Kosciusko County needs residents key holder information

WARSAW, Ind. --- The Kosciusko County Sheriff's Office wants residents who have security alarm systems in their home or business to make sure they have their key holder information updated.

In 2018 the Kosciusko County 911 Communications Center received 3,051 security alarms calls.

The majority of those calls were the result of false or accidental activation.

Alarms can be triggered in a variety of manners; including pets, insects and the wind.

Jan Orban has a home security system; she tells ABC57 she's glad the sheriff's department is making this new push.

"Usually when a security alarm system goes off the alarm monitoring system will call the house and if I don't answer then they call my cell phone," said Orban.

When an alarm goes off, unless disregarded, officers will respond to the alarms. Often times, the alarm company does not have accurate key holder information.

"Sometimes when we respond to an alarm we're given over the radio that there might not be key holder responder, or there might not be key holder information," said Kosciusko County Sheriff Deputy Christopher Francis.

The key holder information contains two important contacts; your name and a current phone number.

Officials need this information just in case anything looks out of the ordinary they can get a hold of you quickly.

"We get to the residence and find out something is wrong, we need to contact somebody worst case scenario like a forced entry," said Francis.

"It doesn't do you any good to have an alarm system if they can't reach you. My monitoring service is the one that checks with me and if I set my alarm off then I need to call them right away to let them know so they can cancel the call to the police," said Orban.

Key holder contact details can be updated through the specific alarm companies and the Kosciusko County 911 Communication Center.

The information is stored in the county's computer dispatch program, under the location's address.

Forms are available under the Kosciusko County Sheriff section at www.kgov.com and can be emailed to Assistant 911 Director Deb Carpenter at [email protected], once completed.