Gardai begin text alert for community’s residents in Limerick

Community groups in the Southill regeneration estate in Limerick have joined forces with gardaí in a new texting initiative launched to help fight crime.

The programme will allow gardaí to quickly respond and advise local residents on safety and security issues and matters related to incidents that occur in the community.

The pilot scheme will piggyback on the existing FreeText service already in place and run by Limerick City and County Council at its Southill local office in the Roxboro Shopping Centre.

Gardaí will provide information by text to each registered community contact.

Inspector Oliver Kennedy, Roxboro Rd station, said: “The text alert initiative is designed to facilitate immediate and cost effective communication from An Garda Siochána to the public.

“This will be achieved in a structured and consistent way in conjunction with existing community crime prevention programmes including, community alert and neighbourhood watch.”

Anne Cahill of Limerick City and County Council’s regeneration section said: “We found the text alert system was very efficient and very quick to get the message out.”

Insp Kennedy said on seeing how well the text alert system worked, they viewed it as an opportunity to get on board.

“It will allow us to get information out to the public in a very timely and efficient manner,” he said.

He also thanked Limerick City and County Council for allowing gardaí to link in to the system.

“We will be sending out alerts on issues such as appeal for information, and crime prevention.”

The officers have already formulated their first alert which is: “Gardaí at Roxboro warn of recent distraction burglaries on the southside, please be vigilant of all types of workman ID badges and a reminder that ‘if it’s too good to be true, it probably is’.”