Dozens of shop and town centre businesses in Northampton have signed up to a new scheme, under which retailers are given a dedicated police contact, aimed at cutting at rising retail crime, stated recent reports.
According to local reports, 37 shops have signed up to the ‘Cops Adopt A Shop’ scheme so far with another 19 planned over the coming weeks. The campaign is a joint initiative between Northamptonshire Police, Northampton Town Centre Business Improvement District (BID), West Northamptonshire Council and the Northamptonshire Business Crime Partnership.
The scheme is aimed to foster a more cohesive approach to tackling town centre crime and a closer working relationship between police officers and retailers.
The scheme sees that each signed retailer is given a dedicated police contact with whom they can have regular conversations. Each officer involved in the scheme has responsibility for a handful of shops which they manage alongside their other duties, ensuring meaningful interactions and highlighting the police presence in the town centre.
The scheme was launched in October after retailers requested to take actions to tackle rising anti-social behaviour and aggravated crime in the area.
The project will also see refocussed police involvement in the Northampton Retail Crime Initiative (NRCI) and the Northampton Town Anti-Social Behaviour Reporting Scheme (NTARS) – a mobile app for reporting anti-social behaviour issues and sharing business crime intelligence.
“For many businesses, perceptions of retail crime and anti-social behaviour is their number one concern,” local reports quoted Mark Mullen who is the operations manager of Northampton Town Centre BID – an organisation run by business owners to make Northampton a better place to live, shop and work.
“The ‘Cops Adopt A Shop’ scheme is a way to address those concerns and bring businesses closer to the police so they can work together to identify repeat offenders and protect their business, their staff and their customers from the threat of crime.”
Mullen added that the early signs of the campaign have been really encouraging.
Speaking about the scheme, Inspector Beth Curlett of the Northampton Neighbourhood Team revealed retailer who have adopted so far have all provided good feedback.
“It has provided a greater level of visibility within the priority area and, as relationships progress, I am confident we will see an increase in intelligence,” local reports quoted Curlett as saying.
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