Mobile CCTV cameras

Keeping an eye on anti-social behaviour

The Safer Surrey Heath Partnership is committed to addressing residents' concerns about anti-social behaviour. To this end it has funded 21 permanent lamppost brackets for portable CCTV cameras, which can be moved around the borough in response to local concerns.

West Surrey Police, one of the six agencies which make up the Partnership, is using the pantilting digital cameras to monitor activities in areas identified as anti-social behaviour 'hot-spots'. The camera was initially sited on Gordon Road in the Watchetts area of Camberley in 2007. The road is often used as a short-cut into town on busy Friday and Saturday nights. Residents have welcomed the presence of CCTV in the area, while police have been successfully using it to combat anti-social behaviour. On one occasion, police made four arrests in one evening for criminal damage to motor vehicles, with all four offenders subsequently charged with criminal damage.

PC Robin Wood, Crime Reduction Advisor for West Surrey Police, said: "The use of portable CCTV in the borough has proven to be a successful deterrent to anti-social behaviour. As crime levels in Surrey Heath continue to sit well below the national average, expanding our CCTV capabilities is primarily about providing reassurance to residents and business owners, and helping to reduce fear of crime within the community. The cameras do, of course, act as effective deterrents to anti-social behaviour and incidents of criminal damage and alcohol-related crime."

Thanks to an additional grant from the Safer Surrey Heath Partnership allocated in April 2008, there are now four mobile cameras which can be used at the 21 locations.

The 21 camera sites are at:

• Gordon Road, Surrey Avenue, Park Street, Watchetts Road, Crabtree Recreation Ground and Townside Place, Camberley Town Centre
• Cumberland Road and Martindale Avenue, Heatherside
• The Green, Frimley Green
• Grayswood Drive and Mytchett Crossroads, Mytchett
• Windmill Fields, Windlesham
• The Square, Lightwater
• Ansell Road, Frimley High Street and Evergreen Road, Frimley
• Bagshot High Street
• Oakdene, Chobham
• West End Memorial and Rosewood Way, West End
• Bracknell Close, Old Dean

Contact PC Wood on 01483 631789.