Agenda item

To receive a report regarding Community Contact Points and Mobile Police Stations.

The PCC reported on priority two which was about making the Police more visible, connected and engaged. Which was very important and about bringing the Police to the people. The paper looked at community contact points and the innovation of mobile Police stations and highlighted the delivery performance, future development and scrutiny. They went to Community contact points in 2022, in order to make certain that they had more delivery in a community setting and to complement traditional front desks which people called Police stations and complements the digital contact methods, organised by the neighbourhood Policing teams. These community contact points allowed officers to discuss safety concerns, receive crime prevention advice and build relationships and reassure the community. In Autumn, two mobile Police stations were launched which could do formal procedures such as, bail signings or interviews in the mobile Police stations. Locations for Community contact points fell into two main needs. The first was the number of people using the contact point. There was also the ability to install a community contact point in a location where you had a specific crime type causing an issue. So, the second point would be to be responsive to local concerns. Engagements were promoted on the Police Force website, social media, Dorset Alert, local posters and community channels. The PCC asked the force to tell their elected members where the community contact point was. From the 1^st of January to the 31^{st of} October Dorset Police delivered 445 community contact points and for the last month a mobile police station. There were 5700 meaningful conversations, and which recorded intelligence or crime prevention advice handed out. 15 crimes were recorded and 54 pieces of intelligence and from October tracked new outcome categories such as, follow up visits, prevention planning, and referrals to other departments. He expected 600 deployments to occur annually. Regular updates were provided by Dorset Police and the OPCC attend the force neighbourhood engagement board. Which was an internal board Police force board that looks at their engagement. The purpose of the board was to ensure consistency, best practice and evaluation of engagement initiatives. Feedback from Cllrs, community groups, surveys and public contact was shared with the force. Dorset Police would conduct a formal review in January to assess the community contact points and the mobile police stations.

Questions and Comments from the members on the report - 24:25.

·       Cllr Gibbs commented that this was a positive step forward for community contact points. Most colleagues did not know that the Verwood office had reopened, and it did not open for very long. He explained that he thought that Police Community contact points were good for engagement but not as effective for crime prevention or information gathering. He highlighted that for people who did not want to report crimes online or over the phone and were a victim of a crime and wanted a bit more information, community contact points would be a place for them to report something. He noted that for him there was always a place for front desks.

·       The PCC responded that the issue with the front desk model was use. Before bringing in the mobile police stations, he asked for the Police to look into it. He wanted to see why front desks did not work and he gave an example of Lyme Regis which only had 15 people use the front desk in the summer. He explained that due to lack of people using the front desks, they were not viable. Most reporting of crimes was done online or over the phone. It was very rare that the PCC was contacted by someone who did not want to use the phone or the internet to report a crime. He added that there was still a gap and communication, consistency and regularity could be improved around community contact points.