Coming soon to a street near you

Palma's neighbourhood policing scheme is now fully in place with 62 officers currently on patrol across the city. City mayor Joan Fageda unveiled the “Qui sempre et dona la má,” (always ready to help) campaign yesterday. A total of 72 policemen and women will eventually be involved in the community policing scheme, with the extra 18 operating from command centres and Citizen Attention offices. City councillor José Manuel Sierra, said “we believed that 87 policemen and women is enough to meet the needs of Palma's neighbourhoods, bearing in mind they are not operating alone, but with the full support and back up of the entire force.” Fageda explained that in order to enable the new neighbourhood police force to operate as efficiently as possible, a new free-phone is being set up. The 092 number is dealing with an average of 200'000 telephone calls per day and is reaching its peak. As a result Fageda said that a new 900 711 092 number has been set up to cope with all the calls the neighbourhood force is expected to generate. The new free phone will be fully operational from December 7 and will be manned from 9am to 9pm. But while the 092 number is for citizens requiring police assistance or wanting to report a crime, the new number is being set up so that the people of Palma can lodge complaints or suggestions with the city council and the security authorities. “The new number is not going to be strictly an emergency number, for that we have 092 and 010, but all three numbers will be inter-linked,” Fageda said. Prior to the new number coming into service a massive advertising campaign is to be launched across the capital.