Youth crime prevention: State Government confirms Project Booyah is coming to Toowoomba

An award-winning youth crime prevention that teaches at-risk teens how to respect themselves and their community, with proven success at reducing youth crime, will open its doors in the Garden City.

Toowoomba has been confirmed as the new home for Project Booyah, the applauded youth crime prevention program that takes at-risk teens and teaches them how to respect themselves and their community.

Police Minister Mark Ryan and Queensland Police Service Commissioner Katarina Carroll were in Toowoomba on Tuesday to make the announcement.

Project Booyah will be run at the Clifford Park Special School campus on Hursley Road with its first intake of students to start in semester one of 2024.

Ms Carroll said the award-winning program had been proven to reduce youth crime in other jurisdictions and she expected it would have the same result in the Darling Downs.

“The evidence clearly shows that if you can intervene early, if you can do all of that work up front you, you have to respond less.

“We know that for every dollar we put into this front end, we save many dollars down the track.”

Queensland Police Service Commissioner Katarina Carroll and Project Booyah Officer-in-Charge Senior Sergeant James Steginga at the official launch of Project Booyah at the Clifford Park Special School, in Toowoomba. June 20, 2023.

The 16-week program is based on cognitive behavioural therapy and asks young people to focus on the positive things in their lives.

They are taught about goal setting, respect and how to manage their behaviour while also learning practical skills, like first aid.

Importantly the teens are selected based on risk factors in their lives, such as coming from homes scarred by domestic violence or substance abuse, disengaging from school and making their first forays into offending.

The program will run two classes each year, helping about 20 teens.

Toowoomba's Robert Brown died on February 13 from a critical head injuries he suffered after was pushed over during a robbery in the heart of Toowoomba CBD a week earlier.

Police Minister Mark Ryan said the Queensland Government is throwing everything it has at the youth crime problem. Picture: Liam Kidston

The announcement is the latest in a growing list of crime prevention programs announced after The Chronicle launched its Enough is Enough youth crime campaign in response to the death of Robert Brown, an 85-year-old Toowoomba man who was killed during a daylight robbery in the CBD.

They include Darling Downs Police rolling out its youth co-responded program in Toowoomba, where specialist officers patrol with youth justice case workers, engage with kids on the street and work to address the problems in their homes that lead to offending.

Polair is now based in Toowoomba for regular shifts so that it is on hand to respond to offending and help police patrol of known suspects.

The Queensland Government has also committed to funding QPS tracker on residents’ cars, made a $30 million commitment to fund security upgrades in seniors’ homes and provide additional funding for police to conduct extra patrols of high risk areas under Operation Victor Unison.

Police Minister Mark Ryan also announced a $1 million investment in the Toowoomba PCYC so it can run more outreach programs.

“We have acted to strengthen laws, but also to strengthen intervention, and not just the intervention that deals with offenders, but also the early interventions like Project Booyah, to stop young people entering the criminal justice system and then having a life of crime ahead of them,” he said.

“We are throwing everything at it.”