Brightlingsea residents have been urged to report incidents of anti-social behaviour to help justify a call for a greater police presence in the town.
At the last meeting of Brightlingsea Town Council, a member of the public reported being harassed by a group of youths while walking her dog in Victoria Place.
Now town councillor Kate Mitchell is gathering details of local incidents and is looking to present them to Essex police at a meeting with the district commander in Tendring. She hopes the meeting will establish what police cover is in place for the town – and which leaders can be questioned about responses to this type of incident.
Despite reports of incidents being circulated on social media, few of them are thought to have been reported to the police.
“It makes it difficult to criticise police for a lack of response if they weren’t made aware of the incidents in the first place,” said Cllr Mitchell, herself a former police officer.
“I know Brightlingsea doesn’t have the issues that other areas in the district have but this is one of the reasons it makes headlines in the community when things like this do happen. We are entitled to and deserve the same level of service as other areas,” she added.
“In my opinion local teams should be providing reassurance patrols in the areas where anti-social behaviour is happening, if nothing else. We should also have a general police presence more often, especially now the summer holidays have started.”
Anyone who has experienced problems that should be brought up at the proposed meeting can contact Cllr Mitchell via email – [email protected].
• The Tendring district commander, Chief Inspector Ella Latham, is currently undertaking a series of meetings with local Tendring councillors. The first of these took place with Clacton councillors on July 22. A Brightlingsea meeting is scheduled for Friday, September 20.
According to the latest figures released by Essex Police, crime in the county is falling. There were more than 10,200 fewer crimes reported in Essex in the year to the end of June than the previous 12 months, continuing a downward trend over the last few years.
Chief Constable Ben-Julian Harrington said there were fewer violent, sexual and domestic offences, and fewer repeat victims of domestic abuse. Knife crime is down, more cases of vehicle theft are being solved, and he claimed that the county’s online child abuse investigators are the most effective in the country.
“We’ve had consistent funding in recent years thanks to the people of Essex, and the Police, Fire, and Crime Commissioner, meaning we’ve been able to grow the force and consistently bring crime down,” he said.
