City of Atlanta False Alarm Ordinance Goes into Effect

On Sunday, September 15, the City of Atlanta's False Alarm Ordinance went into effect.

If you have not registered your home or business alarm, please register online here or by phone at 1-855-725-7102. There is no cost to register.

City of Atlanta residents will have until February 1, 2014 to register without a penalty for an unregistered alarm.

In an effort to improve public safety and better allocate resources, the City enacted a series of amendments to the existing False Alarm Ordinance. There is a $150 fine for not registering an alarm. If an alarm is activated and it turns out to be false there is no fine, just a warning. The 2nd false alarm will result in a $50 fine to the homeowner. Fines will escalate for each false call thereafter.

In 2012, the Atlanta Police Department responded to 65,000 alarm system activations, 95 percent of which were false alarms or alarms that were cancelled in route. These calls represent more than six percent of total 911 dispatches. With every call taking an average of 20-30 minutes, the equivalent of 8-12 full-time police officers were dedicated to responding to false alarms, thereby taking away valuable public safety resources from more pressing matters.

“Our police officers take every alarm call seriously. In many cases, however, the call ends up being nothing more than a false alarm caused by accident or human error,” said Atlanta Police Chief George Turner in a news release. “This new program will allow our officers to spend more time responding to true emergencies.”

The City of Atlanta’s False Alarm Program will be coordinated by CryWolf alarm monitoring service and software, designed and developed by Public Safety Corporation. CryWolf is a comprehensive false alarm tracking and billing system and has helped agencies across the country and in the Atlanta region reduce false alarms, increase collections, and improve administrative efficiency. The issuance of citations will be determined solely by the Atlanta Police Department.

This report was prepared by the City of Atlanta and edited for publication.