Party Hosts Might Become Responsible in Sierra Madre
By admin
Published: Tuesday, July 14th, 2009
The Sierra Madre City Council is considering holding party hosts responsible for multiple police visits.
Complaints about rowdy parties have been occurring in high quantities over the last three years to such an extent that an ordinance might be passed.
In many cases, a party host will assure police that noise and disruptive behavior will diminish, only for the police to receive another complaint, and sometimes even a third.
While police officers can make arrests for public intoxication or fighting at parties, they didn’t have the power to make party hosts responsible for the disturbances and subsequent costs.
The new ordinance will allow police to recover the costs from the responses if the second response occurs within twelve hours of the first written warning (which would be given at the time of the first call).
The unruly partying results in a drain of police resources, because it involves patrolling the neighborhood until partygoers leave, waiting for parents to pick up underage children, transporting and booking suspects, processing evidence, and writing reports.
In some situations, Sierra Madre Police Department has needed emergency assistance from Arcadia, Monrovia, or Pasadena police departments.
1 Response for “Party Hosts Might Become Responsible in Sierra Madre”
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I believe the most important aspect about maintaining a police agency is passing laws that do not treat the police agency as a profit center. When we pass an ordinance that encourages police to write citations we are infringing on our civil liberties.
At issue here is who decided the definition of disruptive music and behavior? Let’s suppose someone “john” has a 40th birthday party and he has a “sensitive” neighbor who will complain about nearly anything. The complaining neighbor will naturally call and complain about the party. An officer from the Sierra Madre Police department will come and likely issue a warning as the police department now has clear financial incentive to issue a warning. The Sierra Madre police department receives more than 50% of the City of Sierra Madre’s general fund and citations contribute directly to the general fund. After receiving the citation “john” realizes has just been abused by his problem neighbor facilitated by a poorly thought out city ordinance.
A better approach is to provide an event permit much like the overnight parking permit. When the problem neighbor calls he is informed that “john” filed an event permit as is allowed party music until a late hour. The event permit also informs ”john” if a public disturbance occurs as a result of his party he will be responsible for the cost to the police department and the city as well as acceptable noise levels to what hours. In the case of an unpermitted event the officers can issue the warning and inform the host that the loud music must be reduced by 10pm as they failed to obtain an event permit.
I feel our civil liberties would be better protected by well written municipal codes constructed mindful of personal privacy that allow individual to celebrate important life events unfettered from petty and vindictive neighbors and city revenue concerns.