In 2016 the municipal government called for a Master Plan to be drawn up with a new GUB model focused on local policing and adaptation to the local area, where territorial units were at the cornerstone of an immediate response to public demand.
The main goal behind this public safety plan is to design a model that gives priority to positive community life on a street/neighbourhood level and helps to scale emerging phenomena better. Public safety policies are therefore more preventive than reactive.
The general public is seen as our main ally in both diagnosing and planning solutions to public-security and positive-community problems. Hence the strengthening of communication and participation channels in every district.
Coordination with the districts and various municipal services is also being strengthened to find cross-cutting solutions to these complex problems.
This new way of working first appeared with the creation of the Neighbourhood Police.
What is the Neighbourhood Police?
- This is a new GUB model that involves creating a neighbourhood police team in each district whose job is to get to know each neighbourhood’s associations, facilities and local residents so as to anticipate problems through early detection.
- Every Barcelona neighbourhood has a neighbourhood police “reference point”, which means the city has 73 once the plan has been fully implemented.
- The Neighbourhood Police officer is your reference point in the area, the person you will be able to contact when necessary, to raise such issues as positive community life and public safety. The public can contact the emergency services, however, by telephoning 112 or 092.
- The new team pays special attention to community disputes and has a support group at its disposal which, with the City Council’s other services, helps to resolve and follow up local residents’ needs.
Neighbourhood Police was first deployed in Nou Barris in May 2017 and was extended in 2018 to the districts of Sant Andreu, Sant Martí, Ciutat Vella and Sants-Montjuïc and in 2019 to Les Corts, Gràcia and Horta-Guinardó, L’Eixample and Sarrià-Sant Gervasi. To that end, all the “reference points” have received specialist training in the skills and tools required.