ANTI-VIOLENCE campaigners are calling on Portland residents to join them at a new meeting with police.

Islanders have been calling for more police action after a series of attacks and a new meeting has been arranged to speak to officers and generate ideas that will improve public safety.

The new meeting at Easton Methodist Church Hall will be chaired by Eddie Waring after he helped set up two residents’ meetings at the Clifton Hotel earlier this summer.

Mr Waring was among a group who met with police after those public meetings to discuss ideas including new ‘pubwatch’ and ‘shopwatch’ schemes.

And he is calling on his fellow Portlanders to seize the opportunity to tell the police what they want and to come up with their own ideas.

Mr Waring said: “We want to appeal to as many people as possible to come.

“There could be better ideas out there.

“We want people to come to us so we can discuss them and make a plan to go on from there.”

Portland town councillor and pub landlord Neil ‘Chaz’ Charlton said this meeting will be a big chance for residents to have their say.

He said: “This meeting is the meeting that needs the full support of the Island.

“They will be letting themselves down if they don’t turn up.

“People are talking about stuff but this is the time to talk about how you feel and pass on your thoughts to the community.”

After the two residents’ meetings at the Clifton Hotel, Mr Waring and Mr Charlton joined Portland mayor David Thurston and fellow resident Nigel McColm for a meeting with the police.

And after that meeting Mr Charlton, Mr Waring and Sergeant Neil Wood met up with the Echo to talk about what they had discussed.

They said they want to work with residents on an ‘epic model’ that includes prevention of crime, police enforcement and communication.

Mr Charlton said: “We can’t achieve any of this without the public.

“It was not about deals being made behind closed doors.

“We can only achieve what we want to achieve if we all work as a unit.

“We addressed everything the community has requested.”

The public meeting will be held in Easton at 7.30pm on Tuesday, August 24.

Under each chair in the hall there will be a piece of paper and an envelope so that residents can leave their ideas and police requests in a box at the end of the night.

They can leave them anonymously or with their contact details.

Sgt Wood, head of the Portland Safer Neighbourhood Team, said: “Things are starting to happen now. We are moving forward and we’ve got to keep the momentum.

Portlanders voiced their public safety fears at two meetings at the Clifton Hotel earlier this summer.

Residents told how vigilante groups were ready to act after fears had grown that gangs were terrorising the island.

At the first meeting, Sergeant Neil Wood warned against vigilante action. He listened to residents’ concerns and pledged to ‘robustly’ address anti-social behaviour.

And he agreed to have a follow-up meeting to discuss ways forward and to show what the police have achieved.

The meeting at Easton Methodist Church Hall is the result of that agreement.

Ahead of that meeting, residents Eddie Waring, Neil Charlton, Nigel McColm and Portland Mayor David Thurston met with police.

Andy Matthews from the Portland Community Partnership also attended.

Sergeant Neil Wood was joined at that meeting by Inspector Pete Meteau, section commander for Weymouth and Portland, and Chief Inspector Matthew Hiles, Divisional Commander of Dorset County Division.

The meeting was used to agree to work together to encourage residents to attend the next meeting and to work with the police.

They discussed ideas including ‘pubwatch’ and ‘shopwatch’ and the police are looking at ways to engage the NHS in projects to tackle drug abuse.