Crime fighters and police this week signed a new Constitution for Community Policing Forums (CPF) and Boards in the Western Cape.
The signing, hosted by the provincial CPF board, was attended by Community Safety MEC Reagen Allen, as well as provincial police commissioner, Thembisile Patekile, at the Milnerton police station on Monday.
The board said despite facing numerous challenges, they worked to change the constitution to align the organisation with the changes in police structures.
In the past, each police station was grouped into a cluster and as such, the CPF committees were structured the same way.
Now, with the changes from clusters to districts, there were more stations grouped.
CPF board spokesperson, Justin Kumlehn, said in addition to these changes, the new constitution addresses historic issues faced over the years.
Along with this are guidelines on how to deal with CPF representatives who have political aspirations.
“There are a number of changes, the majority speak to the change from cluster to districts as well as fixing some historic issues, which have been encountered over the years.
“The change from clusters to districts, which will now align CPF with the operational structure of SAPS, allowing better communication and smoother working relations culminating in a more cohesive working partnership, which will ultimately benefit the community, there were also amendments to strengthen the code of conduct and to introduce mechanisms to deal with members that have political aspirations, improvements on voting processes and dealing with associations linked to the CPF as well as various definitions and legal prescripts that we needed to align with due to changes made over the years.”
He said the board also had to look at streamlining dispute resolution procedures and the vetting of documents required when serving as a CPF representative.
“These changes will assist with better understanding and clearer guidelines as to how CPF must operate, but also as to how they should work with partners so as to allow a whole of society approach to crime and to align us with the SAPS operational structure as well as to fix historic ‘problems’ encountered as we learnt what worked and what did not , as well as to align to updates made to various legislation through the years.”
There are currently 151 CPF committees across the province and prior to the finalisation of the new constitution, the board and police hosted summits last year.
Kumlehn said among the main concerns for CPFs across the province was the lack of resources.
“Lack of regulatory framework for neighbourhood watch structures and the continuous safety threat towards CPF and neighbourhood watch members, these are just a few of the challenges experienced.”