[HISTORY: Adopted by the Borough Council of the Borough of
Collingdale 9-9-1996 by Ord. No. 609A (Ch. 7, Part 4, of the 1987 Code
of Ordinances). Amendments noted where applicable.]
As used in this chapter, the following terms shall have the
meanings indicated.
Any assembly of equipment, mechanical or electrical, arranged
to signal the occurrence of an illegal entry, fire, smoke and/or similar
type emergency or other activity requiring urgent attention and to
which the Borough of Collingdale emergency services are expected to
respond.
Any person, firm, business or corporation of any kind in
control of the premises wherein the alarm system is maintained.
Any alarm system activated by inadvertence, negligence or
unintentional acts to which the Borough of Collingdale emergency services
respond, including malfunction of the alarm system, or any other kind
of direct or indirect signal given to the Borough of Collingdale Police
Department and/or the Collingdale Fire Company No. 1 and/or Collingdale
Fire Company No. 2, any of the various ambulance services associated
thereto, to which police and/or firefighters and/or emergency medical
personnel respond, which is not the result of a robbery, burglary,
intrusion, smoke, fire or similar emergency. Alarm activation caused
by electrical failures beyond the control of the owners of the structure
protected, electrical storms or acts of God shall not be considered
false alarms.
All alarm users with an alarm system using an audible alarm
shall equip such system with a timing mechanism that will disengage
the alarm after a maximum period of 15 minutes. Such audible alarm
must remain disconnected until it can be manually reset. It is the
specific intent of the section to prevent an audible alarm automatically
resetting.
Every alarm user shall be responsible to obtain information
to enable the user to operate the alarm system properly and to locate
and obtain service for the alarm system.
An alarm service fee of $50 per false alarm shall be charged
against all alarm users that either knowingly or unknowingly cause
a false alarm to be received by the Borough of Collingdale emergency
services, which include the Borough of Collingdale Police Department
and/or the Borough of Collingdale Fire Company No. 1 and/or the Collingdale
Fire Company No. 2, any of the associated ambulance services thereto
to which police and/or firefighters and emergency medical personnel
respond, which is not the result of a robbery, burglary, intrusion,
fire or similar emergency, for the first offense; a one-hundred-dollar
alarm service fee for the second offense, and a two-hundred-dollar
alarm service fee for the third offense, and a three-hundred-dollar
alarm service fee for each offense thereafter. Each daily occurrence
of the same offense shall be considered as a new offense and chargeable
as such. All false alarm service fees are payable to the Borough of
Collingdale and shall be made within 10 days of the notice of charge.
Any alarm user who violates any provision of this chapter and
does not timely pay to the Borough of Collingdale the alarm service
fee(s) assessed as required herein, or any alarm user that violates
any provisions of this chapter, shall be guilty of a violation of
the chapter and shall, upon conviction before the Magisterial District
Judge, be subject to pay a fine of no less than $100 and not more
than $1,000, plus the payment to the Borough of Collingdale of the
assessed and charged alarm service fee(s), plus costs of prosecution.
