Chaos follows bungled Bluff beach plan
DRINKING, littering, fighting and illegal parking seemed to be the order of the day at the Bluff beaches over the festive season, with little to no police intervention.
Residents were enraged by what appeared to be a downscaling of the Metro Police presence on the beachfront during the peak season. A satellite station on Ansteys Beach, which has had much success in deterring criminal elements over the years, appeared to be poorly equipped and manned for the December-January holidays.
“It was chaos. I’m not sure what went wrong at the Bluff’s beaches, but it seems drinking alcohol in public was allowed by Metro Police,” said Community Orientated Policing (COP) manager, Rake Jeeves. COP and Community Crime Prevention Unit (CCPU) members patrolled Ansteys and Brighton beaches to try maintain order, but according to Jeeves, the patrols were eventually called off because illegal activities were too rampant to control.
“At 3am on Saturday, 28 December CCPU members sent a message saying they had given up trying to stop people from drinking alcohol as there were far too many for them to stop and it had become a hopeless situation. Every morning trash littered the beaches, including alcohol bottles, some as close as 20m from the Metro Police satellite station.”
In previous years a boom gate was erected for police to search vehicles as they entered the beaches and to monitor the number of vehicles to ensure parking was not overcrowded. This year, no cars were searched and the boom gate never materialised. The road and pavements become almost impossible to navigate as motorists parked on red lines, pavements, grassy areas and on banks and caused a three-vehicle crash on New Year’s Day. Ambulances were unable to reach the crash site because the roadway was blocked by people parking illegally.
Bluff Ratepayers Association chairman, Ivor Aylward asked why the policing was limited on the beaches but had received no feedback. “It is imperative that law enforcement officers are deployed to those beaches during the festive season or else things get out of control, as they did. I have no idea why the policing was scaled down and my requests for information have gone unanswered,” said Aylward.
“The anarchy was due to bad planning on the Metro Police side, but we thank our local SAP who not only had their hands full dealing with other crimes, but did an amazing job juggling between the two. Even the SAP house break-in unit went to the beaches and made arrests between house break-ins and they were assisted by CCPU. The Metro Police dog unit and some Metro Police officers in crime prevention also worked hard over the period and for that we thank them. It was just the Metro Police Bluff beach plan that was a mess. I also thank the lifeguards who had their work cut out for them, dealing with large crowds,” said Jeeves.
– erinh@dbn.caxton.co.za
