Need for Umina police station

The business owners and the broader community have for some time expressed the need for a full time police station in Umina.

The Member for Gosford has continually assured the community that Woy Woy Police station is manned 24 hours a day and there are now more police on the streets of NSW than ever before.

While that may be the case, it is clear that Woy Woy station is not adequately staffed to respond in reasonable time to unlawful incidents on the Peninsula.

Some may say it is irresponsible of me to make such claims publicly but enough is enough.

This is not a local command issue, the police in this region are doing a great job but if they are deployed outside the Peninsula it can take more than 25 minutes to respond.

The NSW Government is busy selling off police stations around NSW, and Kincumber is a perfect example of that.

The station which cost $1.4 million to build was sold for just $300,000 (Sunday Telegraph 14 Feb 2010).

Minister Michael Daley told the Sunday Telegraph only old, outdated or unused stations are being liquidated to allow police to invest in better police stations and provide resources to fight crime.

Let us hope that Umina is one of the areas intended for a slice of the $67.6 million collected so far in the police stations sell off.

This is an issue that will not go away and Umina business and local residents will not be silenced with a few carefully chosen words and statistics.

Premier Keneally has said the Regional Economic Development and Employment Strategy will support a population growth on the Central Coast of an additional 100,000 people.

If the Government's current attitude towards policing and police stations prevails, what hope do we have in Umina?

Email, 18 Feb 2010 Sharon Martin, Umina District Chamber of Commerce