Minutes of Meeting on 5 October 1999:

CRYSTAL PALACE & NORWOOD

CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

MINUTES OF MEETING HELD AT THE PHOENIX COMMUNITY CENTRE

ON TUESDAY 5th October 1999

PRESENT

Chairman - Doug Barnes (Tamnag Thai)
Temp. Secretary - Christopher Dobb (Upper Norwood Joint Library)
Hon. Solicitor - Geoff Harding (Bennett Welch)

Peter Runacres (Thornton Springer)
Wendy Allen (Phoenix Shoes)
Oliver Williams (F.A.)
Norma Manning (Kalya Kosmetics)
Veronica Fullerton (Little Yellow Bird)
Caroline Streek (Quality Hotel/Streek's)
David Kerr (Town Centre Manager)
Ian Ward (I W & S A Ward)
Kanex Pillay (Pizza Express)
Councillor Pat Ryan (London Borough of Croydon)
James Slattery-Kavanagh (Quotes)
Andrea Aiello (Crystal Palace Views)
Monique Dall'occo (Crystal Palace Views)
Neil Dyson (Crystal Palace Foundation)
Kevin Carlton-Reeves

APOLOGIES

Allan Thompson (Hon. Secretary)
Isabel Trist

1. Minutes of meeting 7th September 1999

Agreed
Proposed: Ian Ward
Seconded: James Slattery-Kavanagh

2. Chairman's report

• UNIT meeting - 6th October at Quality Hotel. A report of the meeting will be posted on the Chamber's website
• Policing - Doug outlined the problems and stated his intention to get the different police areas to work together
• Isabel Trist, Town Centre Manager (Lambeth) will come to the next meeting
• Business Fair, 13th & 14th October at Fairfield Halls - invitations are available. A report will be put on website.
• South London Chamber of Commerce - this will have considerable clout and will give its members the ability to network at a higher level. The Chamber has therefore joined.
• Radios - research is taking place to see which system is best technically. In preference, a local firm should be used to supply the units.

3. Guest speaker - Geoff Bailey, Crime Prevention Officer, South Norwood

Geoff talked about the area being a crime hotspot and the difficulty of the it being part of 3 Police Divisions. Whilst little has happened in recent years, this is now changing with the Crystal Palace Partnership and proposals for CCTV. Geoff is now communicating with the CPOs at Gipsy Hill and Bromley.

He then talked about CCTV - part of his role being a consultant. He gave several pieces of advice: -

• Do an Operational Requirement to evaluate what you really need. Ask yourself what do you really want to achieve? What level of picture detail do you want? Companies can do on-site surveys.
• Don't waste your money on dummy cameras - signs are more effective
• Pictures must be of good enough quality to recognise people and colour is better for evidence purposes.
• Tapes should be used no more than 12 times (15 absolute max). If you rotate 31 tapes a month you are keeping a month's history, which can be very useful. The system should be thoroughly cleaned every 6 months.
• Best to install a good system. A domestic VCR is not really satisfactory. However when you increase the image quality the price increases too and you loose area coverage. Need to get the balance right.

If you are contemplating CCTV gets in touch with Geoff and he can take you through all the implications.

Ringmaster System

Forms to sign up to the free system are to be sent out shortly. As our area covers Croydon, Bromley and Lambeth we are advised to fill in at least 2 forms, one for each area. If something occurs a computer will ring and give a message. Geoff said there was the possibility of fax or email messaging in the future.

As part of the SRB every business in the Triangle is to be contacted for a crime prevention survey. Some costs for recommended improvements can be met from SRB funds.

4. Any Other Business

• Christmas lights - they will be sorted out and switched on next month
• Christmas party - the venue has not been decided yet. Beckenham Business Forum wants to hold a joint party.
• Town Centre Manager's Newsletter - David Kerr has produced his Autumn Newsletter, which is now available.
• Business South magazine - a new edition of this is available and anyone who has any news they would like to put in the next one, please let Caroline Streek know.
• Crystal Palace Campaign - Wendy Allen reported on the meeting held at Kingsdale School on 2nd October.
• Website - James Slattery-Kavanagh reported on the updated Chamber website and its new address (www.norwoodchamber.org.uk) which can also be used for email.