Oslo will spend 49 million kroner on youth crime prevention

youth arrestedYouth arrested.Photo: Gorm Kallestad / NTB scanpix

Oslo municipality will put aside 49 million kroner in its revised budget to strengthen the crime preventive work for the city’s youth.

 

Juvenile delinquency has increased somewhat, and statistics show that there are more young people in the country, the City Council wrote in a press release after the revised budget was adopted on Wednesday.

“We are putting in measures in vulnerable neighbourhoods before summer, and also more long-term measures. We will provide more young people’s summer jobs, follow up on regular youth criminals more closely, establish a project for a better school environment among disadvantaged youth schools and rebuild leisure clubs,” said council leader, Raymond Johansen of Arbeiderpartiet (Ap).

The measures will strengthen coordination between the police and the municipality, he said.

There are 50,000 adolescents aged 10 to 17 years in the capital. Last year,151 of them, 3%, were registered as regular offenders, and accounted for 37% of the crime in that age group.

‘’Fighting crime is a police task, but these young people are in contact with the municipality at several levels. We will now strengthen the follow-up of young people and vulnerable youth by NOK 15 million,’’said Johansen.

16 out of the 49 million will go toward tighter measures this summer.

These include, among other things, more summer jobs, more open-time leisure and outdoor activity contacts in the districts.

10 million will go toward youth clubs, while politicians have decided to spend 8 million on a better school environment at youth schools.

“We need to make sure that school is a safe and good place to be, and that we prevent problems and ensure that young people receive quick and useful help. We need to work closely with the students and their families to find out what their needs are,” said Martijn Thorkildsen of the Sosialistisk Venstreparti (SV).

 

© NTB scanpix / #Norway Today