Planning for community safety Print E-mail

Community safety

Community safety is about people - both young and old - feeling safe in their own community where they live, work, play and attend school.

A community is safe when everyone who lives in the community decides what they do, where they work, who they meet, and where they go without being afraid of becoming a victim of crime or feeling unsafe.

Community safety plans

Community safety is complex, as is planning for the community’s safety. Different ideas and actions can be brought together to plan for community safety. Community safety planning is not just about crime prevention, it’s also about creating safe and healthy public, community and home environments.

A community safety plan sets out:

  • what is needed to make the community safer and why it is needed
  • what can be done to make the community safer and how it can be done
  • who is responsible for doing what to make the community safer.

A community safety plan can be a separate plan or it can be part of - or include -another community-based plan such as:

  • local Indigenous partnership agreement (LIPA)
  • local implementation plan (LIP)
  • negotiation table action plan
  • local government community plan
  • local government safe public space plan.

Community safety groups

Community safety is everyone’s right and responsibility. Everyone who lives in, works in or delivers services to the community should take part in developing a community safety plan such as:

  • community residents
  • non-government organisations based in the community
  • Community Justice Groups
  • Aboriginal shire councils and Indigenous regional councils
  • state and Commonwealth agencies providing community services.

Each group will be responsible for one or more elements of the community safety plan and will need to work together to make the plan happen and to improve community safety.

Role of the state and Australian governments

The Queensland Government, together with the Australian Government, believes community safety in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities is a priority.

The Queensland Government is committed to supporting Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island communities who want a local level community safety plan. This is part of the state’s response to the Crime and Misconduct Commission’s report, Restoring Order: Crime prevention, policing and local justice in Queensland’s Indigenous communities.

The state is working with the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) on strategies to help make communities safer including:

  • national Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander safe communities strategy, as part of the COAG National Indigenous Reform Agreement
  • national plan to reduce violence against women and their children.

These national strategies see community safety plans as one way of reducing violence and making places safer.

At the community level, Queensland Government agencies that play a key partnership role in developing and implementing community safety plans are:

These agencies work with the Commonwealth Department of Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, the Aboriginal shire or Indigenous regional council, key community organisations, and residents to develop a local community safety plan and put it into practice.

Role of Indigenous local governments

Indigenous local governments should help with community safety planning in at least three ways:

  • provide leadership
  • create safer public spaces
  • work with government agencies, non-government organisations and other stakeholders.

Further information

For more information on creating safer communities and public spaces visit:

Last Updated on Monday, 09 May 2011 19:12