KEY POINTS:
Residents on Auckland's North Shore could possibly make police reports by text or email - and it need not even be in English.
This is one of the new initiatives the Waitemata police district's Asian-ethnic advisers have put forward as their bosses grapple with ways to improve police relations with ethnic communities in the area.
Nine community leaders, representing the main migrant communities - including Chinese, Koreans, Indians, Japanese and refugees - met at the North Shore Policing Centre last night for the first time since being offered one-year contracts as ethnic advisers for the police district.
Under-reporting of crime is the biggest issue facing the Waitemata police district with regard to its ethnic communities, and district commander Superintendent Viv Rickard is hoping the appointment of Asian-ethnic advisers from within these communities will help his district to resolve that.
"Looking at the statistics, we don't have an issue with Asians as offenders - but we have an issue with them as victims," Mr Rickard said.
"But a bigger problem we have is that many are not coming forward to report crime."
He added: "Research often tells us one thing, but when we talk to people, the picture being painted is sometimes very different. We hope our Asian-ethnic advisers will help us build better relations and better links with those communities."
The advisers, who are all engaged on a part-time, on-call basis, will be paid an honorarium for their services.
"We acknowledge there are some things people can do within their own communities that police will find hard, so we want to work alongside these people and tap on their expertise to help us with our work," said Mr Rickard.
"But at the same time, to show that we value their contributions, they will be financially reimbursed for their time and efforts."
He said the appointment of these advisers was also part of his district's response to 2005 national police-commissioned research which found that people from ethnic communities were generally dissatisfied with police service.
They thought police were slow in responding to crime reports, had low crime-solving rates, lacked follow up actions, lacked visibility, lacked resources and were not communicating enough with people in their community.
The research, conducted by the Migration Research Group at the University of Waikato, also found that people with a language barrier were less likely to make police reports and those who could speak English well often had to rely on others in their communities to interpret for them.
The problem with language as a barrier between communities and police is very real, especially on the North Shore where Asians make up nearly 20 per cent of the population.
"Lack of proficiency in English is a problem as to why many do not come forward to report crime, and this is another area where we hope the advisers, and maybe their proposed new initiatives like texting and emailing reports in a language they are comfortable with, can help bring more forward," Mr Rickard said.
"I will be happy if the result of having these advisers is getting more from their communities to report crime."
Besides discussing their new roles last night, the advisers were also briefed on police strategic action plans and ethnic strategies by police national strategic ethnic-Asian adviser Kefeng Chu.
