Alarmed over false alarms: Saugus proposes fines for violators

SAUGUS – Police chased down 17 false alarms over the weekend, some physically, some by phone but all of them proved to be time consuming.Under a proposed article on the annual Town Meeting warrant, some of those businesses and homeowners responsible for the wayward alarms could be facing steep fines if they are not careful.Police Chief Domenic DiMella is asking Town Meeting members to approve a bump in false alarm charges in the hopes of getting alarm owners to take better care of their systems.”We have a big problem with false alarms,” he said. “And every trip ties up a cruiser.”Many nights the Police Department has as few as two cruisers on the street and if one is tied up responding to a false alarm, DiMella said that hampers their coverage.Under the new changes only two false alarms in a calendar year would be acceptable. A third false alarm would cost the violator a $50 fine. The fine would jump to $100 each for the fourth and fifth false alarms and $200 per alarm for sixth and subsequent alarms.Also new, DiMella said, would be charging a late fee if the fines are not paid in a timely fashion.The Police Department will provide written notification that the fine must be paid within 30 days or an additional $5 will be tacked on along with 12 percent of the outstanding balance. Failure to pay that within 15 days and violators will be hit with another $25 fine for every 30 days the fine goes unpaid.”It encourages them to pay it or they get hit with a late fee,” DiMella said.The Fire Department has a similar setup except they tolerate three false alarms. If the fourth and fifth alarms prove to be false, Fire Chief James Blanchard said the perpetrator gets hit with a $150 fine each, the sixth and subsequent false alarms double, however, to $300.”Here’s the glitch,” Blanchard said. “The (Square One) Mall comes in on one box and we have to look to see which business the alarm is coming from then we have to see which smoke detector was tripped.”To be able to issue the fines, the false alarms have to have come from not just the same business but the same smoke detector. Blanchard said if a business’ smoke detector “A” goes off on Monday and smoke detector “B” goes off on Tuesday, it’s not a strike two because two different alarms were tripped.”We do fine and we fine a lot of people,” Blanchard added.The real gain of the program, according to Blanchard, is that companies become aware of problems that might be causing the false alarms and fix them.”We will send a letter when they have two false alarms from one detector warning them that after the third we will fine them” Blanchard said. “That’s usually all we have to do. The ultimate goal is not to fine, but to get them to maintain their fire systems.”DiMella said he is hoping for the same results with his program – that residents and businesses will take notice of their systems and, if they are going off with regularity, fix the problem.If they don’t, DiMella said, officers will issue fines without hesitation if the article is approved.