TTPS gets two thumbs-up from residents in San Juan

An­na-Lisa Paul

Se­nior Re­porter

an­[email protected]

The North East­ern Di­vi­sion (NED) has been giv­en a glow­ing en­dorse­ment by res­i­dents, busi­ness own­ers and work­ers in the San Juan dis­trict who claimed to be feel­ing much safer fol­low­ing an in­creased po­lice pres­ence over the past sev­er­al months.

It comes as the TTPS says it has dou­bled down on ef­forts to es­tab­lish a sta­tion coun­cil at all po­lice sta­tions across T&T, fol­low­ing the ap­point­ment of a steer­ing com­mit­tee to over­see the ex­pand­ed man­date.

Con­firm­ing they were in “re­set” mode to re­duce crime and in­crease vis­i­bil­i­ty, Deputy Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice (DCP) in charge of Op­er­a­tions, Suzette Mar­tin, said, “We are ask­ing stake­hold­ers to join their re­spec­tive sta­tion coun­cil and join the of­fi­cers in try­ing to make T&T a much safer place.”

En­cour­ag­ing peo­ple to con­tin­ue to of­fer sug­ges­tions on how the TTPS could bet­ter serve the pub­lic, she said, “We now have a steer­ing com­mit­tee in place so we should be up and run­ning by the mid­dle of No­vem­ber.”

But she as­sured, “They are work­ing while we are putting the doc­u­ments in place.”

Pressed as to what feed­back the TTPS had been re­ceiv­ing, re­lat­ing to the work be­ing done by the re­spec­tive sta­tion coun­cils – she proud­ly in­di­cat­ed, “The pub­lic ap­pre­ci­ates what the sta­tion coun­cils are do­ing and I ap­pre­ci­ate hear­ing from them.”

Mar­tin added, “Ef­fec­tive polic­ing be­gins with lis­ten­ing. We can­not build safer com­mu­ni­ties from be­hind our desks alone.”

“We must be present, ac­ces­si­ble and will­ing to hear di­rect­ly from the peo­ple we serve.”

Host­ing Cof­fee & Con­ver­sa­tion fol­low­ing a walk­a­bout in the San Juan dis­trict last Sat­ur­day, she ex­plained, “This is about break­ing down bar­ri­ers, build­ing trust and re­mind­ing every cit­i­zen that their con­cerns mat­ter.”

“I look for­ward to en­gag­ing with the peo­ple every­where, hear­ing their per­spec­tives and work­ing to­geth­er to­wards prac­ti­cal so­lu­tions that make our com­mu­ni­ties safer.”

She en­cour­aged, “Your voice mat­ters, your safe­ty mat­ters, and to­geth­er we can make a dif­fer­ence.”

The Na­tion­al Sta­tion Coun­cil, which will be led by Neil Boodoos­ingh, has been tasked with set­ting up sta­tion coun­cils in all po­lice sta­tions and, ac­cord­ing to him, “What we are try­ing to do in the ini­tial stages is to get every civil­ian and every of­fi­cer who is op­er­at­ing in na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty to join the sta­tion coun­cil with­in their dis­trict.”

He in­di­cat­ed, “There is go­ing to be a sta­tion coun­cil in every dis­trict and you need to join and let your voice be heard so we can make T&T a safer place.

“We are work­ing for you and pos­i­tive things are hap­pen­ing.”

The steer­ing com­mit­tee will vis­it To­ba­go on No­vem­ber 10 and 11 to con­duct sim­i­lar out­reach ex­er­cis­es.

Snr Supt in the NED, Claire Guy-Al­leyne re­vealed they had four ac­tive sta­tion coun­cils op­er­at­ing in the di­vi­sion thus far, with the Mara­cas Bay and Blan­chisseuse Po­lice Sta­tions be­ing the lat­est two to come on board.

Join­ing Mar­tin on the walk­a­bout, she too in­vit­ed cit­i­zens, “Join us. Come on board and let your voic­es be heard.”

Pres­i­dent of the San Juan Busi­ness As­so­ci­a­tion, Abrahim Ali, is­sued a clar­i­on call for peo­ple to join the TTPS as he in­sist­ed, “It is for the ben­e­fit of every cit­i­zen in T&T.”

The po­lice and busi­ness con­tin­gent were heart­ened af­ter hear­ing from phar­ma­cy work­er Karen Git­tens, who re­port­ed feel­ing “Much safer, com­pared to years ago.”

Re­veal­ing she of­ten fin­ished work­ing af­ter 8 pm dai­ly and felt no ap­pre­hen­sion or fear when walk­ing to her house due to the in­creased vis­i­bil­i­ty of the TTPS, she laugh­ing­ly urged Mar­tin to in­struct her of­fi­cers, “To smile more as some of them are too se­ri­ous.”

Prompt­ing smiles from both Mar­tin and Guy-Al­leyne, who promised this di­rec­tive would be com­mu­ni­cat­ed, Git­tens said, “I know the sun is very hot dur­ing the day, but if they can smile a lit­tle more...it will be good.”

She re­port­ed see­ing of­fi­cers as­sist­ing stu­dents and el­der­ly peo­ple in the area, and she ap­pealed for sim­i­lar vis­i­bil­i­ty in oth­er ar­eas.

The se­nior of­fi­cers ex­pressed ela­tion up­on hear­ing the feed­back, as Sal­ly Ali wel­comed them.

Em­ployed with Char­ran’s Book Store for more than 20 years, she said, “I feel very se­cure. See­ing them here to­day, they are show­ing us that they are al­ways there for us. In turn, they will al­ways have our full sup­port.”

One fe­male ven­dor called on Mar­tin and oth­ers to clean up “those sell­ing the drugs.”

Claim­ing she had been ac­cused of fa­cil­i­tat­ing such in the dis­trict, the woman said even though she would be in dan­ger for high­light­ing the is­sue, she in­sist­ed, “It have to stop. I doh care that my life go be in dan­ger for talk­ing out...it had­da stop.”

Op­er­at­ing Ka­jol’s Va­ri­ety Store for more than 20 years, Shar­da Singh plead­ed for more po­lice on the streets, es­pe­cial­ly with the Christ­mas and Car­ni­val sea­sons ap­proach­ing.

Over at Young Rich Kids Bar­ber Shop – 18-year-old Syon Hicks said while he felt safe, he need­ed the po­lice to “ease up” their rough treat­ment of youths like him.

“Younger peo­ple like me, in­stead of rush­ing them one time, like ask. For ex­am­ple, if they walk­ing, they go stop you and just say, if you have a bag...they go stop you and say, ‘Hey, what you have in that bag?’”

“Oth­er than that...noth­ing else.”

Hicks said he plans to ex­pand his busi­ness and im­prove him­self and his stan­dard of liv­ing.