In this Article the following terms and phrases shall have the following meanings:
(a) "Police" or "Police Department" means the San Francisco Police Department.
(b) "Chief of Police" means the Chief of the San Francisco Police Department or his or her designee.
(c) "Alarm installation company" means a person in the business of selling, providing, maintaining, servicing, repairing, altering, replacing, moving, or installing an alarm system in an alarm site.
(d) "Alarm dispatch request" means a notification to the Police Department that an alarm, either manual or automatic. has been activated at a particular alarm site.
(e) "Alarm license" means authorization granted by the Chief of Police to an alarm user to operate an alarm system.
(f) "Alarm monitoring company" means a person in the business of providing monitoring services.
(g) "Alarm site" means a single fixed premises or location served by an alarm system or systems. Each unit, if served by a separate alarm system in a multi-unit building or complex, shall be considered a separate alarm site.
(h) "Alarm system" means a device or series of devices, including, but not limited to, hardwired systems and systems interconnected with a radio frequency method such as cellular or private radio signals, which emit or transmit a remote or local audible, visual or electronic signal indicating an alarm condition and intended to summon law enforcement response, including local alarm systems. Except as otherwise specifically provided in this Article "alarm system" does not include an alarm installed in a vehicle or on someone's person unless the vehicle or the personal alarm is permanently located at a site. Independently controlled alarm systems within the same premises shall constitute separate alarm systems. Alarm devices installed on a temporary basis by the Police Department shall not constitute alarm systems. The Director of the Department of Emergency Management may by regulation exclude low-end local alarm systems that are not intended to summon law enforcement response from some or all of the requirements of this Article.
(i) "Alarm user" means any person, who (which) has contracted for monitoring, repair, installation or maintenance service from an alarm installation company or monitoring company for an alarm system, or who (which) owns or operates an alarm system which is not monitored, maintained or repaired under contract.
(j) "Arming station" means a device that allows control of an alarm system.
(k) "Automatic voice dialer" means any electrical, electronic, mechanical, or other device capable of being programmed to send a prerecorded voice message, when activated, over a telephone line, radio or other communication system, to a law enforcement, public safety or emergency services agency requesting dispatch.
(l) "Cancellation" means the process where response is terminated when a monitoring company (designated by the alarm user) for the alarm site notifies the responding law enforcement officer that there is not an existing situation at the alarm site requiring law enforcement agency response after an alarm dispatch request.
(m) "Conversion" means the transaction or process by which one alarm installation company or monitoring company begins the servicing and/or monitoring of a previously unmonitored alarm system or an alarm system previously serviced and/or monitored by another alarm company.
(n) "Duress alarm" means a silent alarm system signal generated by the entry of a designated code into an arming station in order to signal that the alarm user is being forced to turn off the system and requires law enforcement response.
(o) "False alarm" means an alarm dispatch request to a law enforcement agency, when the responding law enforcement officer finds no evidence of a criminal offense or attempted criminal offense after having completed a timely investigation of the alarm site.
(p) "Holder alarm" means a silent alarm signal generated by the manual activation of a device intended to signal a robbery in progress.
(q) "Premises" means any land and building located within the City and County of San Francisco except land or buildings owned, rented, or leased to the federal government, the State of California or any political subdivision or agency thereof, or the City and County of San Francisco, including the public schools.
(r) "Local alarm system" means any alarm system, which is not monitored, that annunciates an alarm only at the alarm site.
(s) "Monitoring" means the process by which a monitoring company receives signals from an alarm system and relays an alarm dispatch request to the municipality for the purpose of summoning law enforcement to the alarm site.
(t) "One-plus duress alarm" means the manual activation of a silent alarm signal by entering at an arming station a code that adds one to the last digit of the normal arm/disarm code (e.g., normal code: 1234, one-plus duress code: 1235).
(u) "Panic alarm" means an audible alarm system signal generated by the manual activation of a device intended to signal a life threatening or emergency situation requiring law enforcement response.
(v) "Person" means an individual, corporation, partnership, association, organization or similar entity.
(w) "Responder" means an individual capable of reaching the alarm site within 45 minutes and having access to the alarm site, the code to the alarm system and the authority to approve repairs to the alarm system.
(x) "SIA Control Panel Standard CP-01" means the ANSI-American National Standard Institute approved Security Industry Association-SIA CP-01 Control Panel Standard, as may be updated from time to time, that details recommended design features for security system control panels and their associated arming and disarming devices to reduce the incidence of false alarms. Control panels built and tested to this standard by Underwriters Laboratory (UL), or other nationally recognized testing organizations, will be marked to state: "Design evaluated in accordance with SIA CP-01 Control Panel Standard Features for False Alarm Reduction."
(y) "Takeover" means the transaction or process by which an alarm user takes over control of an existing alarm system, which was previously controlled by another alarm user.
(z) "Tax Collector" means the Treasurer-Tax Collector of the City and County of San Francisco.
(aa) "Verify" means an attempt by the monitoring company, or its representative, to contact the alarm site by telephonic or other electronic means, whether or not actual contact with a person is made to determine whether an alarm signal is valid before requesting law enforcement dispatch in an attempt to avoid an unnecessary alarm dispatch request.
(bb) "Zones" means division of devices into which an alarm system is divided to indicate the general location from which an alarm system signal is transmitted.
(cc) "Department of Emergency Management" and "Director of the Department of Emergency Management" or "Director" mean the Department of Emergency Management and Director of the Department of Emergency Management of the City and County of San Francisco, respectively.
(Added by Ord. 154-02, File No. 021078, App. 7/12/2002; amended by Ord. 30-03, File No. 021995, App. 2/28/2003; Ord. 175-13
, File No. 130551, App. 8/2/2013, Eff. 9/1/2013)
(Former Sec. 3702 added by Ord. 524-83, App. 11/4/83; repealed by Ord. 154-02, File No. 021078, App. 7/12/2002)