North Yorkshire Council

 

Harrogate & Knaresborough Area Committee

 

5 June 2025

 

Community Safety and CCTV Service Annual Update

 

 

 

1.0       PURPOSE OF REPORT

 

1.1       To provide Members with an annual update on the work of the Community Safety & CCTV service in the Harrogate & Knaresborough areas.  This will include a focus on Community Safety Hubs, CCTV and the wider strategic Community Safety Partnership   

 

 

2.0       SUMMARY

 

2.1       The report provides an overview of Community Safety & CCTV delivery and the priorities for the year ahead.

 

3.0       COMMUNITY SAFETY HUBS

           

3.1       Local issues

 

·         Anti-social behaviour (ASB) – Knaresborough - young people riding motorbikes and scooters in an anti-social manner. Pinewoods and Bilton area - issues with fire setting, graffiti and underage drinking. Harrogate town centre  

·         Early intervention/prevention - roll out and enhancement of ASB warning letters and Acceptable Behaviour Contracts for low level anti-social behaviour.

·         Target Hardening Approach – Identification of repeat hotspot locations. The installation of railings on the wall of Springboard/Wesley chapel. Exploring funding options, HHP lead partner and multi-agency approach to solving associated issues in this area.

·         Retail and nighttime economy – Christmas campaign around getting home safely, engagement with premises, joint activity with North Yorkshire Police and licensing, distribution of material to raise awareness on key messages and support with domestic abuse campaigns.

·         Closure Orders – closure of properties associated with anti-social behaviour, disorder and nuisance to our communities, in conjunction with North Yorkshire Police.

 

3.2       Ongoing work to tackle local issues

 

·         Street Aid Project – Harrogate Street Aid provides financial aid through grants to people who are or have been street homeless, to support them to turn a corner in their lives. The things that people need to move off the streets vary from person to person, so Harrogate Street Aid enables someone to think about what will practically help them, and to apply for a grant to pay for it. Funds for these grants are cumulated through donations made by members of the public through tap terminals located in Harrogate town centre.

·         Project Spotlight – Harrogate Town Centre - Project Spotlight is a joint initiative led by North Yorkshire Council and North Yorkshire Police focussing on Harrogate town centre to tackle anti-social behaviour, street crime and retail theft through engagement, enforcement, education and prevention.

·         Community Engagement and Reassurance – throughout the year numerous sessions have taken place in residential areas and high footfall areas which focus on specific issues and provide reassurance to our communities following trends in crime.

·         Support with Operations – Community Safety Hubs have supported North Yorkshire Police Operations, including exploring Civil Injunctions to tackle county lines and violence. As well as involvement in multi-agency days of action, such as Operation Tornado, where we have supported with community reassurance following executed warrants and coordinating partnership involvement in executing other methods of enforcement.

·         Funding to Partners – throughout the year funding has been provided to small projects led by partner agencies to support local issues and initiatives. For example, providing parking buddies to North Yorkshire Police to assist with parking issues and road safety outside of primary schools in Harrogate and Knaresborough.

 

3.3       Community Safety Hub tools and powers

The Community Safety & CCTV service, as part of service development, is committed to the continuous professional development of the staff team.  Our aim is to ensure effective use of all tools and powers available to the Community Safety Hubs within the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014, and consistent use in the application of these across North Yorkshire.

 

A Criminal Behaviour Order has been compiled ready for court, for a problematic female in Harrogate, whereby ongoing ASB incidents towards retail premises and criminal damage has been a persistent issue.

 

3.4       Project/thematic work

 

Eleven emergency bleed kits to be installed in Harrogate. Initiative to provide tertiary prevention for catastrophic bleeds, bleed kits will equip the public with lifesaving equipment to mediate the consequences of violence whilst medical help arrives. Specific locations are currently being confirmed and will be based on local knowledge and analytical data provided by Intelligence Analysts in North Yorkshire Police.

 

The locations of the knife bins have been mapped and are accessible via the North Yorkshire Police website: Knife bins | North Yorkshire Police

 

 

Location

Knives or bladed items deposited

Description

Harrogate, ASDA Car Park. (Initial pilot scheme installed 23/01/2023)

2071 items since initial instalment in 2023.

441 items this year up to 29/04/25.

Knives with blades longer than 3”, lock knives, scissors and sharp tools

Boroughbridge,

74 items up to 07.05.25

Knives with blades longer than 3”, lock knives, scissors and sharp tools

Knaresborough, Fisher Street Car Park.

125 items up to 07.05.25

Knives with blades longer than 3”, lock knives, scissors and sharp tools

 

3.5       Community Safety Hub activity as per Performance Framework

 

The Community Safety & CCTV service is currently developing a Performance Framework to enable the service to evidence performance against identifiable outcome measures.  This will demonstrate the effectiveness of the Community Safety Hubs against our Key Performance Indicators.

The Community Safety Hubs receive a significant amount of enquires which require action or support.  In addition to enquires, the Hubs will coordinate more complex cases that require wider partner engagement.  Common themes include ASB, need for early intervention, disruption, mental health implications, drugs and alcohol.

 

4.0       COMMUNITY SAFETY PARTNERSHIP     

 

4.1       The Harrogate Community Safety Hub undertakes work that supports the strategic priorities of the North Yorkshire Community Safety Partnership. This work is driven by the Partnership Team within Community Safety and supported by staff members of the locally based Community Safety Hubs.

 

Here is a link to the North Yorkshire Community Safety Partnership Strategic Plan 2024 – 2028.

 

4.2       Domestic Abuse

 

16 Days of Action – 25 November to 10 December 2024

 

To support the international campaign at a local level, a total of seven community engagement events were held across the county.  Partner agencies were invited to join the Community Safety Officers at the events and those able to attend included IDAS Foundation, North Yorkshire Police, NYC Health and Adult Services, St Giles Trust.  Events were held in locations that generated a good footfall: supermarkets, a stall on market day.  At all the events there was a comprehensive range of leaflets the officers were able to hand out.  All the events generated good engagement with the public and it was noted that on four separate occasions domestic abuse was disclosed to an officer, and appropriate actions were taken to support the victims with advice and signposting.  Communications for the events included posts on social media and internal NYC platforms: Viva Engage, intranet.

 

·         24/4/25 - Stalking awareness stall at ASDA. Also, present IDAS and NPT.

·         Safeguarding week commencing 16/6/25 awareness session at HDH planned with NPT, IDAS and Crimestoppers.

 

 

 

 

4.3       Preventing and reducing serious violence

 

The knife bin roll-out across North Yorkshire took place in January 2025. Bins located in Harrogate, Knaresborough and Boroughbridge.

 

4.3.1    Night-time economy

 

The Community Safety & CCTV service is working in partnership with North Yorkshire Police, NYC colleagues and additional partner agencies to support the North Yorkshire Police Night-Time Economy Strategy.

 

4.4       Standing Together to Tackle Hate Crime, Radicalisation and Extremism

 

4.4.1    North Yorkshire Local Prevent Groups and Protect & Prepare Groups

 

Local multi-agency groups have been set up to focus and deliver on ‘Protect and Prepare’ and ‘Prevent’ strands of the CONTEST Strategy.  These groups are chaired by senior managers from the Community Safety & CCTV Team and are supported by a Senior Development Officer.  A local group covers the following areas:

 

·         West (Ripon, Richmond, Skipton, including the outer areas of Northallerton)

·         Central (Harrogate, Selby, Knaresborough, Ainsty)

·         East (Scarborough, Whitby, Thirsk, Malton, Easingwold)

 

The aim of the local ‘Protect and Prepare Groups’ and local ‘Prevent Groups’ is to work together with partners, communities and businesses to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism, and to identify risk and vulnerability in relation to a potential terrorist attack in North Yorkshire.

 

This includes the development of short, medium and long-term strategies and action plans to mitigate such risks.  Activities can include local community engagement events, supporting national campaigns, support events (businesses) and multi-agency training opportunities, as well as building on local intelligence to help inform plans, such as the Counter Terrorism Local Profile.     

 

Each of these local groups report on their local activity directly into the York & North Yorkshire Prevent Partnership Board, the NYC Strategic Protect & Prepare Group, North Yorkshire Community Safety Partnership and the York & North Yorkshire CONTEST Board.

 

·         WRAP version 4 (workshop to raise awareness on Prevent) currently in the early stages of being trained to deliver.  Multi-agency Prevent champion event to be held in May. Community Safety Hubs take a lead on the local Prevent delivery.

 

4.4.2    Martyn’s Law

 

The Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Bill, known as Martyn’s Law, gained Royal Assent on 3 April 2025, after more than five years of campaigning by Figen Murray OBE, the mother of Martyn Hett, one of 22 victims brutally murdered in the Manchester Arena terror attack on 22 May 2017.  Martyn’s Law essentially mandates that public premises with a capacity greater than 200 are better prepared for terrorist attacks and ready to respond. Each local Protect & Prepare Groups will help to support the implementation of Martyn’s Laws over the next 24 months within their locality.

 

5.0       CCTV and business crime

 

5.1       There are currently CCTV Control Rooms in Harrogate, Scarborough and Northallerton, with provision in Selby being provided by a third party.  Harrogate and Scarborough provide a 24 hour/365-day service.  The Northallerton CCTV Control Room functions will be transferring over to the Harrogate CCTV Control Room by the end of August 2025.  Ripon cameras (10) are managed by the CCTV Control Room in Harrogate.

 

5.2       The future vision of CCTV across North Yorkshire is subject to further strategic review and transformation. The aim is to review our existing infrastructure, identify opportunities, maximising technology and working alongside our key partners.

 

 

6.0       RECOMMENDATIONS

 

i)      As part of annual reporting arrangements to Area Constituency Committees, it is recommended that Members note the content of this report, outlining progress of the Community Safety Hubs covering the Harrogate & Knaresborough localities and the Community Safety & CCTV service.

 

 

 

Report authors: Evie Griffiths Senior Community Safety Officer / Julia Stack Community Safety & CCTV Manager

Presenters of report – Evie Griffiths Senior Community Safety Officer / Julia Stack Community Safety & CCTV Manager