MONTGOMERY COUNTY
MARYLAND
FALSE ALARM REDUCTION PROGRAM
ANNUAL REPORT
FOR YEAR ENDING 2000
False Alarm Reduction
The False
Alarm Reduction Unit (FARU) of the Montgomery County Department of Police
completed its fifth year of enforcement under the amended Chapter 3A, Alarms,
of the Montgomery County Code. In
calendar year 2000, the FARU exceeded several of its goals for the year, as
well as maintained false alarm dispatch rates, even with an increase of almost
8,000 newly registered alarm sites.
The false
alarm dispatch rate is perhaps the truest measure of false alarm reduction, as
it calculates the number of false alarm dispatches relevant to the total number
of alarm users. The false alarm dispatch
rate is the only rate, which takes into account the growth of the alarm user
base. Montgomery County has the lowest residential false alarm dispatch rate
of any jurisdiction in the country at .32.
This means that overall, residential alarm users experience, on average,
only 1 false alarm every three years, which is a remarkable statistic. The commercial false alarm dispatch rate is
1.09, a slight increase over 1999. Combined residential and commercial false
alarm dispatch rates remained at .44, and is one of lowest combined reported
dispatch rates in the entire country.
Chart 1 – False Alarm Dispatch Rates
|
Type
|
1994
|
1995
|
1996
|
1997
|
1998
|
1999
|
2000
|
Residential
|
N/A
|
.66
|
.54
|
.45
|
.36
|
.35
|
.32
|
Commercial
|
N/A
|
2.29
|
1.82
|
1.32
|
1.06
|
1.04
|
1.09
|
Both
|
1.43
|
.98
|
.78
|
.61
|
.48
|
.44
|
.44
|
Reported false alarm dispatch rates
are as high as 4.0, which means that every
alarm user has four actual responses every
year. If Montgomery County’s false
alarm dispatch rate was 4.0 instead of its current .32, it would mean that
police officers would respond to 245,336 alarm activations each year. That would require 79 police officers to do
absolutely nothing but respond to burglar alarms at a staggering cost of
approximately $12,000,000.
In
projecting the number of alarm activations to which police would have responded
in 2000, absent any enforcement of the alarm statute, statistics show that
police officers would have actually responded to 87,707 alarm activations
instead of 26,877. This number assumes
that the 1.43 dispatch rate present in 1994 would remain constant through and
including 2000, which is highly unlikely.
A more accurate assumption would be that, absent any enforcement of the
amended alarm law, the dispatch rate would continue to rise each year, and the
number of actual responses in 2000 would be more than 150,000. This projection clearly shows just how
significant the .44 dispatch rate and the 26,877 (as opposed to over 150,000)
actual responses to alarm activations in 2000 really are. Estimated costs to respond to 150,000 alarm
calls would be $7,500,000; clearly a cost that no local jurisdiction can
absorb.
Since
enforcement of the alarm law began in 1995, alarm activations to which police
officers must respond has been reduced by a total of 37.2%. Despite a growth in alarm users of 31,578,
police responded to almost 16,000 less
alarm calls in 2000 over 1994. Actual
responses to alarm calls between 1999 and 2000 rose slightly.
In
reviewing Graph 1 above, it reveals that requests for dispatch continue to
rise, as do the total number of alarm users in Montgomery County. Absent enforcement of the alarm statute,
coupled with the increase in alarm users, one would expect that the actual
dispatches to alarm activations would increase substantially, or at least as
the same rate of growth. However, actual
responses to alarm activations increased by a mere 1.4% between 1999 and
2000. Chart 11 on page 15 and Chart 12
on page 16 indicate that the increase in false alarms occurred most often in
commercial locations. Statistical
analysis of the commercial false alarms indicate that banks are a major
contributor to the false alarms in Montgomery County, yet account for a very
low percentage of the total number of commercial alarm users. The FARU will be focusing on bank facilities
in the coming year, looking at any unique security needs, problems and/or
circumstances, which may contribute to their false alarm problems.
Graph 1
also shows that the County continues to maintain a reduction relative to the
total number of requests for dispatch vs. the total number of alarm users. For example, in 1994, Montgomery County
police officers responded on 97.5% of all requests for dispatch (43,936
requests for dispatch with 42,821 actual responses). However, in 2000, police officers responded
on only 55.3% of all requests for dispatch (48,603 requests for dispatch with
only 26,877 actual responses). This
represents a 42.2% reduction between requests and dispatches, even with 31,578 more alarm users, and correlates to
significant savings in police officer time.
Graph 2 and
Chart 2 below depict the difference between the requests for dispatch and the
actual responses since 1994. While there
was a slight increase (1.4%) in the percentage of total calls responded to
between 1999 and 2000, the number of requests for dispatch and the total number
of alarm users increased as well, which makes this slight increase less
significant.
Chart 2 – Requests for Dispatch vs. Actual Responses
Year
|
Requests for
Dispatch
|
Actual
Responses
|
Percentage of Total Calls Responded To
|
|
2000
|
48,603
|
26,877
|
55.3%
|
|
1999
|
48,434
|
25,951
|
53.9%
|
|
1998
|
46,839
|
25,877
|
55.3%
|
|
1997
|
45,791
|
29,219
|
63.8%
|
|
1996
|
40,534
|
32,390
|
79.9%
|
|
1995
|
40,967
|
35,624
|
87.0%
|
|
1994
|
43,936
|
42,821
|
97.5%
|
One
critical timesaving measure in the alarm statute is the requirement that an
alarm company cancel a police response when it is determined that an alarm
activation is false. The high number of
non-responses was due, in part, to that required cancellation by alarm companies. The higher the number of cancellations, the
better the job the alarm companies are doing of reducing the number of false
alarms to which police officers are required to respond. In 2000 alarm companies cancelled 7,424
requests for dispatch, an increase of more than 200 cancellations from 1999. These cancellations provided officers with
more time to engage in other law enforcement related activities.
The FARU
continued its strict enforcement of all requirements for requesting dispatch,
including providing the correct alarm user registration and alarm business
license numbers. Police officers were
not dispatched when an alarm business failed to provide all of the required
information to ECC calltakers. Nor were police
dispatched if an alarm user was in a violation status for failure to register,
failure to pay a false alarm response fee, or failure to upgrade the system to
meet county installation standards. The
legally mandated non-response provisions in the alarm law resulted in 3,282
requests for dispatch that were denied as a result of the violation status of
the alarm user or alarm business. It is
significant that this number is down from 3,651 in 1999, which represents a
full 369 fewer requests for dispatch that were in violation of the statute. This is directly attributable to the FARU’s
enforcement initiative in 2000 that cited alarm businesses that were illegally
requesting dispatch. (See Major
Accomplishments on page 10 for further information on this initiative.)
In 2000,
almost 7% more residential and commercial alarm users experienced no false
alarms at all. A total of 45,684 alarm users had zero false alarm activations
in 2000. As the following pie graphs
show, each year, more alarm users achieve the zero false alarm threshold. This statistic, which is supported by the low
false dispatch rate, is indicative of the success of the overall false alarm
reduction program. These reductions
become more significant when viewed with the steady increase in the number of
alarm users each year.
1995 Alarm Users = 36,436 1996
Alarm Users = 42,150
1997
Alarm Users = 48,008 1998
Alarm Users = 54,175
1999 Alarm Users = 58,143 2000
Alarm Users = 61,334
As a direct
result of the FARU’s strict enforcement of the alarm legislation, there were 20,172
alarm calls to which police officers were not required to respond in 2000. This
equates to savings in 2000 of approximately $1,008,600 and 13,448 hours of
police officer time, or 6.47 police work years. (Monetary savings are based on a conservative
cost of $50.00 per response. Work year
savings are based on an average of 20 minutes per alarm response by two
officers.) This timesaving allows police
officers more time to engage in proactive crime prevention efforts,
neighborhood patrol, and community policing initiatives.
The
following graphs illustrate the revenues, hours, and work years saved as a
result of the false alarm reduction program.
Graph 3 shows that the actual revenue saved in 2000 as a result of
police officers responding to 20,172 less false alarms was $1,008,600. Since the FARU began enforcement of the alarm
statute, the total revenue saved by Montgomery County has been $4,442,050.
Graph 4 shows that the actual hours saved in 2000 as a result of
police officers responding to 20,172 less false alarms was l3,448 hours. Since the FARU began enforcement of the alarm
statute, Montgomery County has recovered 59,215 hours in police officer time.
Graph 5 shows that 6.47 actual work years were saved in 2000 as a
result of enforcement of the alarm statute.
Since enforcement began, Montgomery County has recovered a total of
28.47 work years of police officer time.
The total
savings in dollars, hours, and work years since 1994 have been significant, and
are depicted in Chart 3 below. As stated
previously in this report, absent strict enforcement of the alarm statute,
Montgomery County would have paid
more than $5,000,000 in 2000 alone responding to false alarms. The $4,442,050 savings to the county is,
therefore, even more significant.
Chart 3 – Cumulative Savings
Year
|
Revenue
Saved
|
Hours
Saved
|
Work Years
Saved
|
|
1994
|
$ 55,750
|
743
|
.35
|
|
1995
|
$ 242,750
|
3,236
|
1.56
|
|
1996
|
$ 366,950
|
4,892
|
2.35
|
|
1997
|
$ 752,850
|
10,038
|
4.82
|
|
1998
|
$ 968,550
|
12,914
|
6.21
|
|
1999
|
$1,046,600
|
13,954
|
6.71
|
|
2000
|
$1,008,600
|
13,448
|
6.47
|
|
|
|
|
|
TOTAL
|
$4,442,050
|
59,215
|
28.47
|
In calendar
year 2000, the FARU had 459 registered government facilities, all of which were
held to the same strict standards as all other alarm users. Of the 459 government alarm users, 104, or
23%, had a least one false alarm. This
is down from 113, or 25.4%, government alarm users in 1999. Those 104 alarm users collectively had 213 false
alarms. The good news for government
alarm users is that 355, or 77%, had zero
false alarms in 2000. This percentage is
slightly better than the percentages shown for all other alarm users
(74.5%). The following chart reflects
government alarm user activity for 1999 and 2000.
Chart 4 – Government Alarm Users
|
# of False Alarms
|
# of Alarm Users
1999
|
# of Alarm Users
2000
|
|
0
|
332
|
355
|
|
1
|
72
|
54
|
|
2
|
22
|
17
|
|
3
|
13
|
14
|
|
4
|
2
|
7
|
|
5
|
1
|
1
|
|
6
|
0
|
1
|
|
7
|
1
|
0
|
|
8
|
0
|
1
|
|
9
|
1
|
2
|
|
13
|
1
|
0
|
