Agenda item

Ben Jackson, Public Protection, ASB & Licensing Service Manager:

a)    presented an overview of the current level of Anti-Social Behaviour (ASB) across the city, to highlight the current and arising issues and to appraise the Committee of the work and projects that were being undertaken across the city to reduce and address ASB

b)    reported that the Public Protection and Anti-Social Behaviour (PPASB) Team dealt with a wide variety of complaints including ASB, noise, environmental and animal issues, and received in excess of 4000 requests for service each year across the city

c)    advised that the PPASB team had been subject to a management of change approximately 18 months ago, this resulted in the PPASB Officers moving to the same job descriptions opposed to the previous arrangement of them being specialist Officers

d)    advised that from 1 April 2022 to 31 March 2023 the PPASB Team received 4049 requests for service across all of their services including ASB, noise nuisance, animal related concerns, environmental issues such as fly tipping and pests

e)    reported that service requests dropped during covid, however service demands now exceeded pre-covid levels. Service demand continued to rise post covid and there was a 26.3% increase in service demand when compared to the pre-covid demand of 3205 (Year 17/18) with the last financial years demand of 4049. The service demand for Quarter 1 of 23/24 remained high at 966, which suggested that demand remained stable and high for the year 23/24

f)     gave further detail within the report covering the following main areas:

·         Enforcement Actions

·         PPASB Post Covid-19

·         Anti-Social Behaviour Co-Ordinator (ASB Police Officer)

·         City Centre

·         Public Spaces Protection Orders (PSPO)

·         Partnership Working

·         Police

·         Forward Look

g)    explained that the removal of the ASB Co-Ordinator role by Lincolnshire Police was a risk to the service. Work was underway to improve joint working, training and communication between the Police and Council teams.

h)    invited members’ comments and questions.

Question: Would the removal of the Police Officer from the PPASB Team affect the performance of the team?

Response: Reassured members that the Council was being proactive with dealing with the withdrawal of the Police Officer from the PPASB Team. A meeting would be taking place shortly between the Council and the Police to discuss protocols and refresh procedures to fill in any gaps. The PPASB Team would be upskilled on tools and powers to ensure we could action them rather than relying on the police. Also Housing Staff would be upskilled on use of their powers.

Question: Would Police Officers also be upskilled?

Response: Yes, this would also be discussed at the upcoming meeting.

Question: Did Council staff work at South Park Police Station?

Response: Hotdesking was available, however, it was not necessary for Council staff to spend a lot of time working at South Park Station as there was already very good communication between the Council and the Police.

Question: What enforcement could be done in relation to dog fouling?

Response: Resourcing was an issue to be able to proactively enforce dog fouling. If an incident was reported it would be fully investigated. We could look at encouraging people to report dog fouling in a similar way to the fly tipping campaign.

Question:  How did the Council deal with noise complaints and could noise be recorded on a phone and reported to the Council?

Response: There was legislation and processes that the Council had to adhere to. This included sending letters to the perpetrator, noise logs and noise monitoring equipment that could be installed. Very few complaints related to loud parties that could be recorded on phones. Most reports were of low level noise that required noise equipment for prosecution.

Comment: No response was received from the Council when a report was made via the online system.

Response: We would look at the system to find a way to provide feedback to customers that we had listened to them and that their report had been recorded.

RESOLVED that the contents of the report be noted.