Bordesley Green Neighbourhood Team - Your update

Firstly happy new year to you all!

I wanted to start this year with a few updates to the community that we serve, give you an insight into what we have planned and our commitments for this year.

For those that may not have met me, I am Sgt Allen and have had the fortune of being the Bordesley Green Sgt since June of 2024. When i joined the team, my priority and commitment was to restore neighbourhood policing and give YOU the opportunity to have your voice heard and for us to tackle the issues that matter to you. As a part of that, i needed to repair relationships with partners to allow us to be effective in tackling those issues. This has taken time and has been set back by others budgets or internal police changes, however i believe we have been quite successful in building that foundation. It is now time to move forward and build on top of those foundations further. 

The first commitment is that i will be remaining in post so that there will be no sweeping changes to anything i have put in place and give some stability to the public who have had a turbulent change in leadership over several years

The next commitment is our priorities. Whilst our priorities were also focused on issues reported directly by our community, they were never formally set with yourselves. As such i completed the first priority setting meeting back in August where we set four priorities. How i set these are two based on issues raised by you and two that we, as a team identify. These priorities have to be specific so that we can define the issue and therefore establish effective plans to tackle that issue, measurable so that we can see if we have an impact, achievable ie we have the resources to do so and time bound so i know we can work on this for the three months we set. 

The priorities that were agreed for September to December were:

1.ASB and vehicle crime on Finnemore Road - We started with tackling a pair of homeless people in the park on Finnemore road. My focus here was to balance there welfare with the reported issues. It was coming into winter and they were sleeping in sheets and bin bags. We gave them food packages and toiletries. Whilst this was ongoing, we were pushing our partners to support them with housing. I can see how perceptively, it looks we were allowing them to cause ASB and fly tipping within the park however enforcement would displace the issue elsewhere or just give them a need for aggressive begging to be able to afford fines etc. Support was clearly needed and i am happy that in the end we were able to get them housing and ongoing support. That was the right thing to do. Our focus now is to have the park secured of an evening to prevent further crime and disorder. These conversations are ongoing. We will ensure patrols are done of the location and swift action taken where proportionate. With regards to the ASB, this has been helped greatly by the change to road layout and after consultation with residents (Those that answered door knocks or attended my meetings), people feel these issues have reduced. We are aware that the drug dealing has moved to other locations and is not as frequent in this area. That was expected given we had increased patrols and pursued several people in this area. Patrols will continue however i feel this is no longer a priority and will move to monitoring in the background as part of our default patrols 

2. Untaxed/Auctioned vehicles - Since joining the team, parking has been a long standing issue. We have tried every tactic from letter drops, awareness, tickets and vehicle seizures with no marked improvement. I have requested better engagement from the council on enforcement and local councillors for parking measures. I am happy to see that council wardens have increased patrols in the area of our ward where issues are at the worst ie around Mansel Road and the surrounding area. We have some dates planned for joint enforcement upcoming. However on top of this, we have been seizing vehicles that are untaxed or causing an obstruction every fortnight or so. This is to free up space for you to use and remove those vehicles that just shouldn't be there. We have identified one garage/trader causing a significant issue and this has been assigned to an officer to tackle. I now see this being able to move into monitoring and not a priority area for now. We will still be having a fortnightly or so focus on vehicle seizures and a zero tolerance approach to parking and driving offences

On this - I need more information on suspected vehicle traders or garages. Please get in touch via WMNOW or the details i will list below. Your details will never be shared and are dealt with confidentially

3. Barnesville Close - Barnesville Close has been a hotspot of ASB for far too long and there is a sense of fear or reluctance for those living there to engage. This is due to use letting them down and allowing these issues to fester. This has meant that where we have potential suspects, we dont have anyone willing to identify them so that we can confirm they are those causing the ASB and as such is a barrier. There has been several arrests made and prosecutions ongoing. We have increased patrols and regular engage with residents. We now have support of the local housing provider and the council and are working together for better security and long term solutions. This should allow for us to identify those responsible. I am not yet satisfied with the results and need more time on this. As such we as a team have decided to keep this as a priority for January to April 26. I would urge any residents here to get in touch to support ongoing investigations. Dates, times and descriptions are key. Again, your details are never shared and dealt with confidentially.

4. Coventry Road mainly 24/7 shops, ASB and nitrous oxide. This is a key issue for us all and i thank the community for all there support on these. It has allowed us to secure warrants and closure orders. We have kept up enforcement and are pushing for prosecutions for those responsible in the supply of nitrous oxide. However those investigations take time and i cant update further. However, we are committed to further work and will be planning with partners shortly on plans for the next few months. I want to take this further and as such we have kept this priority and extended this to April 26. If you have any information regarding nitrous oxide, drugs, users, dealers etc then please get in touch via the below. Your details will never be shared and are dealt with confidentially

That brings me to our priorities for January to April 26. Ontop of the two being continued to April, we have set two further priorities.

1.Burglary - We are noticing a slight increase in Burglaries within our ward. As such we want to tackle this. There are several plans in motion and we will be offering crime prevention tools and advice every week. We want to be able to reach as many people as possible so please get in touch if there is somewhere you think would be great for a drop in service. If you know of anyone particularly vulnerable, please let us know and we can visit them with alarms etc.

2. Porters Way - We didn't get complaints regarding this area however i am now being informed of issues at the location namely drug use, ASB and abandoned vehicles. We appreciate that this area is also used to access vital services for a local youth group. As such we want to tackle this area. Those that saw our work when we supported on Parliament Street, Camelot way and surrounding roads will know what this team can achieve. My plans for that area will be put in place for Porters Way. An officer has been allocated this and moving those plans forward 

Updates on our priorities can always be found on the Bordesley Green page on the WMP website Bordesley Green | Your area | West Midlands Police | West Midlands Police under the crime and priorities section. Our next priority setting meeting will be on the 12th April 2026 over at Saltley Wellbeing Centre. This will be from 9am to 1pm as a drop in service. I will be working out of the location so please come along and have your voice heard to shape our work for May to August 2026 

My next commitment is how we communicate with you. I am happy with our offering with a monthly cuppa with a coppa and our virtual drop in session. I am aware that our weekly updates via WMNOW has reduced over the festive period however that is due to holidays or officers supporting elsewhere with the increased demand in our City Centres over this period. Those weekly updates will return this week and i will ensure i send a monthly update from me personally with updates on priorities and work we have done. 

I would like to ask for feedback on our offerings as i would like to offer two cuppa with a coppas in a location accessible by those towards the Alum Rock side of our patch and one towards the Coventry Road for those that live in that area. However at the moment, we don't get a significant turn out to these meetings and id like to understand why so please get in touch and let me know. I recognise that people may not be aware so i am having dates booked several months in advance and will ensure these are regularly published each week, sent out via X and where we can put up in community centres. If there is other feedback please let me know. For now we will hold one cuppa with a coppa per month in one central location which is likely to be St Pauls on Belchers Lane. Dates are on the process of being booked and will be published one confirmed. The virtual drop in will continue with the next being tomorrow (Sunday 4th January 2026, 5pm to 6pm via Teams) 

The last update is exactly on the team

As it stands we have:

PC Sutheran 

PC Amar

PC Johnson

PC Eaton

PC Mohamud 

PC Cooper

There is also PC Burton but she is enjoying her maternity leave and PC Sutton who will be back soon.

We do have PC Sharifzadeh but after some great proactive stop and search, arrests and prosecutions, he has been successful in a new role on a proactive City Centre team. We are going to miss him but he'll be around for a bit longer.

There is a lot of plans for the year and we will ensure to keep you updated. On top of tackling the issues above and engagement, we regular respond to calls for service, patrol our patch, deal with local issues, deal with issues reported directly to us and conduct inputs at every school each term. 

There is also a long term partnership project that goes beyond just policing and crime that is coming to Bordesley Green. I am committed to this project and have asked to be involved. I hope further news is shared soon

I would love feedback on how you think we doing, how we can improve and what we are doing well. This important as you are the community we serve and so we need to be working effectively. 

To get in touch for all of the above requests, you can message here or email bordesleygreen@westmidlands.police.uk 

Thank you and i look forward to working with you over 2026 

Regards

Sgt Allen