Villadom Times Weekly Newpaper Online-April 27, 2011 Issue

Franklin Lakes April 27, 2011 THE VILLADOM TIMES I • Page 5 Borough ofﬁcials reduce hours of ﬁre siren use by Frank J. McMahon In response to residents’ complaints about fire siren noise, the Borough of Franklin Lakes has reduced the number of hours during which sirens will be used for fire calls. The sirens have been used between 6 a.m. and 11 p.m., but they will now be used from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. The number of cycles the siren sounds has been reduced to six. From 6 p.m. to 8 a.m., the sirens will be used to summon firefighters only for confirmed working fires, and they will continue to be used for emergency management services needs. The borough is also investigating the possibility of increasing the height of the siren at the intersection of Ewing Avenue and High Mountain Road to lessen the impact of its noise. The fire department has a mixed opinion of the benefit of raising the siren. It was last August when Dr. Ahmed Chaudhry, who lives at that intersection, attended a council work session and complained about the noise from the siren located near his backyard. He said that siren prevents him from enjoying the use of his property and swimming pool. He argued that beepers and cell phones should be used to alert the firefighters. Mayor Frank Bivona said the reduction in the hours the sirens will be used is a step in the right direction. “The big question is: If you don’t need them at certain hours why are they needed at all? But we are willing to look at any improved technology to negate the need for sirens in the future. This is a good first step. We may always need sirens for the Office of Emergency Management, but maybe this will reduce their impact on residents,” Bivona said. Councilman William Smith said the fire department deserves credit for moving forward and looking at all means of communication. “Our goal is to eliminate them (sirens) altogether, but the fire department feels strongly that they need them. But with the technology today and in the future we hope we won’t need them,” Smith said. Councilwoman Nathalie Lota pointed out, however, that a lot of the sirens in the borough are not working, so the whole town is not covered. A Birch Road resident who did not want to be identified, told the council that the siren on his street was disabled for five years, then it was repaired, and it has needed repair two or three times since then. He said the siren is literally in his neighbor’s back yard and he is impacted when he is working in his home and his neighbor’s kids can’t play in their backyard. He questioned if sirens are needed with the technology that exists today. “If not, turn the rest of them on,” he said, “and put one in the yard of the mayor and the police so they can feel our pain.” In recent years, the use of fire sirens was a controversial issue in Mahwah, where neighbors of two siren locations filed a 2007 lawsuit against the township in an attempt to force the township to stop using the sirens to alert volunteer firefighters. The lawsuit was dismissed in Superior Court in October 2008. At that time, Superior Court Judge Robert P. Contillo made note of the fact that sirens had been used in the township since the 1930s, during which time it relied on sirens to sound the alarm for a fire emergency in order to summon the firefighters. 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