Mr Vorster said a local trader had “thugs chasing customers into her store where she had to shelter Burleigh locals”.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Hermann Vorster says the new police beat will stop “thugs” harassing locals. (ABC: Glenn Mullane)<\/p>\n
But Cr Hammel said such “strong” political rhetoric could harm the city’s image.<\/p>\n
“That’s a really sad thing if that’s how the community feels, and that’s something that reflects on the entire Gold Coast,” he said.<\/p>\n
“For the city, as a tourism city that relies upon its brand being put around the world, having a local state politician come out with such strong words like that is a concern.”<\/p>\n
Mr Vorster said a $500,000 expansion of council-run CCTV will “blanket Burleigh, our wonderful coastal village, with more eyes”.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Mark Hammel says he would welcome more police resources in Burleigh Heads. (ABC: Danniell Mahe)<\/p>\n
Queensland Police Chief Superintendent Kylie Rigg said the new beat will contain an interview room, reception, and a room for taking statements, but not holding cells.<\/p>\n
“With light rail coming down to this location, it’s likely we’ll see an increased presence, we’ll have more people visiting this place,” she said.<\/p>\n
Locals respond<\/p>\n
Darren Garvin manages the building where the beat will be based.<\/p>\n
He said anti-social behaviour has gotten worse over the years, especially when “the nightclubs open up”.<\/p>\n
“We’ve had juvenile delinquents break into our property,” he said.<\/p>\n
Burleigh Pavilion owner Ben May said the area has gotten much busier.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Burleigh Heads on the Gold Coast. (Supplied)<\/p>\n
“There’s more and more apartments, there’s more and more people, there’s more and more traffic, there’s more and more business \u2014 everything changes,” he said.<\/p>\n
“The old timers who want to sit in peace and quiet probably miss some of the old times.<\/p>\n
“Maybe the younger generations absolutely love it, and that’s the crowd that’s making it a busier and busier place.”<\/p>\n
Paul Surman has lived in Burleigh for 45 years and said “there’s a lot of crime these days”.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Alanasia Malone and Paul Surman have welcomed the new police beat. (ABC: Danielle Mahe)<\/p>\n
“For young families, seeing drug-addled idiots fighting in the parks \u2014 it’s not great,” he said.<\/p>\n
“I’ve seen people fighting in the street at 9am.”<\/p>\n
Local Alanasia Malone said Burleigh feels a lot safer than other suburbs.<\/p>\n
“I go for bike rides along Burleigh and for runs both at afternoon and night, and I feel safe,” she said.<\/p>\n
“Some other people do have those perceptions about crime, there are sometime homeless people, maybe the [police beat] will just help with the overall feeling of safety.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The state government says a new $1.1 million police beat in Burleigh Heads will address anti-social behaviour and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":235426,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[67976,124682,141197,48,2485,43,38854,141198,141199,92209,44,1158,141200,41,39,42,40],"class_list":["post-235425","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-beat","tag-burleigh","tag-burleigh-heads","tag-crime","tag-gold-coast","tag-headlines","tag-heads","tag-herman-vorster","tag-kylie-rigg","tag-mark-hammel","tag-news","tag-police","tag-police-beat","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=235425"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235425\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/235426"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=235425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=235425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=235425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}