Criteria:
Bushfire Arson Prevention Handbook (Australian Institute of Criminology, Australian Government)
The Australian Institute of Criminology developed a Bushfire Arson Prevention Handbook as part of a five year project aiming to reduce the impact of deliberately lit fires in Australian bush land environment. The handbook is used by local organisations particularly police and fire agencies, when establishing community based bushfire and bushfire arson (BFA) prevention strategies. Over past four years, research into bushfire arson has found that:
The handbook contains seven elements:
Element 1: Establishing local coordination between police and fire agencies:
To get a precise picture of the local bushfire and BFA danger, it is a good idea to distinguish between what both parties know, as frequently police gather different intelligence to fire agencies. In the first stage of a conference between fire agencies and police, the goal should be to:
Element 2: Identifying the BFA threat
Examples of Bushfire Arson Costs to the community:
- Destruction of local business
- Psychological costs
- Staffing and financial resources diverted from other areas of police operations to investigate BFA
- Investigation costs
- Insurance costs and the flow-on effects to the community
- Replacing equipment
- Environmental damage
- Replacing infrastructure
- Payment of fire levy to local council
- Damage to water supplies
- Reduction in productivity
Element 3: Getting stakeholders involved
Attempt to get organisations/agencies to dispatch representatives who have the capability to arrive at decisions and have the capability to deliver resources to the BFA prevention plan.
Element 4: Deciding what should be done about the BFA threat
Once the problem has been found, you need to decide how to handle with the BFA risk. This involves 3 steps:
Element 5: Planning project implementation
Element 6: Developing the evaluation plan for your project
Element 7: Putting your project into action and revisiting the various elements when necessary
Points for a successful bushfire arson prevention project:
This project satisfies the first criterion as it aims to prevent arson.
- Reduce/eliminate the number of deliberately/accidentally caused bushfires
- If reducing/eliminating bushfires is not feasible, then reduce the damage caused by bushfires
- Reduce the amount of fatalities as a result of bushfires
Bushfire Arson Prevention Handbook (Australian Institute of Criminology, Australian Government)
The Australian Institute of Criminology developed a Bushfire Arson Prevention Handbook as part of a five year project aiming to reduce the impact of deliberately lit fires in Australian bush land environment. The handbook is used by local organisations particularly police and fire agencies, when establishing community based bushfire and bushfire arson (BFA) prevention strategies. Over past four years, research into bushfire arson has found that:
- Bushfire arsonists are seldom caught, so it is hard to identify bushfire arson perpetrators
- Bushfires are fairly patterned in time, space etc, therefore, it is possible to map and anticipate where fires are most probable to occur (AIC 2008, 2007; Bryant 2008; Muller 2008)
The handbook contains seven elements:
Element 1: Establishing local coordination between police and fire agencies:
To get a precise picture of the local bushfire and BFA danger, it is a good idea to distinguish between what both parties know, as frequently police gather different intelligence to fire agencies. In the first stage of a conference between fire agencies and police, the goal should be to:
- compare what you know
- set goals and objectives for your approach
- start developing your strategies
- have an idea of who you would need to engage in the community
- start developing project timelines
Element 2: Identifying the BFA threat
Examples of Bushfire Arson Costs to the community:
- Destruction of local business
- Psychological costs
- Staffing and financial resources diverted from other areas of police operations to investigate BFA
- Investigation costs
- Insurance costs and the flow-on effects to the community
- Replacing equipment
- Environmental damage
- Replacing infrastructure
- Payment of fire levy to local council
- Damage to water supplies
- Reduction in productivity
Element 3: Getting stakeholders involved
Attempt to get organisations/agencies to dispatch representatives who have the capability to arrive at decisions and have the capability to deliver resources to the BFA prevention plan.
Element 4: Deciding what should be done about the BFA threat
Once the problem has been found, you need to decide how to handle with the BFA risk. This involves 3 steps:
- choosing objectives that address the key problems
- deciding on projects that address the objectives
- choosing indicators that measure whether you have achieved the objectives
- reduce rewards of BFA
- increase risks of committing BFA
- increase the effort to commit BFA
- remove excuses for the behaviour
- empower the community
Element 5: Planning project implementation
Element 6: Developing the evaluation plan for your project
Element 7: Putting your project into action and revisiting the various elements when necessary
Points for a successful bushfire arson prevention project:
- Need access to local agency data relevant to bushfires
- Use current research findings and reports to support your approach
- Have stakeholders who have committed or promised to provide resources
- Only propose projects that you have the capacity to sustain
- Good communication across key stakeholders is essential (Anderson, 2010)
This project satisfies the first criterion as it aims to prevent arson.