OKTIBBEHA COUNTY — A wiring issue at 21 Apartments will be subject to county fines until it is fixed.
Supervisors on Monday evening unanimously voted to fine the owner of the apartment complex southeast of Starkville for violating the county’s false fire alarm ordinance.
In the past few months, Fire Services Coordinator Patrick Warner said rural firefighters have responded to 15 false alarms at 21 Apartments, which is located at Ace Avenue and Oktoc Road.
“It’s just false alarm after false alarm,” Warner told supervisors during their meeting in the chancery courthouse. “One night, we got called over there seven times. The fire chief in that area got tired and he refused to go back over there after the seventh time.”
Faulty wiring, and not someone pulling the fire alarm, is causing the problem at 21 Apartments, Warner said. Despite multiple meetings with management, he said, “they’re just not getting it fixed.”
This is the first time the county has enforced its false alarm ordinance since its passage a year ago, and supervisors on Monday set the fine structure at up to $1,000 for the first instance, $2,000 for the second and $1,000 for each occurrence after that.
Warner said 21 Apartments, owned by the Yugo corporation, will be fined $1,000.
Rural fire departments receive several false alarm calls, particularly to apartment complexes, Warner said.
“We’ve been very lenient on apartment complexes,” he told The Dispatch. “But this ordinance has been in effect for a year, and it’s time to step up and do something.”
Board president Bricklee Miller, speaking during the board meeting, said her niece lives in an apartment complex in the county — not 21 Apartments — and her story is similar.
“She was saying the other day that the alarm goes off so much that they don’t even get up,” Miller said. “So if there really is a fire, these alarms go off so much that they think they’re false alarms.
“If this is faulty wiring, whatever is happening, they need to get it handled,” she later added regarding 21 Apartments. “Not only is it making their residents numb to the fact, but it’s also our resources (getting) called out multiple times.”
The Dispatch called the 21 Apartments office this morning but did not get an answer before press time. The complex’s website notes the office does not open until 10 a.m. on weekdays.
In other business, the board voted 4-1 to authorize Mississippi Engineering Group to conduct the annual inspection of the Oktibbeha County Lake dam.
Engineer Clyde Pritchard, whose firm contracts with the county for general engineering services, typically performs the annual inspection. He recused from doing any projects related to the dam in 2021 in the wake of ongoing controversy over a plan to repair it.
Pritchard concluded in January 2020 the dam was in imminent danger of breaching.
MSEG, meanwhile, has taken over efforts to design dam repairs. The majority of supervisors decided Tuesday to hire that firm for the inspection, rather than hire yet another third party.
Miller opposed, instead suggesting the county obtain proposals from other firms.
Zack Plair is the managing editor for The Dispatch.
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