In addition to responding to specific crime and by-law incidents during the past month (May 2017 – see map), the MID Public Safety team stepped up their preventive activities, which play a key role in crime prevention.
The public safety officer regularly patrol the Albertyn Road, False Bay Station area during peak times, and especially early morning and late evening. Their presence assist with ensuring that commuters can walk in relative safety down Albertyn Road on their way home. This team alerts relevant authorities when they find that there are no authorized controllers on duty at the broken level crossing.
Known areas where there’s been reports of suspicious activity are targeted for special monitoring, including the subways, Surfers’ Corner, Muizenberg Park and others. Patrollers not only check for signs of criminal activity but also report on erection of illegal structures and by-law transgressions.
The patrollers also act as eyes and ears for the Social Development and Law Enforcement teams, monitoring the increase or decrease in the number of homeless individuals, car guards and street children. This is key information that is fed back to the relevant MID teams and stakeholders so that they can be pro-active in addressing social challenges in the area and act quickly to get support from authorities for required intervention.
And of course bin pickers are closely monitored on bin days – those loitering, looking over property walls or leaving litter in the streets are asked to clean up after themselves and to move along.
Pro-active work like this not only serves as a visible deterrent to crime, it also sometimes prevents a crime from happening! For example near the beginning of last month, one of the patrollers noticed a garage standing open – it looked suspicious, and upon investigation he found someone inside who claimed to know the owner. He didn’t feel comfortable with the explanation, however, so he escorted the man out, and then closed and locked the garage. It turned out that the owner had simply forgotten to shut it. Through the local neighbourhood watch WhatsApp group, the owner was traced and his keys returned to him – nothing went missing!
Remember that when you are in the MID area, if you see anything suspicious or feel unsafe in public space then you can contact the MID Public Safety Patrollers on 060 850 6260.
Also report all crimes to SAPS on 021 787 9000 and By-Law matters to Law Enforcement on 021 596 1999.