Gloucester awarded for City Safer Status

Gloucester’s City Protection Officers (CPOs) have gained awards for their work to provide a safer place for those who work, study, live and shop in the city.

The Impact Awards by the Gloucestershire Constabulary and the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner (OPCC) award excellence in policing and the community. They recognised the success of Gloucester City Safe and the City Protection Officers (CPOs) who often go above and beyond their duties.

City Safe, managed by Steve Lindsay, is a not-for-profit business crime reduction partnership. the scheme is for local businesses to work together to reduce crime, disorder and anti-social behaviour which impacts them, their staff and customers.

Since 2017 the Gloucester BID has cooperated with City Safe to introduce City Protection Officers. The CPOs are joint funded by Gloucester Business Improvement District (BID), OPCC and Gloucester City Council to support visible CPOs who patrol the area, helping to deter crime, such as thieves shoplifting.

Gloucester’s business crime reduction partnership has been praised in reports as a success – evidence shows that the city has the best city centre business crime reduction partnership in the country.

Recent figures reveal how within the 190 businesses involved, there has been a 46 per cent reduction in business crime. Alongside this there have been 160 City Safe Exclusions, with 11,552 people being given yellow cards.

This partnership has helped lead to Gloucester gaining ‘Purple Flag’ status – an accreditation for areas that meet or surpass the standards of excellence in managing the evening and night-time economy.

The CPOs operate in two teams of two, seven days a week, patrolling the whole BID area. They have become a familiar and welcomed sight in Gloucester. They are linked through radio and phones where BID members are able to call for their assistance to incidents – giving an added sense of security and community. Police CCTV operators also support the scheme by monitoring the cities camera infrastructure.

Steve and his team also rose to the challenge the Government put to local authorities to have Covid marshals in place within weeks. He scaled up his team to cover all six districts to help support high streets and public spaces throughout the pandemic.

As well as the usual City Safe duties, there were new pandemic-based tasks the team took on. This included engaging with businesses and those in the community in order to encourage them to be Covid compliant, providing face masks and hand sanitisers, installing signage and updating this when guidance changed.

City Safe Manager Steve Lindsay is delighted the hard work and dedication of his team has gained recognition, he said, ‘The CPOs have great pride in their work and consistently carry out additional duties to improve open spaces and visitor experience across the county; they pick up litter, drug paraphernalia, direct the traffic and the police with their duties. The team also often goes above and beyond this role. In one instance team members rallied round to raise around £600, some food vouchers, new toys and bedding for a family who were financially struggling.’

Alongside the awards, Police Community Support Officer PCSO Adam Stevens was presented with the Krystian Craig Memorial Bowl for going above and beyond his duties. On top of his outstanding commitment, Adam volunteers at The Cavern in his spare time. The Cavern provides support for vulnerable adults both working in the café and those who provide a service on a support line.

Gloucester News Centre – http://gloucesternewscentre.co.uk