Holiday program in place

Local police say they will increase their footprint throughout the upcoming school holiday period to tackle an expected spike in juvenile crime.

South Hedland Sergeant Andrew Ramsden said police had been working hard behind the scenes to develop a school holiday program aimed at keeping children occupied and off the streets at night.

“Our strategy is to have a bigger footprint and fill the gaps the other service providers can’t fill,” he said.

“If you keep the kids occupied they aren’t on the streets.”

He said the activities included in the program would be more frequent because of the popularity of the previous school holiday program.

Sgt. Ramsden said there were gaps in the previous youth activity programs, which encouraged police to work with other agencies to centralise the programs.

He said the No.1 priority was to target peer-group pressure, which often resulted in a small per-centage of children being pressured into low-end crime.

A rundown and timetable of the activities, which will run from September 25, is available at the JD Hardie Youth Centre page on the Town of Port Hedland website.

For more information, visit porthedland.wa. gov.au/the-jd-hardie-youth-zone.aspx.