York Council election manifestos compared

5. Leisure

York’s cultural attractions have strengthened in recent years. The Art Gallery/Museums Trust is putting on a wide range of events while the Libraries management team have recently been awarded a 15 year extension to their contract. York has a strong theatre presence and attracted the new Shakespeare outdoor venue last year

Things are less promising for informal sport and open space provision. Playing fields in west York are being built on. Outdoor games areas are being closed and bowling greens lost.

All parties are promising to plant more trees, although none yet recognise that more needs to be invested in maintaining existing tree stocks.

Rather belatedly, the adverse impact of the cuts made to youth provision 7 years ago, are being recognised. All parties promise to do more to entertain teenagers.

The LibDems and Greens commit to a rolling programme of play equipment renewal.

North Yorkshire Police launch PCSO recruitment campaign

Today marks the start of North Yorkshire Police’s major new recruitment campaign to bring more than 50 Police Community Support Officers into the Force over the next 12 months.

North Yorkshire Police launches PCSO recruitment campaign

The campaign is part of a wider recruitment plan to boost the number of frontline police working across North Yorkshire’s communities

Police Community Support Officers (or PCSOs) are paid employees who work alongside warranted Police Officers to keep communities safe.  They take part in neighbourhood patrols, help to tackle anti-social behaviour, provide crime prevention advice and support investigations.  Whilst many people choose to be a PCSO as a permanent career role, others use the position to gain experience before applying to become a warranted Officer.

Speaking about the recruitment campaign, Phil Cain, Deputy Chief Constable of North Yorkshire Police said:

“PCSOs are a really important part of the policing family because they have a very direct link with communities, and help to solve the problems that can affect peoples’ quality of life.

“The increase in the Precept has meant we can boost the number of PCSOs we have in our Force by 20, which is really positive, and will make a significant different to communities.  But added to that we also need to recruit to fill vacancies that have arisen from people retiring or moving into warranted Officer roles.

“Our aim is to recruit 50 PCSOs this year in three intakes.  Today’s campaign is the start of that process.”

Based around the qualities required to succeed in the PCSO role – including communication, people skills, level-headedness, problem-solving and team-work – the campaign encourages people with these abilities to “be a PCSO”.  As well as general publicity, North Yorkshire Police will be holding some special workshops aimed at encouraging people from under-represented groups, such as black and minority ethnic communities, to make an application.

Said DCC Phil Cain:

“We made great progress last year in attracting candidates from a diverse communities into the Force, and we’re continuing to focus on that again this year.  We want our workforce to be representative of the wider demographics in North Yorkshire as a whole, and we’ll be running our Positive Action activities alongside this PCSO recruitment campaign to support that.”

Anyone interested in joining North Yorkshire Police as a PCSO can visit:  www.northyorkshire.police.uk/pcso for information on the role and how to apply.