Would you come to public meetings?

As mentioned in the last blog, Sergeant Andy Williams and I went up to London to give a series of four presentations at the National Policing Improvement Agency seminar. They went very well. We had an audience of about 40 people in each session and received some really good feedback - in fact one session gave us a round of applause.

We explained how we do our community engagement in Northam, Newtown and St Marys. They were particularly interested in the Junior PCSO schemes, our stop/search role plays and how we try to engage with the harder to reach groups, especially in Newtown and things like when Andy has spoken at the Mosques during Friday prayers reagarding some of the recent Muslim issues. We took some of our newsletters, My Beat leaflets and other leaflets we use and send out - really just for people to look at, but after the first session the group took them all so we had none for anyone else! Just goes to show that what we are doing here is not happening everywhere. The audience were from police and other agencies including the Met, City of London, Kent, Surrey and Sussex forces. We have several email addresses now to send stuff off to. Overall a good experience.

Anyway, brought back down to earth when we returned to Southampton. As a result of the London trip I missed the Chapel residents' meeting, but PCSO Fiona Oates went along. I gather the meeting was much better than the previous one - for us anyway - as the vehicle crime in Chapel has reduced again.

We have had several reports this week about drug related problems and possible dealing in and around College Street, where the Drug Intervention Project(DIP) is. We have good contact with the DIP and regularly pop in, but with these extra concerns have also completed some plain clothes operations in the area. These have been useful, although after about an hour the people identify us, and give us a wave. I do not mind them knowing we are there actually, because the dealers will then be aware and hopefully move away and work somewhere else.

Regarding the policing pledge, I have included this piece in my recent newsletters about a possible monthly meeting for each beat for people to let us know of there concerns or worries. Have a look and please let me know what you think about a monthly meeting.

Policing Pledge – Monthly Meetings and Community Priorities

The Policing Pledge states that the police will arrange regular meetings in the neighbourhood, at least once a month to discuss the community priorities.

We currently discuss the community priorities at the residents meetings, where the public have full access, and at quarterly patch chats. This seems to work well, however does not exactly comply with the pledge of monthly meetings. We do have the weekly surgery at the Northam Housing office, and regular surgeries at Tesco Express, St Marys School, City College and Halls of Residence but this is not exactly a public meeting.

Would you support monthly police meetings?

I am happy to arrange monthly public meetings in Northam and St Marys to discuss the community priorities, but we would need people to attend. Please let me know if this is something that you would like me to arrange, or confirm you are happy with the current arrangements for community priority setting.

Well that’s it for now

Cheers

Dick.