting of fines from all alarm system users.

Jacksonville Police Chief Mike Yaniero said his department has put a lot of time and effort into figuring out how to reduce the need for more police officers as the city grows.

"We are always talking about hiring more officers," he said. "By reducing the number of false alarms we will reduce the need for additional police officers."

Fifty-two percent of the 99.5 percent of false alarms is due to operator error, the analysis data shows. Yaniero calculated that the time spent each year on false alarms due to operator error is equivalent to one police officer's patrol time for a year.

"This is a case of concentrating on the things we can change to reduce that need," he said.

Part of PMAM's duties will be to properly educate alarm users in how to use the systems they've purchased.

Alarm owners in high turnover places - like apartment buildings - are not effectively educating new users how to operate the alarms they are inheriting, Yaniero said.

"They might tell them the code number, but don't tell them about a 45-second delay, for instance," he said. "If we can educate owners to use their alarms properly we can have police officers more engaged in traffic enforcement and proactive patrolling in our neighborhoods."

Contact crime reporter Lindell Kay at 910-219-8456. Read Lindell's blog at http://onslowcrime.encblogs.com.