Los Angeles Times
May 7, 2010

California homeowners will be required to install carbon monoxide detectors starting in July 2011 under a bill signed Friday by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger that is aimed at preventing deaths and injuries caused by poisoning from the odorless, colorless gas.

Up to 40 California residents die each year from carbon monoxide poisoning, according to state Sen. Alan Lowenthal (D-Long Beach), whose legislation was signed by the governor.

“SB 183 will help put an end to the senseless deaths and injuries Californians suffer due to accidental carbon monoxide poisoning every year,” said Kevin Nida, president of the California State Firefighters’ Assn.

The California Air Resources Board says an average of 30 to 40 “avoidable deaths” occur in California each year because of unintentional carbon monoxide poisoning. Lowenthal said there also are hundreds of “avoidable” emergency room visits and hospitalizations in the state each year.

The bill requires that alarm devices, which can cost less than $30, to be installed in existing single-family homes that have a fossil-fuel burning appliance, fireplace or attached garage, starting in mid-2011. All other residential units will have to have the detectors in place by Jan. 1, 2013.

In addition to the firefighters association, the legislation also was supported by the California Alarm Assn. and Home Depot.

AUI Professional Security Solutions has finished it’s PSA Security Network evaluation of the ADPro perimeter security solution.  The full evaluation will be available in Security System News soon or can be viewed “here”.  Here are a few excerpts from the evaluation.

Description: This is an evaluation of the outdoor intrusion detection solution created by integrating four different ADPRO products.  This includes the ADPRO FastTrace video recorder/transmitter, Video Central software, Presidium video motion detector, and PRO PIR’s.  For the purpose of this evaluation, the proposed test site was a small equipment yard with an automatic gate and moderate pedestrian and vehicle traffic.

By themselves long range PIR’s and video motion analytics can be prone to a high number nuisance alarms depending on the environment.  The ADPRO solution answers this problem by combining the two technologies into one intrusion detection platform. 

The PRO PIR is a long range motion detector and is available in several different models.  The ADPRO FastTrace is a video recording and alarm transmission appliance.  The Presidium appliance handles the video motion analytics and passes on the results to the FastTrace appliance.  The Video Central software is used for configuration of the FastTrace appliance and for remotely monitoring alarms and video.

The system has so many features and applications that it is difficult to list them all here.

The Bottom Line: This is an excellent concept and the ADPRO solution delivers it as a comprehensive and stable platform.  There are many different types of outdoor perimeter detection solutions out there and this one should seriously be considered right along with the rest of them.  Because of the moderate learning curve and depth of configuration involved you won’t want to install just one.

CATHEDRAL CITY, Calif.—City officials here have adopted a verified-response policy in order to cope with its false alarm problem. Worse than the move itself, security industry officials say, is that the municipality apparently gave no warning to alarm companies and has, reportedly, ceased speaking with representatives of SIAC and the Inland Empire Alarm Association, who have been proactively working to combat the problem for more than a year.

Police officials were quick to point out they are not discontinuing alarm response. “Anything that’s manually operated—hold up or panic, for example—we’ll still rate those as priority one as we always have. The only thing we’re changing is that if it’s a mechanically activated alarm—motion, for example—until it’s verified we won’t necessarily respond,” said CCPD public information officer Lt. Chuck Robinson. “Those alarms will still be dispatched out, but it will be up to the officers in the field to decide what priority they give the response.”

AUI Professional Security Solutions is a provider of verified alarm systems, either as an upgrade to your existing systems or a new install.  Although most municipalities do not yet require verified alarm system to dispatch, most will give a much higher priority response to such alarms.  To find out more about what a verified alarm is please visit our “Technology” section “here”.  To contact us please click “here”.