Posted by The Dean of Cincinnati

Photo courtesy of here.

Back in January, my home was burglarized and I encountered government bureaucracy via the City’s False Alarm Reduction Unit.  Back then, I was never able to determine concretely how long it took police to respond to the call.  This past week, I had another incident with my alarm.  The response time was so slow, I wonder the point in even owning an alarm.

In January, when an actual burglar broke into my home, Cincinnati Bell’s Complete Protection department called and asked if I wanted police dispatched.  I was a bit thrown off by the question, so after contacting my wife, I called them back within a minute and said that I would like to have police dispatched. 

Here is what happened to me last Thursday:

1.  My teenaged sister-in-law arranged with my wife to stop by our house after her track practice. 
2.  My wife promptly forgot about these plans, and we went out to dinner.
3.  My sister-in-law came in the house, and didn’t know the alarm code.
4.  Cincinnati Bell called my home, and spoke with my sister-in-law.  She told them what had happened, and that she did not know the code.
5.  Cincinnati Bell called my cell phone, and informed me that they were dispatching police.
6.  My mother-in-law called, to tell me about the alarm situation with her daughter.

At this point, I decided there was no reason to abandon my dinner to meet police.  I figured there was no way a skinny 16 year old girl would be going to jail for breaking and entering, and that we could resolve everything over the phone.  So we told my sister-in-law to call us as soon as she saw the police driving up the street.

Fifteen minutes later, we called her, asking if the police had arrived.  My wife stayed on the line, and it took another five minutes or so until a cruiser pulled in front of our house.  The situation with my sister-in-law was easily resolved, and we went back to eating our dinner.

I could walk to the local police station in under twenty minutes.

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