Politics & Government

Appeals Court Overrules Lisle-Woodridge FD in Alarm-Monitoring Lawsuit

The ruling says a 2009 LWFD ordinance violates state law and compares the District's monitoring system unfavorably to that of private companies. The court's decision may carry implications beyond Lisle and Woodridge to other Illinois fire districts.

A 2009 ordinance passed by the Lisle-Woodridge Fire District again has been found by a court to be an overreach that violates the Illinois Fire Protection District Act, in a decision that also slams the district’s fire-alarm system as inferior to that of private companies, Security Info Watch reports

The ordinance, passed in September 2009, mandated that all commercial and multi-family buildings in the District switch from private alarm-company contracts to using the District’s own direct-dispatch system. According to an August 2012 article in the Bugle, five alarm companies brought suit the following year, claiming violations of the Illinois Fire Protection District Act as well as anti-trust laws.

The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had previously ordered a stay of a lower court’s injunction against the ordinance, the Bugle said, but the court ruled definitively against the LWFD's monitoring monopoly at the end of July, according to SIW.

Find out what's happening in Woodridgewith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Not only did the 50-page ruling say that the ordinance violated state law, but it added that “the district’s system is less reliable and more dangerous than the private alarm companies’ systems, does not comply with NFPA standards, and interferes with the plaintiffs’ ability to serve their customers,” SIW reports.

Security Sales & Integration, quoting a lawyer for the alarm companies, adds that the ruling found "the district having an out-of-service rate of more than 12 percent compared to alarm companies’ rate of 1 to 2 percent."

Find out what's happening in Woodridgewith free, real-time updates from Patch.

The District had previously argued that the ordinance would cut out an unnecessary and time-wasting middleman. 

“The basis for the need to eliminate a third party dispatcher is for the safety of our citizens and firefighters,” LWFPD Bureau Chief Jim French told the Bugle a year ago. “When the alarm goes off now, the call goes directly to our dispatch system which results in a faster response time.”

But the court has emphatically rejected that argument, and its decision may carry implications beyond Lisle and Woodridge to other Illinois fire districts.

“I think those fire protection districts [with similar laws] are going to have to think and weigh the decision and how they want to go forward,” Kevin Lehan, executive director of the Illinois Electronic Security Association and spokesman for EMERgency 24, told SIW. “The private industry and the public sector, we have to work together in a partnership... We have to come up with the best systems and processes that will provide the highest level of public safety for communities of all sizes in this state and this nation.”

According to SSI, the ruling leaves several claims unruled upon, such as accusations that the District violated companies 14th Amendment rights, and a filing based on the Sherman Antitrust Act, accusing the District of "anti-competitive behavior."

Read more about the decision at the Security Info Watch and Security Sales & Integration websites.


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