The cities with the greatest success in dealing with false alarm issues and maintaining public support take a citizen-oriented approach. Dallas can accomplish the same thing by working with the alarm industry and the state legislature.

The average savings of 30 minutes a week per patrol officer under 'verified response' is not worth a big jump in crime like this.

The City of Dallas has a real problem with this statistic. A proposal that was supposed to help police fight more crime has instead led to a predictable increase in crime. This is why fewer than 30 of the nation's approximate 18,000 police departments utilize verified response.

This is not a false alarm.

We have always said we're going to have a compare and contrast on the public policy issues.

There are a lot of much bigger public issues than year 2000 preparedness, and I think that certainly has an impact on the way it has been handled.