News

From today, criminal behaviour in Poole Town Centre will be tackled through a new initiative to be launched by Poole Town Centre Management, the Borough of Poole and Dorset Police. Poole Against Retail Crime (PARC) has been established as a new partnership initiative aimed at tackling anti-social behaviour and retail crime in the town centre. As part of the Borough of Poole’s Crime and Disorder Strategy, the initiative has been welcomed by the town’s businesses to ensure that Poole remains a safe place to live work and visit.

Any town centre business can become a member of PARC. Those who join will be able to utilise the town’s radiolink network, be part of the CCTV coverage, share intelligence and photographs of known offenders with the Police and introduce a new exclusion notice scheme which can ban people from all members premises.

Supt. Chris Dennis said " We are delighted to see the development of PARC which will help us meet some of our objectives within our Poole Policing Plan, particularly in relation to anti-social behaviour and public re-assurance." Dorset Police have seconded a Police Officer to establish the initiative two days a week to the Town Centre Manager’s office.

Chairman of Poole Town Centre Management and Store Director of Beales, Sarah Morgan said "Poole will be the first town in Dorset to formally establish a retail crime initiative with the support of the Home Office Retail Crime Action Team. We are sure that Poole’s example of managing town centre crime will be followed by other towns so that we can work together on tackling this problem". Janet Knox, Poole’s Town Centre Manager said "PARC will be a real asset to Poole. Alongside our newly established Poole Pubwatch initiative, we will be able to make a real impact on town centre crime".

As part of the PARC initiative, the Government Office for the South West is considering a funding application to support its set up costs. This will include funding for a new ‘Business Information Crime System’ (BICS), a database that is being widely used around the UK by other retail crime initiatives. It is hoped in time that if other towns follow suit, a regional network of BICS databases will work together to improve intelligence information and tackle crime.