Mandurah Mayor describes mall brawl as an “anomaly”

MANDURAH Mayor Rhys Williams has addressed the alleged Smart Street Mall melee on Saturday morning and labelled it an “anomaly”, despite the incident being the second of its kind in the area in a matter of months.

Mayor Williams said he had seen footage of the incident and believed it confronting.

“It’s a confronting piece of footage but these sorts of incidents in cities happen all over the world and it doesn’t make it okay,” he said.

Mayor Williams said the City had a number of short and long term strategies to deter this kind of behaviour.

“In the short term we have just set up a city centre business unit focused on the activation of our city centre,” he said.

“We’re also working on a Liquor Accord we set up recently to ensure our local vendors and traders aren’t selling alcohol to underage people and are aware of safe alcohol consumption in our venues.

“In the long term our approach is to ensure, through early intervention programs, people are aware of consuming alcohol safely, to ensure this is a city that people can enjoy.”

Mayor Williams said he was happy with the day and night time security patrols and WA police presence in the city centre.

“We already have random security patrols, different times on Fridays and Saturday nights and Monday to Friday during the week,” he said.

“In the last six months there have been two major incidents in the mall and while its two more that we would like, we’re not at the point where we see an incident every weekend.

“We’re looking at strategies how we can create a safer place during the evening.”

The City agreed upon passing $1 million dollars in this year’s budget to activate the city centre and inject funding into the City’s community safety strategy.

“By no means is this the end of the resources as we’re looking for more ways to create a safer more vibrant city,” Mayor Williams said.

Mandurah Police Officer in Charge Darren Hart said incidents like these were a rarity in Mandurah.

“You won’t find a better response of several vehicles attending an incident like that anywhere in the state,” he said.

“I’m satisfied that we have the resources to take on that sort of issue effectively.”