The City of Gold Coast is the 6th largest city in Australia, with a permanent population of over 540,000 people, not including tourists.
Unfortunately it is an altogether too common occurrence that the truth about the levels of crime in any particular area are based on myths and misinformation rather than fact.
Sensationalism of certain events can result in members of the community feeling unsafe. This is a problem not only in our community – it happens across the world. In a recent article in the Police Chief Journal, Chief Richard Beary, the President of the International Association of Chiefs of Police identified that ‘As we continue to work towards transparency and improved communication with our communities, data can play a vital role’.
We are very fortunate in Australia in that we have national standards for defining and collecting data on crime. What a lot of people don’t know is that the Queensland Police Service makes this available to the whole community through our website.
If you are interested in seeing what is really happening in your area go to https://www.police.qld.gov.au/forms/CrimeStatsDesktop.asp.
Once there you can enter your location, dates, and the type of crime you are interested in, and you will be given an accurate picture of what is really going in.
