Officers take up community beat

Two police officers are going to take a short walk across West Street into new roles with Oldham Council.

Supt Chris Sykes and Chief Insp Sarah Jones are joining the Community Safety Unit at the civic centre on secondment from the Oldham Police headquarters.

The unit, set up six years ago to help reduce crime and the fear of crime is being given a new brief as part of neighbourhood working.

Supt Sykes, who has recently had a high profile role in sorting out disturbances in Yorkshire Street, Oldham, which left three men stabbed, will be seconded to the unit for two years.

Chief Insp Jones will join him for between six months and a year. Oldham chief executive Charlie Parker said: “They will give the unit a slightly higher profile and provide a more direct relationship with the police.

“They will be co-located in the civic centre from May.

“Oldham citizens will see a bigger change and tighter arrangements around neighbourhood working and how we work more locally.

“There will soon be a paper to cabinet councillors with a radical change in the way we deliver services and closer working arrangements with the police, primary care trust, and Street Scene.”

The unit was originally set up in the environmental services department, but the new unit will also include police relations with schools, and will report to the new assistant executive director for neighbourhoods — appointed in the next two weeks.

Mr Parker added: “Supt Sykes will head the community safety function and take in some of the local neighbourhood policing.

“He will have a much broader role dealing with crime and disorder, alcohol, what we are doing with neighbourhood policing, crime prevention, and cohesion.”

The unit covers anti-social behaviour reduction, crime reduction, and has a team of crime analysts. It will spend almost £400,000 this year on alley gating and initiatives to tackle and prevent domestic burglaries, vehicle crime and robberies.