Held 20th January 2010

Present
Sergeant Alan Bell
PCSO Support Tess Smith

Dave WARBURTON Stoke Sub Hamdon
Mike STEPHENS Shepton Beauchamp
Ashley CHAPMAN Stoke Sub Hamdon
Godfrey TOWNROW Curry Mallet
Roger WEBB Norton Sub Hamdon
Ed LORCH Tintinhull

Apologies
Mary CLARKE (Mike attended on her behalf)
Tim OLIVEY St Michaels
Angela CATLING Kingsbury Episcopi
Michael BEACHAM Curry Rivel
Michael LLOYD Langport & Huish
Mandy BULGIN Ilton

1.0 As this was the first meeting, Sgt Bell opened the meeting with a welcome and thanked everybody for attending.

1.1 Dave Elson retires this year and the responsibility of NHW will now come under the SSN beat teams. PCSO Support will have the responsibility of Ringmaster. The current issues with ringmaster were discussed; it is hoped that it will be working again shortly. 1.2 Reference numbers to be used on ringmaster messages so that they can easily be referred to. 1.3 List to be held of what messages have gone out so that the audit trail can be traced and allow closure messages to go out when an observation is no longer needed for example. To close the loop on all other messages a request was made for messages of thanks to go out afterwards to encourage the community interaction. 1.4 Roger Webb handed Sgt Bell a ‘Watch Update’ sheet that Berkshire Police produce as an idea to get information across.

2.0 There is a large voice within the scheme that is currently not being heard. We aim to hear this powerful voice through the steering group. We would like to know what the community want in your area through asking them and then feeding back to the Police.

3.0 It was decided that in order to improve the communication this process will need to be adapted to a 2 way system with the equal amount of communicational support.

4.0 Community Safety is a paramount factor, looking after the vulnerable members of our community.

5.0 It is thought the Steering group can help push initiatives and schemes such as Nominated Neighbour, No Cold Calling Alert Zones, Vulnerable Property, Bobby Van referrals to seek the interest from their communities. Any interest to be fed back through the steering group. This will help to raise awareness and educate people about potential scams. All interested parties would then be contacted by SSN either by person or letter.

6.0 It was decided that a clear protocol would need to be written detailing exactly what is wanted, eg, the Police would like to see x,y and z implemented and you can help in this way…

7.0 ‘Ways to contact the Police’ leaflets were handed out along with business cards for Tess Smith and Alan Bell and ScamWise papers

7.1 A request was made for future paperwork/posters for members of the schemes to also be sent to the Steering Group in a PDF format so that they can forward it on to members electronically?

Next meeting date is yet to be confirmed but is thought that it will be in late March