[Adopted 1-6-1998 by L.L. No. 1-1998]
It is the purpose of this article to protect and promote the public
health, safety and general welfare by eliminating avoidable false fire and
burglar alarms and thereby ensuring that fire and police facilities and personnel
will be available for actual emergencies. False alarms unnecessarily drain
resources and require emergency responses which contribute to increased accident
rates and which delay responses to real emergencies.
This article applies to all installed fire and burglar alarms which
are directly connected to a police or fire agency or to a private agency which,
in turn, makes a connection to a police or fire agency or to no agency but
merely sounds an alarm on the premises, each installed alarm having the purpose
of notifying police and/or fire agencies that an emergency exists at the site
of such installed alarm requiring an immediate response from such police or
fire agency. This article does not apply to state, county, town and village
buildings.
As used in this article the following terms shall have the meaning as
indicated:
AVOIDABLE FALSE ALARM
Any false alarm received by a local police or fire agency from an
installed alarm which is caused by improper installation of the system, by
a mechanical failure or malfunction of the system or is due to negligence
on the part of the owner, user, custodian or other person responsible for
the installed alarm. An avoidable false alarm does not include an alarm activated
by a natural phenomenon such as a tornado, earthquake, or the like, or by
acts of third parties which are beyond control of the person responsible for
the installed alarm.
INSTALLED ALARM
Any mechanical or electrical device installed in a building for the
purpose of automatically notifying, directly or indirectly, police or fire
agencies when a break-in or fire occurs and used for the purpose of summoning
help from police or fire agencies.