Municipalities not sharing experience on dealing with New Year's violence: report
Dutch municipalities seem to learn little from each other when it comes to handling New Year’s Eve violence like riots, fires, and first responders being attacked, Omroep Gelderland reported. The broadcaster spoke to eight municipalities where things go wrong year after year and found that few of them asked other municipalities with similar problems how they deal.
In 2017, the Dutch Safety Board (OVV) urged municipalities to do just that. There are many measures that municipalities can take, including firework-free zones, camera surveillance, letters to potential troublemakers, or organizing a professional fireworks show instead of allowing locals to set off their own. “Ensure that municipalities learn from each other by making better use of each other’s experiences and good examples,” the OVV recommended.
But according to Omroep Gelderland, municipalities are focusing much more on reinventing the wheel themselves than learning from each other.
The broadcaster reached out to Hedel, the municipality that covers Maasdriel, as well as Alphen aan den Rijn, Altena, Hoeksche Waard, Koggenland, Noardeast-Fryslân, Rhenen, Woudenberg, and Zuidplas. These municipalities all struggled with things like riots, fires, and harassed first responders over the past few New Year’s Eves. “It is striking that these municipalities mainly ask neighboring municipalities about their approach, but do not look at other municipalities in the country with similar problems,” the broadcaster wrote.
Only Rhenen and Noardeast-Fryslân reached out beyond their neighbors for advice. Rhenen (Utrecht province), asked Urk, Staphorst, and Atlena for advice. Noardeast-Fryslân got in touch with various municipalities in Groningen, Friesland, and Drenthe.
Alphen aan den Rijn told Omroep Gelderland that it gets information through the Association of Dutch Municipalities (VNG). The others who responded said they only had contact with neighboring municipalities.
“You would expect municipalities to share experiences with each other, but they don’t. They are desperately thinking, while if they had heard that a certain approach like a charm in another municipality, they could have copied it. It is astonishing that they don’t do that,” Ira Helsloot, a professor of governance of safety at Radboud University, told the broadcaster.
