Richmond Mayor Wants Compensation For Residents Disturbed By False Alarms

RICHMOND (KCBS) -- Emergency sirens have almost become a part of life in Richmond, where the community warning system keeps sounding off false alarms.   Now, the city's mayor says the county owes his residents for the mistakes.

"The bottom line is it's never worked as intended," Richmond Mayor Tom Butt told KCBS.

The Contra Costa County warning system is tested each month, but even when it went off for a half hour on a random day earlier this month, most residents went about their business.

Richmond Mayor Tom Butt says it has a never cry wolf effect when the faulty siren goes off on accident - residents just ignore it if they can.

"Everybody kind of jumps," Mayor Butt said.

Butt has introduced the idea of fines for false alarms, but didn't gain traction.  Now he says that if the county is asking people to miss work by sheltering in place for an emergency that turns out to be fake, they should have to pay.

"Somebody should pay for it. There really should be compensation," Butt said.