A project to ensure people who have committed low level offences give back to the community has helped to clean up 19 public spaces in neighbourhoods across the county.
Since its inception a year ago, the Immediate Justice programme has helped to restore areas in our communities through over 550 hours of reparative work.
The Immediate Justice programme provides an alternative to prosecution for people who have committed lower-level offences such as criminal damage, causing a public nuisance or being drunk and disorderly.
Those who have been referred to the scheme by Police Officer and PCSO’s are assigned a minimum of four hours that is spent repairing the harm they have caused to communities through reparative work.
Locations and community assets of all kinds have been restored and cleaned across Northamptonshire, benefitting from work such as graffiti removal, litter picking, gardening and repairs undertaken by over a hundred people who have completed an Immediate Justice penalty.
The areas that have benefited are:
Residential areas – Crestline Court in Northampton; Hemmingwell Estate in Wellingborough; St Peter’s Close in Daventry; Cottingham Road area in Corby and St George’s Street in Northampton.
Community spaces – St Lawrence Church in Towcester; Daylight Veggie Patch in Wollaston; Weston Favell Community Allotments and Wellingborough’s Victoria Centre.
Parks – St Katherine’s Gardens in Northampton; West Glebe Park in Corby; Mill Road and Highfield Road parks in Kettering; Twywell Hills and Dales County Park in Kettering; Becket’s Park in Northampton and Queensway Park in Wellingborough.
Other areas of the county that were helped through the Immediate Justice programme were Rutherford Drive in Wellingborough, Walter Tull Way in Northampton, and Northampton’s Union Canal.
Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner Danielle Stone is pleased Immediate Justice is having an impact: “Our parks and community spaces are vital to our communities, and I am so pleased that the programme has helped to restore and maintain so many of them.
“Immediate Justice ensures that there are visible and worthwhile consequences for anti-social behaviour and that members of the public can be reassured that crime is being taken seriously.”
The Immediate Justice scheme is a pilot project and the Commissioner and her team are looking at how this important work can be taken forward in the longer term.
