The next time a burglar alarm goes off in San Jose -- chances are one will be sounding soon -- police won't automatically send officers to see if a crime is taking place.
Starting Sunday, San Jose police will respond to residential and commercial alarms only if someone can verify that an apparent break-in may be happening or has already occurred. Police say the new "verified response" strategy will ensure that in a department shrunken by budget cuts, officers aren't wasting time chasing thousands of false alarms.
But notice of the policy change has left some people concerned that their safety will be compromised.
"Do police expect me to come here, see robbers and get myself shot or killed so I can call police and tell them some burglars are here?" asked Johnny Koonce, whose custom car and bike shop was cleaned out by burglars in 2009. "They should be the first responders."
With notice of the impending policy change reaching businesses, a trade association for commercial alarm companies has called on city leaders to reconsider. They favor rules that allow for more false-alarm fines but still guarantee a police response.
But San Jose police say they're following the lead of other cities including Fremont, Las Vegas and Salt Lake City that have stopped automatic alarm responses to make better use of their officers' time. Police stress that they still will automatically respond to alarms involving banks and automated teller machines,
critical infrastructure, firearms dealers and explosives, as well as panic buttons or robbery alarms.
And police say they don't want San Jose citizens attempting to stop crooks themselves, only to call 911 if an alarm is sounding and they see signs of a break-in, such as broken glass or a suspicious car parked nearby.
"We want people to be a good witness and report anything suspicious," police spokesman Sgt. Jason Dwyer said.
While Koonce and others wonder if criminals will view the policy change as an open invitation to rob, police argue it will help them fight crime.
"Now officers have the freedom to go do proactive police work," Dwyer said. "It acts as a deterrent. We anticipate shorter response times and we don't anticipate a huge increase in burglaries."
Under the old policy, San Jose police responded to all alarm calls. But of the 12,000 audible alarms police checked out in 2010, 98.4 percent turned out to be false, and cops made just two arrests.
"It was a drain on our resources," Dwyer said.
In a memorandum sent last month to the City Council's public safety committee, police Chief Chris Moore wrote that "the primary purpose of police is to respond to reported crimes, preventive patrols and community policing, and the practice of responding to all audible alarms does not accomplish any of those goals."
Although the city fines property owners for repeated false alarms, the $466,633 collected in fines does not make up for the $662,203 police say it costs them to respond, based on the hourly cost of the officers' time.
The department, which has seen a 20 percent reduction in its ranks in two years, has scaled back other operations, including horse-mounted patrols, gang-prevention officers and school crossing guards.
Before making the policy change, Moore said the department researched how other agencies have dealt with an increasing number of false alarms.
Fremont implemented its plan in March 2005 amid similar concerns about public safety. One year after Fremont police stopped responding to burglar alarms without independent confirmation, burglary rates jumped 14 percent.
However, burglary rates in Fremont dropped in 2007 and '08.
"Burglaries are very cyclical," said Fremont police Sgt. Bill Veteran.
Under the old San Jose policy, a minimum of two officers responded to each alarm call, and in situations where the alarm is coming from a large commercial building, as many as eight officers may have responded, Dwyer said.
"That's eight hours of personnel time you've spent where no crime has been committed," Dwyer said.
And in most cases where an alarm sounds because of a break-in, the burglars are long gone.
"The bad guys are never there anyway," said Veteran. "They don't stick around."
The California Alarm Association, a trade association of licensed alarm company operators and suppliers, argues that the alarm industry and law enforcement leaders have created a better way to deal with false alarms while still responding to all alarms. The association says its model, which requires customers to pay registration fees and escalating fines for false alarms, often generates revenue that covers the cost of police response.
In this model, alarm companies must call two numbers to try to verify with the customer that it is not a false alarm. Repeat false offenders would then fall under a verified response system.
As an example, the association wrote that Oakland has reduced alarm dispatches and collected more than $1 million in fees by implementing the program
But in his memo to the City Council, Moore wrote that the models presented by alarm companies "do not provide the efficiencies we are looking to achieve." Police made the change to the verified response system with the agreement of the City Council and Mayor Chuck Reed, according to Officer Jose Garcia.
Still, police still consider alarms a worthwhile investment to keep thieves at bay.
"We're not telling people to get rid of alarms," Dwyer said. "An audible alarm can work as a deterrent."
Contact Mark Gomez at 408-920-5869. Follow him on Twitter @MarkMgomez
Copyright 2012 - San Jose Mercury News, Calif.
McClatchy-Tribune News Service
