Partnership working bringing the sparkle back to Northampton

A policing operation dedicated to improving Northampton town centre has seen a partnership clean-up event help bring a sparkle to the area.

Operation Workforce is being run by Northamptonshire Police to improve officer visibility and tackle four key crime types – anti-social behaviour, retail crime, drugs and serious violence – in the newly revamped Market Square area, in response to concerns from business owners and residents.

Yesterday (Thursday, September 19) saw a clean-up session take place with graffiti removed from buildings and street furniture by officers and volunteers from partnership organisations including Northampton Town BID and the Office of the Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner, which also provided the funding to purchase the cleaning materials.

With the operation now into its fifth week, the successes are stacking up, with positive feedback from businesses, shoppers and residents as well as partners.

Northampton Neighbourhood Policing Inspector Nicola Davis-Lyons said: “The feedback we’ve had from businesses so far has been really positive, I’ve had a number of businesses email me personally to let me know that they have noticed the increased police visibility and my officers are telling me when they are out and about on their patrols they are getting much more engagement, people are coming and talking to them.

“My team are really, really loving this operation because they are getting to be out doing what they love doing, they’re out on foot amongst the community, they’re speaking with the local businesses here as regularly as they can do, and that’s what I think a lot of people join the police for, you want to be out and about in your community making a difference.

“So for us there’s a lot of pride in this piece of work, we really want this to be a town centre that people can be proud of and we are committed to doing our bit to achieve that.”