‘Something needs to be done’: Tennant Creek businesses, council hit by disappointing crimes
Plagued by vandalism and theft, not even the local council is safe in Tennant Creek as businesses say crime is ‘beyond a joke’.
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Plagued by vandalism and theft, not even the local council is safe in Tennant Creek as businesses say crime is “beyond a joke”.
In less than a week the Barkly Regional Council has had to close the local library, the town’s health and wellness centre, the pool twice and the council administration; all due to vandalism.
While all facilities have since reopened, the damages forced the council to redirect its resources temporarily and has prompted an NT Police investigation.
An NT Police spokesman said Tennant Creek police had received reports and were investigating instances of criminal damage.
“Tennant Creek officers are managing the current workload,” the spokesman said.
Member for Barkly Steve Edgington said although they were only temporary closures, the incidents were still disappointing.
He said steps were being taken to reduce crime in the local community.
“I recently met with the Regional Coordination Committee and am impressed to hear that they are working collaboratively across government and non-government agencies to reduce crime in Tennant Creek,” Mr Edgington said.
One of the local businesses that has been struck by vandalism, theft and ram raids over recent months is the Tennant Creek Hotel.
Publican Jon Jenkins said the business was ram raided in November, then raided again in December leading to the loss of about “30 to 40 bottles”.
“On Christmas morning, people broke into our main liquor holding at about 3am, again bent one of the bars – I don’t know how they did it because they’re thick things – and got 102 bottles of spirits,” he said.
“Out of those bottles we got four back; and later on they did another job and we lost another 72 bottles of spirits.
“Later on in the month we caught two people on the roof trying to break-in and the police came and took them which was good.”
Mr Jenkins wrote to Mr Edgington and said “something needs to be done”.
“We also had our beer and spirits brought up by MSC Freight and people broke into his yard, we lost another eight cartons of spirits that they just took out of the trailers and then took the seven tonne truck,” he said.
“All up we’ve lost about $20k … it’s beyond a joke.”
The MSC Freight truck was stolen on January 8 and was recovered by NT Police on January 10, nearly 470km away from Tennant Creek in Camooweal, QLD.
NT Police statistics show between December 2023 and October last year, 68 commercial break-ins were reported in Tennant Creek, while 153 house break-ins were reported.
In that same period, there were 200 thefts reported – not inclusive of motor-vehicle thefts.
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Originally published as ‘Something needs to be done’: Tennant Creek businesses, council hit by disappointing crimes
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