Spokane County adopts fees for false security alarms

Businesses and residents in unincorporated areas of Spokane County will now face $65 fines each time Spokane County Sheriff’s Office deputies respond to false alarms triggered by security systems.

Spokane County Commissioners set the fee Jan. 9, rectifying a gap in the county code that’s existed for almost six years. The commission initially adopted an ordinance aimed at reducing the number of false alarms in 2018 but tabled discussions of what the fee amount should be for a later date. Sheriff John Knowles started that conversation again at a commissioner meeting last month.

Commissioner Al French said the policy is intended to recoup the county’s costs for responding to false alarms so taxpayers are not stuck with the bill. Collected fines will go nto the county’s general fund, the ordinance states.

It will also ensure sheriff’s deputies are able to respond to actual emergencies, French said.

“Philosophically, what you want to do is make sure the deputies are not tied up, that they’re able to respond when you need them,” French said.

Sheriff’s office spokesperson Mark Gregory said the department responds to around 1,100 to 1,200 false alarms every year, which can result in a lot of wasted time and resources. The false alarms are usually initiated by alarm systems tied to companies with centralized dispatch hubs that notify law enforcement that a response is needed.

The new fee structure, Gregory said, will hopefully motivate security system owners to make sure their system is working properly and establish alternative notification processes with their alarm providers. He encouraged alarm users to have their companies provide first notification to themselves to verify a trip, rather than law enforcement.

“Between the wind, and everything else, I got roughly 20 trips yesterday,” Gregory said of his own residential alarm system. “Can you imagine if 20 calls went to 911 yesterday because of my alarm setting?”

County code states alarm users will not be charged a fee if a responding deputy determines a false alarm could be attributed to an act of nature such as an earthquake, tornado or windstorm, and newly installed systems are allotted one false alarm response in the first 60 days of installation free of charge. An appeal process will be available for those who feel they were wrongly fined, Gregory said.

The city of Spokane has had a similar policy in place, the False Alarm Reduction Program, since 2006. Homeowners are charged $85 per false alarm response while commercial properties are charged $165. In Spokane Valley, which contracts with the sheriff’s office for law enforcement needs, the fee is set at $65.

Spokane Police Department spokesperson Julie Humphreys said the city’s program pulled in $406,119 in 2021 and $468,464 in 2022. Last year’s total of $405,983 does not yet include fees charged in December, but Humphreys estimated another $60,000 will be collected. Humphreys emphasized that the program is not intended to be a money-maker for the city and that it is only recoup the costs of having to respond to false alarm calls.

The majority of the roughly 4,000 alarm system calls the police department has received each year over the past decade have ended up being false, Humphreys said. Of the 4,556 such calls SPD received in 2022, 3,069 were confirmed to be false alarms. The remaining 1,487 were designated as canceled or “other,” which Humphreys said includes instances in which officers responded and extended grace to the alarm user as the trip could have been tied to something like an extreme weather event.

“So you might be thinking, ‘So what is the point of these systems,’ ” Humphreys said. “Well they do serve as a good deterrent. It gives people a lot of peace of mind.”

There is no way of knowing how many break-ins or burglaries are prevented each year by displaying signs on a property that warn that an alarm system is installed there, Humphreys added.