Community Safety Partnership | Bluelight Consultancy

A Community Where People Care Enough To Act

Posted on 24/12/201624/12/2016 by bluelight

So there we were, police, council and housing officers together with resident street champions and councillors, all gathered outside of the Oaktree Sports Centre in Mansfield, Nottinghamshire, on a freezing cold December’s evening. In less than an hour it would go dark which left us with about 45 minutes to be briefed and to venture into the Oaktree Estate - would we discover a community where...
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Communities where no one wants to get involved?

Posted on 15/12/201616/12/2016 by bluelight

On my travels and during my workshops I often hear individuals in ‘agency world’ discussing how no-one in the communities they work in (you know, the ‘deprived ones’) wants to get involved in volunteering activities that will make their area safer. Do any of these common complaints sound familiar? ‘No-one wants to get involved in the activities we arrange’ ‘It’s the same small number of ...
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Doing a lot without doing a lot

Posted on 13/12/2016 by bluelight

In my last three blogs (here, here and here) I explored some of the issues and challenges around Bishop Desmond Tutu’s famous quote about pulling people out of the river, finding out why they are falling into the water in the first place, and then taking action to stop them. But what if we could stop people getting to the water’s edge in the first place? Or once there we created, in ...
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Silent Working

Posted on 29/10/201629/10/2016 by bluelight

'There comes a point where we need to stop pulling people out of the river. We need to go upstream and find out why they're falling in.' Bishop Desmond Tutu But first, we need to discover the 'silent working' in our organisations. Getting upstream and stopping people falling in – sounds like an easy journey doesn’t it? But if it were that easy public services would be in this position al...
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Changing community conversations through Appreciative Inquiry

Posted on 11/08/201625/09/2016 by bluelight

Appreciative Inquiry community conversations

During a recent visit to Mansfield, as part of the field research phase prior to the start of their Problem Solving in Community Safety course, I joined a small group of Council and Fire Service employees in the Ravensdale Estate. The aim of these walkabouts is to enable me to get a real feel for what is going well and to ascertain what the issues are from a resident and ‘boots on the ground’ ...
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‘Tough Love’ PSPO – An Effective Enforcement Solution?

Posted on 10/02/201610/02/2016 by bluelight

A ‘Tough love’ PSPO (Public Space Protection Order) is what is needed to tackle Exeter’s homeless and rough sleeping problem claimed the city’s MP Ben Bradshaw in the press recently. He described a, ‘perfect storm of homelessness’ after a visit to the streets that are now home to dozens of rough sleepers with all their associated problems. Ben believes a PSPO will help in solving som...
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Liberate your Inner Citizen – Step-by-step guide to Appreciative Inquiry

Posted on 25/01/201619/01/2017 by bluelight

Are you in a position where you’re part of any kind of community engagement process, especially PACT (Police and Communities Together)? Are you tired of attending meetings where all that is discussed is what is ‘broken’ with demands for, ‘someone to do something about it?’ Do you wonder why your PACT and community meetings appear to generate actions for the police and other partner agencies ...
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Appreciative Inquiry – Changing Oxford’s Community Engagement

Posted on 23/01/201616/02/2016 by bluelight

Last year I started a pilot course alongside Oxford City Council, Oxford Police and Skills for Justice Awards for the ‘Problem Solving in Community Safety’ qualification. To achieve this award delegates need to complete a practical problem solving assignment based on the learning from the course. For many of the delegates this has involved running an appreciative inquiry. The overall ai...
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The problem with PACT

Posted on 22/01/201618/02/2016 by bluelight

Have you ever run or been part of a Police and Communities Together ( PACT ) meeting? Where members of the community are invited to: ‘raise their community priorities or concerns;’ ‘receive crime prevention advice,’ and be updated as to what the police (mostly) and partners have been doing to address the priorities and concerns raised at the previous meeting. PACT tends to be called different t...
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Conference planning for a ‘Covert Appreciative Inquiry’

Posted on 21/01/201626/01/2016 by bluelight

In my last blog I took a rather irreverent (or maybe factual?) look at police conferences and their purpose. How for the most part they have a tendency to run by the same old rules and how generally, they serve only to impart knowledge, understanding and maybe consult to a lesser degree. A couple of months ago I was presented with a conference challenge by Barnsley’s Community Saf...
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