Newark City Council passed a new law for false fire alarms, which would cause the owners of the buildings to be fined when firefighters respond to the alarms.
The law, which is an effort to update Newark’s fire code, gives written warning the first three times firefighters respond to the false fire alarms. A fine of $100 will be given to the owner of the building on the fourth false alarm.
False alarms negatively affect emergency resources, which is why the law is meant to discourage them, Dave Tynan, Newark fire marshal, said.
The law is only relevant to automatic alarms that falsely go off. If a person were to call 911 and it was a false alarm, rather than an automatic system going off, no written warning or fines would be charged.
False alarms aren’t crimes, but purposefully setting off a false alarm is a crime. There can be a fine anywhere between $250 to $1,000 and jail time up to 90 days.
As part of the law, buildings with truss construction in the roof or floor, which causes them to collapse quicker in a fire, will be required to visibly display a warning to firefighters on a red triangle sign.
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