[CC 1977 §2-74; Ord. No. 1012, 5-2-1973; Ord. No.
1236 §§1 — 3, 2-20-1980]
A.
The
Police force is hereby established which shall consist of the Chief
of Police and such additional Police Officers with such ranks as may
be authorized by the Board of Aldermen.
B.
All
Police Officers shall be subject to the personnel rules of the City
of Harrisonville and the Standard Operating Procedures of the Police
Department and shall familiarize themselves with same and shall in
all ways conform with same.
[Ord. No. 3040 §§1 —
2, 6-16-2008; Ord. No.
3196 §1, 11-21-2011]
A.
ALARM AGENT
ALARM BUSINESS
ALARM SUBSCRIBER
ALARM SYSTEM
AUTOMATIC DIALING DEVICE
CALENDAR WEEKEND
CALENDAR YEAR
FALSE ALARM
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
TELEPHONE COMPANY
Definitions. The following words, terms and phrases, when
used in this Section, shall have the meanings ascribed to them in
this Section, except where the context clearly indicates a different
meaning:
Any person who is employed by an alarm business, either directly
or indirectly, whose duties include any of the following: Selling,
maintaining, leasing, servicing, repairing, altering, replacing, moving
or installing on or in any building, structure, or facility any alarm
system.
Includes any business engaged in any of the activities of
selling, installing, servicing, altering, leasing, repairing, maintaining,
replacing, moving, monitoring, or responding to an alarm system and
causing any of these activities to take place.
Any person that leases, contracts for, buys or otherwise
obtains and operates an alarm system for the purpose of obtaining
a response to the alarm from the Police, and on whose premises an
alarm system is maintained, excluding audible alarms on motor vehicles.
Any device which is designed or used for the detection of
burglary or attempted burglary or for alerting others of the commission
of a robbery or attempted robbery within a building, structure or
facility, or both, and which emits a sound or transmits a signal or
message when activated for the purpose of deterring the intruder or
notifying another person of the happening or both.
Refers to an alarm system which automatically sends over
the telephone switching network, a prerecorded voice message or coded
signal indicating existence of an unlawful act to which a Police response
is requested.
Shall begin on Friday at 5:00 P.M. and end on Monday at 8:00
A.M.
Each twelve (12) month period beginning on January first
(1st) and ending on December thirty-first (31st).
The activation of a burglary or robbery alarm, whereby the
Police are summoned to a location, and neither of these crimes is
occurring, nor is there any evidence of these crimes having occurred
or having been attempted. An alarm will not be considered a false
alarm if it is determined by the Police Department that the alarm
was caused by:
A natural or man-made catastrophe, or an act of God. Such events
include tornadoes, floods, earthquakes or other similarly violent
conditions.
Vandalism causing physical damage to the premises.
Telephone line outage.
Electrical service interruptions and/or power outages.
Attempted entry of a location causing visible, physical or other
evidence of damage to the location.
Severe weather with severe lightning, etc.
Multiple false alarms on any one (1) system, occurring within
a twenty-four (24) hour period of time, shall be considered as one
(1) false alarm.
Multiple false alarms on any one (1) system occurring within
a calendar weekend shall be considered as one (1) false alarm.
The test of a local alarm system by a licensed alarm business
agent or employee who is present at the premises servicing, repairing
or installing the alarm when such testing does not result in the alarm
being activated for an uninterrupted period exceeding sixty (60) seconds
and when the Police Department has been notified of the test.
The utility that furnishes telephone service to the City
area.
B.
Alarm Reporting. All reported alarm soundings, either directly
or by relay from an alarm business, shall be done in a manner prescribed
by the Chief of Police.
C.
False Alarms — Warning, Reimbursement To City, Suspension Of
Service, Appeal. The following limits are established for
each alarm system:
1.
Warning notice. Upon receipt of the third (3rd)
false alarm within a calendar year, a warning notice shall be issued
by the Police Department to the alarm subscriber.
2.
Subsequent false alarms. Upon receipt of subsequent false alarms within a calendar year following the warning, a partial expense reimbursement fine to the City in accordance with the schedule presented in Subsection (I)(1) of this Section shall be paid by the alarm subscriber for each such false alarm. Failure to pay the partial expense reimbursement fine within twenty-one (21) days of demand by the Harrisonville Police Department will result in all alarm service otherwise rendered by the Police Department to be suspended until payment is made.
3.
Multiple false alarms in twenty-four (24) hours. Any multiple false alarms set off in a twenty-four (24) hour period
of time shall be considered as one (1) false alarm per the definition
of false alarm.
4.
Grace period. For the purposes of this Section,
the schedule of partial reimbursement fines of false alarms shall
become effective thirty (30) days after installation of a new alarm
system or the date of the first (1st) false alarm reported by the
system, whichever occurs first. During this thirty (30) day grace
period, false alarms will not be chargeable under this Section. This
is for newly installed alarm systems only.
5.
Appeal from fine. An alarm subscriber who desires
to appeal a partial expense reimbursement fine imposed by this Section
shall submit a written request for a hearing to the Chief of Police
within ten (10) days of receipt of the notice that such a fine is
due. The Chief of Police or designee following not less than ten (10)
days' notice to the alarm subscriber of the date of the appeal hearing
shall then meet and consider the appeal. Appeals of the Chief of Police's
decision shall be heard at the next available meeting of the Public
Safety Committee.
D.
False Alarms — Reinstatement After Warning.
1.
The warning provided in Subsection (C)(2) prior to the hearing described in Subsection (C)(5) shall be withdrawn after the Police Department is shown proof of inspection and service by a licensed service company, and is satisfied that the fault has been corrected. The Police Department may designate the licensed company for inspection and service.
2.
On the effective date of reinstatement of the alarm service, the
false alarm count shall revert to zero.
E.
Limitations And Restrictions.
1.
Automatic dialing devices. No person shall use,
operate, or install any device that will, upon activation, automatically
initiate a telephone call and deliver a recorded alarm message to
any telephone of a customer of the public telephone company, without
the prior written consent of such customer.
F.
Automatic Dialing Devices. It shall be unlawful for any
person to install or have installed within a residence, business,
or any building within the City limits an automatic dialing device
or tape dialer that when activated sends a prerecorded voice message
over a telephone cable or wire to the Police Department by use of
the City's 911 emergency telephone service or by use of any other
telephone number assigned to the Police Department.
G.
Local Alarm Systems — Length Of Alarm. Each alarm
system with any exterior sound-producing device including, but not
limited to, gongs, buzzers, sirens, bells, or horns shall be equipped
with a time device which limits the operation of such exterior sound-producing
device to fifteen (15) minutes or less for residential alarms and
thirty (30) minutes for property not zoned residential. However, older
model alarm systems that do not have the capability to automatically
discontinue the audible alarm sound within the appropriate time frame
shall not be subject to the requirement of this Section.
H.
Violations.
1.
It shall be unlawful for any person, corporation, or partnership to violate any provisions of this Chapter except that it shall not be deemed unlawful to accumulate more than three (3) false alarms in any calendar year. Such accumulation shall be dealt with as set out in Subsection (I)(1).
2.
The accumulation of more than three (3) false alarms shall not be
a criminal violation and shall not be punishable in Municipal Court
but failure to pay the partial expense reimbursement shall be such
a violation.
3.
It shall not be a defense that the warning referenced in Subsection (C)(2) is not given or is not received.
4.
If the alarm subscriber is other than an individual, the corporation
or partnership may be charged with the ordinance violation and be
summoned into court by delivering said summons to an officer, partner,
or managing or general agent, or by leaving it at any business office
of the corporation or partnership with the person having charge thereof.
I.
Penalties.
1.
Any alarm subscriber with an alarm system which has recorded more
than three (3) false alarms within a calendar year shall be subjected
to the partial expense reimbursement fines as established in the City's
Comprehensive Schedule of Fees.[2]
[Ord. No. 3650, 5-1-2023]
[2]
Editor's Note: The Comprehensive Schedule of Fees is on file
in the City offices.
2.
Any person convicted of violating any provision of this Section shall, unless the specific penalties of Subsection (I)(1) of this Section apply, be punished by a fine of not less than fifty dollars ($50.00) nor more than five hundred dollars ($500.00), or by imprisonment for a period not to exceed thirty (30) days, or both such fine and imprisonment.