Crime prevention assistant

Crime prevention assistants in Karlovy Vary

From September 2009 onwards, the Crime Prevention Department of the Ministry of the Interior of the Czech Republic (Ministerstvo vnitra ČR) ran the “Crime and Extremism Prevention Programme – Úsvit (Dawn)” in ten localities across the Czech Republic. Its aim was to increase safety in socially excluded localities and their surroundings, to reduce socially risky behaviour, to prevent attacks committed with an extremist motive and to support non-repressive working methods of both the Police of the Czech Republic and the municipal police. Within the Úsvit Programme, the project “Crime Prevention Assistant” was evaluated as a success.

Crime prevention assistants (APK) have been working in Karlovy Vary since January 2013. The original purpose of the local project was to use five assistants to maintain public order and safety in a socially excluded building and its surroundings (the municipal hostel in Úvalská Street). The assistants were also tasked with establishing communication with the residents of the housing estate of which the hostel formed part.

Over the years the presence of the assistants at the hostel proved its worth, so we extended their work to another municipal hostel (in Kollárova Street), to the Lower Railway Station (Dolní nádraží) and to individual problem areas of the city, including the historic centre. The work of the assistants is specific in that it is not repressive; it is a role focused on social work, prevention and building relationships within the community. Their presence is intended to build trust between residents and the security services, to explain the rules of public order and to act as a link in problematic localities. In short, an assistant works where the ordinary police often come up against a barrier of mistrust. The aim is to change the environment so that crime becomes less possible and people have a better chance of finding their place in society.

Thanks to various projects funded by the Ministry of the Interior, the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs (Ministerstvo práce a sociálních věcí) and, not least, by European Union funds, the number of assistants working in Karlovy Vary reached in the best years  as many as eighteen, fourteen of whom were co-financed from the grants mentioned above.

After thirteen years of experience we can confirm that the system has proved to be an effective complement to the ordinary work of municipal police officers. The assistants are present directly in the places where risky behaviour occurs and, thanks to their ability to communicate, they are often able to resolve a situation without force. If a more serious incident does occur, the assistants act as the first point of contact, and a municipal or state police patrol then responds.

At present, despite the considerable positive feedback on the work of the assistants from all over the country, the state is withdrawing from funding these projects. Towns and cities therefore lack sufficient money for them, and in some places the posts are being abolished altogether. At the moment the Karlovy Vary Municipal Police receives a grant for only four assistants, from a funding scheme of the Ministry of the Interior. For this reason the number of assistant posts has gradually been reduced to fourteen, with the city covering both its own contribution and the cost of the remaining ten assistants. Today the assistants primarily cover the municipal hostels in Kollárova Street and in Jateční Street (replacing the hostel in Úvalská Street, which is being renovated), the historic city centre and the area around the Lower Railway Station. Our assistants also occasionally take part in programmes organised by the Prevention and Supervision Unit for nursery and primary schools. In addition, the assistants help us at various social, cultural and sporting events.