Surveillance at the Carter St Riverside ovals will be significantly beefed up following a spate of attacks over the last 12 months.
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Tamworth MP Kevin Anderson joined with deputy premier and police minister Troy Grant at AgQuip to announce a further $250,000 grant to install CCTV security at the fields and on Bridge St.
“Our community won’t keep putting up with windows being smashed, walls being covered in graffiti and our sporting fields being torn up by vandals,” Mr Anderson said.
Deputy mayor and chair of the council’s crime committee Russell Webb was very pleased with the news.
“It will help as a deterrent and a mechanism to help capture people causing this damage,” he said.
“And it goes a long way to making Tamworth a safer place.”
Cr Webb estimated there were over four targeted attacks on the Riverside ovals in the last year, all coming at a cost to the community.
Tamworth District Cricket Association administrator Grahame Davies was equally pleased with the announcement.
“Riverside has been targeted over the last two or three years, but especially in the last 12 months,” Mr Davies said.
“It’s very disruptive having to transfer games because it taken out our turf wickets.
“We had it covered, but the situation is never ideal.”
Mr Davies said he hoped to have more talks with council about putting down bollards as a further deterrent.
“There was talk of closing off Carter St earlier, but council we’re reluctant to do that because it’s a public road,” he said.
“There was talk of more bollards too, but we haven’t had any more discussions since last season.
“We’ll look to have more talks before the season begins.”
Deputy mayor Webb said it would be a case of “watch and see” whether council would consider putting bollards down at Riverside.
“All of these things involve spending community money,” he said.
“We’ve got to spend it in the best possible way because we haven’t got an endless supply.”
The crime prevention committee chair was optimistic cameras were going to curb the vandalism at the fields, a sense of confidence echoed by Mr Davies.
“Hopefully it will stop it, it should be a deterrent. We’ve been asking for this for the last two years,” Mr Davies said.
“Hopefully they’ll be able to catch the offenders, the cameras have already been proven to work over at the touch football fields.”
The grant for Tamworth was delivered as a part of the NSW government’s community safety fund, which is set to deliver $10 million in funding over four years.
CCTV measures will also be rolled out on Bridge St.