noise pollution, police, hoons, hoods - failure of law

8/14/2019 NOISE POLLUTION, POLICE, HOONS, HOODS - FAILURE OF LAW

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I now designate the Blue Mountains, the World Heritage listed National Park as...

• the Illegal Muffler Noise Capital NSW

• the Hoon Capital of NSW, and, if not also

• the Barking Dog Capital of NSW. The Letters to the Editor section of the

Blue Mountains Gazette has been plentiful with Barking Dogs complaints

over the last year. And complaints re barking dogs have been ongoingapparently for years. Obviously the community can read and hear, but can law

enforcers or those who promote themselves as serving the community hear?

MEDIA:

The illegal noise intrusions are not peculiar to Blue Mountains; they are everywhere,and the fact that they are, is confirmation that all law enforcement in regard to them

has failed or is not being enforced On top of the heap of failure and ineffectuality is

the Dept of Environment and Conservation (DEC), NSW . In a test case to its

Hotline over 10 months it has proven itself – there is no other word - USELESS.

Now if the DEC administrates the laws re Noise Levels, and informs and trains its

agents of enforcement; it follows that if it fails and the laws it administrates haveinherent failures, then its agents such as Councils and Police will also fail. And so

they do. This is why car hoons, illegal noise from stereos and barking dogs are a

constant daily cause of neighbourhood intrusion, disturbance and distress.

Any media wanting verification / Witnesses / Dates / Vehicle Registration Plate

Numbers / Names, to any of the events, etc, noted in the following can contact

me…

Popular Current Affair media love to cover enduring nieghbourhood disputes. These

disputes become extreme when there is no law enforcement by Police or Council, and yet the failure of both these agencies to enforce the law, and the laws they are bound

to enforce, are never investigated, clarified or publicized by the Media, least of all

by the government depart which administrates them - DEC.

To date I have not heard any creditable investigation by any media – especially

from the ABC - into laws and law enforcement of noise pollution.

Christopher Watson

Mobile 0413 237 161

If law enforcement agencies cannot stop illegal activity which announces itself

with extreme noise, how can they possibly prevent any other illegal activity which

comes in silence?



WHY CAR HOONS / STEREO BASE THUMPERS and ILLEGAL NOISE

from ILLEGAL MUFFLERS RULE OUR STREETS

1. It is not illegal to fit illegal mufflers, even by accredited RTA Pink and

Blue Slip inspection agents.

2. Most RTA Inspection agents are only required to give an ear test,

therefore it is up to the agent’s discretion. What if the agent is partially

deaf? What about complicity / mutual benefit / friendship? - a police officer confided that his faulty vehicle had been passed by an agent. I’ve had the

same benefit multiple times.

3. There is no penalty for illegal noise emissions.

4. Vehicles stopped by police RARELY / NEVER have their muffler noise

emission checked by requesting driver to depress accelerator.

5. L & P Plate recipients are not required to answer any question relating tovehicle noise or vehicle illegal noise emissions on their test questionnaire.

There are no such questions on the questionnaire.

Red and Green P Platers are easily street identified. They are often the

most illegal in their noise abuse – modified mufflers, stereo base

thumping, etc. Or as one commentator calls it “The mating call of

morons.”. And yet while being most prolific and easily identified, these Red

and Green P Platers continue unactioned by law enforcement.

Other easily identifiable noise offenders are usually late model vehicles, in

particular Fords and Holdens, flash in appearance and in colour, often

looking more like unmarked Highway Patrol vehicles. Once again, these soobvious in their need to attract attention to themselves, receive no attention

re their noise emissions.

6. If a noise defect notice is given, many bikes and vehicles can simply re-

insert the baffle to the exhaust system of which it was previously

extracted, to pass test, then extract it again following inspection.

BIKIES: I am told by DEC and Police that (6 – as above) is the practice of

bikies to evade having their trade-mark ‘thunder’ emissions silenced. Now

that a Special Bikie Task Force is in operation you would expect silencing.I don’t expect it. Police have failed for years to silence their thunder, so the

question must arise: Who’s law rules the roads?

7. If a member of the public makes a complaint to police re noise

disturbance of a vehicle, police advise they can do nought until they

catch the offending vehicle/driver in the act of the offence . If that were



true then the same simplicity of law would apply to “murder, domestic

violence etc” – police would need to catch in the act.

8. After a 10 MONTH TEST to the DEC Hotline 131555, some 20 calls of

complaint re the one vehicle – giving all the prescribed information -

the DEC FAILED TO STOP ( 1) ONE NOISE ILLEGAL VEHICLE.This is astounding given all the staffers and resources at their disposal. The

DEC is not required to make public its successes or failures. The DEC has

no courtesy or obligation to inform you of any action, yet the obligation is put upon the community to action themselves to complain.

9. REALLY STUPID: While Police only require the registration plate

number to identify a vehicle, the DEC Hotline requires registration

plate number PLUS 2-3 descriptors – colour / make / model. As

evidenced from the above, they, having been given these, still remained

ineffectual.

10. REALLY STUPID: If a vehicle owner removes its make and model

identification the DEC Hotline advises you in the likeness of ‘Little

Britain’ that its computer says ‘No” – no match to identification.

Therefore no action.

REALLY STUPID: A DEC Hotline staffer even asked if I could take a

photo of this vehicle. Is the DEC as aberrated as the offenders? The

reason a member of the community has to complain is because the DEC,

RTA, Council and Police have not enforced the law in the first place. TheDEC already has all the identification at their disposal, and they want me to

take a photo. What an abrogation of intelligence and action.

11. REALLY STUPID: If you then give the rego no. to police and request

the make and model no. of the vehicle so as to pass it on to DEC, you

will be advised that under privacy laws this info cannot be made

available to you.

12. REALLY STUPID: An illegal noise offender can therefore daily intrude

into the privacy of your home, but their vehicle remains legally

protected from identification. In other words a vehicle has more privacy

than you.

13. STUPID: The DEC requires rego plate no. plus 2-3 descriptors. They

expect you to obtain not only rego plate no. plus the descriptors, even if the

offending vehicle is passing you at 10 klm over the speed limit? – Reallystupid.

14. In talking with Rangers, Police officers, Vehicle Inspection agents, there

seems to be a consensus of confusion and lack of clear understanding



regarding legal law noise decibel levels. And all this confusion flows from

the DEC to all the law enforcement agencies, while the general public is

generally totally ignorant. Test what I say, ask anyone what the legal noiselevels are.

15. STUPID: The DEC Hotline has informed me that the legal decibel noiselevel (especially for unnecessary noise – stereos/radios/entertainment, etc)

is no more than 5 decibels above normal background surrounding noise; this

measurement being taken from the nearest boundary from which the noise is being emitted). But this precise and clear legality is not even mentioned on

their send-out pamphlet to public regarding Neighbourhood Noise. Really

Stupid.

16. STUPID: While 5 decibels (as above ) is the legal law, Police having no

decibel measuring instrument are reliant on their own discretion, which

can vary from one officer to another. As an officer informed me: A young

officer may be biased towards loud music. Discretion should be based onreality but police are given no experience in discretionary legal levels based

on reality.

17. STUPID: Councils are supplied with decibel measuring instruments

(Check out the actuality/regularity of their use – possibly nil), but most

noise complaints occur after council hours. Sounds like administrativestupidity to me.

18. STUPID: The Muswellbrook Shire Council so failed its legal duty re

noise level enforcement, a local Priest had to buy himself a decibel

measuring instrument; even then to no availing consequence from

Council.

19. STUPID: Often Councils promote and sponsor public events which

exceed the legal noise levels they are meant to enforce, even with Police

in attendance.

20. While Councils demand greater and greater revenue, and reportedly

some Council Managers demand a salary greater than some State

Premiers, when it comes to local neighborhood law enforcement of noise

disturbance – barking dogs, loud entertainment, etc, - Councils are less

and less responsive. Council will put the onus back upon the individual,

requesting them to monitor and virtually take court action, even when

the obvious is obvious to all.

In Muswellbrook, extreme base thumping music emanated from the same

house in the same street daily but the ranger and council did nothing. They

are no doubt doing/not doing the same things today. The same ranger was

closely associated with a local hotel which daily for years abused the legal



noise levels, and according to a President of the local Development assoc.,

would inform the hotel owner on any impending law enforcement

operations. The Singleton Council Rangers were allegedly under investigation for involvement in Dog Fighting and Car Rebirthing. And so it

is throughout - I would suggest – the majority of Councils. In 2008,

Wollongong Council was sacked. In the north coast regional areas other Council’s were under investigation and evaluation. Self serving and blatant

corruption are giving Councils their reputation.

In Denman, there was only one street where I didn’t observe a discarded

alcoholic bottle or container. The town was entering the “Tidy Town

Competition” – talk of self-induced stupidity! They’ll probably win.

BARKING DOGS: In the Blue Mountains they’re prolific and a

disturbance, especially when you’ve got about 9 dogs in a 100 metre radius,

and each dog barks intermittently. After years of failed complaints re

barking dogs a Blackheath woman was compelled to take court action andwas awarded damages. Where the bloody hell was the council and its

rangers?

• Nevertheless, the DEC states that any intrusive and disturbing

noise into the privacy of your home can be considered a noise

offence. How many Rangers or Police know this? How many are

prepared to act on this? Does the general public know this? – Ask.

• The world standard noise level accepted by the DEC NSW as

their standard, is no more that 5 decibels above the normal

background surrounding noise (notably in regard to unnecessary

noise)

In Denman in the Upper Hunter, dogs barked consistently for 8-12 hours a

day. Despite endless complaints to Muswellbrook Environmental Services

Director, nothing was done by the Council’s director or Council’s Rangers.The annoyance of these dogs was acknowledged by neighbours. The same

negligence of the Council applied to a house which almost daily, and with

regular extreme noise parties, emitted a decibel noise level of around 100

decibels plus. And both of these offenders resided on the same street as didthe local Police Station, as did the Hotel in question (as above). Police

passed all of these offenders daily, but apparently – in their discretionary

capacity – heard nothing of offence.

In requesting communication with Katoomba Council Rangers re this

submission, a Senior Ranger would not comment, advising me to contactCouncil’s Media Dept. If Rangers aren’t authoritative of the laws they are

meant to enforce, then of what avail to speak with the media dept? – their

presence is to protect and promote the Council, not the community. Besides,



the DEC assures me that their education and training of Councils in regard

to noise levels and law enforcement is intensive and thorough.

TRAILBIKES: It should be mandatory for all trail bikes to have

identification plates. In many communities they are the most illegal, both in

noise offence and in usage, involved in fire outbreaks and an assortment of illegal activities. They are completely non-regulated and almost

unidentifiable for the purpose of police action.

Any media investigating further will no doubt find an escalation of confusion

and blatant stupidity than here outlined.

TOO EASY: SIMPLE SOLUTIONS FOR THE ELLIMINATION OF

ILLEGAL NOISE and CAR HOONS

1. GO, HAVE A COFFEE: The first and fool-proof way to eradicate noise

hoons is for police – on or off duty – to go and have a sidewalk coffee.Hoons want attention, need an audience; they will come to you. Enjoy the

coffee and note the registration plates, then pass them on to DEC for Testing.

This effort simply requires a phone call. However, most police do not even

know the DEC Hotline exists, nor do most of the public. And even if theydid, you would still need to get the DEC to act.

2. DON’T LET A CHANCE GO BY:

Second easiest solution, yet one over-looked, is simply for police to

request drivers to depress the accelerator. Police are visually focused on

vehicles arousing suspicion. These vehicles are never noise emissionevaluated by a quick accelerator depression test. Thousands of vehicles are

pulled over but this opportunity becomes a wasted space.

3. Third Easiest: If I, as an anonymous ‘joe-blow’ of the community could ridKatoomba of Hoons in one month, the same would apply in every

community. All it needs is one police officer to trust what the community

give them and to ACT on it. Strange isn’t it? – if not for public support

most crime would likely go unsolved (unless they were caught in the act),yet when the public comes to police, as I have done to report constant car

hoons, police will not offer support – their loophole being ‘we have to catch

them in the act.’ Well, if after near one year they haven’t been caught in theact, it is just as well I wasn’t holding my breath. It just proves that the police

are in danger of not only isolating themselves from the streets but also from

the community.4. Issue Police with hand-held decibel measuring instruments, i.e., if the law is

serious.

5. Highway Patrol has audio/visual coverage. Audio/visual the noise level

from vehicles. Issue on-the-spot penalty for obvious illegal modification to



increase noise level, removal of baffle etc. The A/V accords instant Court

evidence if required.

6. Some toll gates have audio/visual coverage. Improve it to include the above – decibel identification of illegal vehicle noise emissions.

7. If Cops are tops, then so are the majority of the considerate community and

the police should be educated in trusting them and taking their complaintsseriously. Most will not complain for fear of retribution from the

offender(s). Or in my case, I think the police considered me more a nuisance

and aberration for constantly complaining than they did the offenders.

Even Police are fearful: ABC Radio National reported in 2008 that there

were several enclaves around Newcastle in which police refused to enter

without a police escort. Muswellbrook Council informed me there was an

enclave where Rangers would not enter without first notifying Police.Lawless disorder is becoming the accepted. Police, like the community are

intimidated by youth and group violence and violent criminality that they

have removed themselves into protective isolation, and only visible in en-

masse operations leaving the frontline to private security companies – onlyaffordable by business.

8. If police resources are so diminished whereby police are confined to lessactive duty through having to type out hours of paperwork, then like

Highway Patrol with wrist audio recording, make this available to all police.

Give the audio tape to ‘Work-for-the-dole personnel’ (those who can type

and meet other general requirements) for them to type out, thereby freeing police for active duty. After-all, we see more local politicians in the local

weekly community paper than we see police on the streets of the local

community.

9. Educate Police whereby they are aware that they can facilitate removal of

hoons and illegal noise abuse from the streets by taking a community

complaint on general trust, forwarding it to the DEC Vehicle InspectionUnit as a police complaint on behalf of the complainant.

If police want increased support and intelligence from the community,

the community needs to experience intelligent initiative support from

the police.

10. The DEC informs me that if a complaint is received by Police they will

request the offender to take action within 30 days. But if a member of the public complains direct to DEC then no certificated action by the offender is

required. The complainant is required to call the DEC a second time after the

lapse of one month to make a second complaint. Only then, as the DECHotline has informed me, will they then issue a notice of action - so we’re

probably looking at a time-line of some 3 months. And if you don’t

complain a 2nd time then the DEC is not obliged to take action. What if

you’re driving down the highway, you note an offender who you may

never see again, then the DEC is not obliged to inform you if they will or

will not take action, and is therefore not obliged to take any action?

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I would conclude from the failure rate of the DEC, evidenced by the prolific

number of noise abusive illegal mufflers and car hoons, that most

complaints fall between the cracks of plausible politeness and helpfultelephone demeanors into non-effective action. So the DEC has to also be

made accountable to public witness.

The Police should also have access to vehicle complaints made to the

Vehicle Inspection Section of the DEC; they do not. Why not? Would

this not ensure a mutual obligation for both Police and DEC to support

and action each other into effective law enforcement?

This preliminary report is written after years of dealing with ineffectual action

from Councils, Council Rangers, the DEC Hotline and Police. A lot depends on

who you talk to as to what answers you receive, Often there is contradiction

and confusion. Much depends on the initiative of the individual. Most

individuals are just doing a job and will give you any answer that seems to meet

the moment and free them from any responsibility of effort or action.

So it is that after many years I am still confused by all the anomalies of seemingstupidity within the systems of law, frustrated and stressed by illegal noise

intrusion by an aberated, if not alcoholic fueled or drug induced minority who

create the majority of disturbance in all communities.

POLICE COMMAND CENTERS

POLICE / PUBLIC RELATIONS:

Since centralization of Police resources into Local Command Centers one couldsay - and it is confirmed by every member of a community who maintains

reasonable community consciousness - The greater the Local Command

Centre the less command of the local ground the Police have; even senior

police agree .

With the emergence of Local Command Centers police have become isolatedfrom the streets and street intelligence. Urban youth and criminal enclaves

increase thoughout all communities – suburban and regional.

The expectation of seeing Police is only on camera, i.e., when they are on

TV or have a speed camera pointed at you. Police have become isolated

from street reality behind gated compounds; their fear of threat of drive-by

infliction means that there is even no direct visual access from the station

windows to the street.

In Katoomba, The Police Station is on the main street, where it is notuncommon to see skate-boarders skating down the middle of the street, or

vehicles parked on the wrong side of the road, or hoons who make extreme

muffler noise no more than 100 metres from the police station. But all this goes

unnoticed as police have become isolated within sophisticated communication

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systems, which leaves them isolated from street intelligence. The hoons and

crims are more street savvy on police presence, than the police are to the

presence of hoons and crims on the streets.

Police (The System of Policing) are isolated from the action, and as such

community problems go unnoticed and unresolved. It is only when thecommunity can take no more that it comes to public attention, usually via the

media that there is then a major en-masse operational appearance by Police.

Example – Rosemeadows, Dubbo, Macquarie Fields, Brighton Le Sands,Redfern, and so on – including the upcoming Operation Unite.

HOUSING COMMISSION / DOCS: These enclave problems are further

exacerbated by other govt depts., such as Housing Commission and DOCs putting all problematics and misery into the one block or the one street or the

one enclave. What you rub against you pick up. And further, there appears to be

a complete lack of responsibility placed by the Housing Commission on a

minority of recipients receiving social housing. This minority creates socialhavoc, unbearable living conditions for the greater community, and yet local

police and Housing Commission allow their daily disturbance to continue. Thecommunity knows who they are, the police know who they are, everyone knows

who they are, but nothing is done. Social Housing appears to be delivered

without requiring reciprocal social or lawful responsibility from the recipients.

In Glebe (Inner Sydney) youths, 12-16 years, have for years destroyed property,

damaged cars, vandalized houses, threatened and intimidated their community.

They are out in the streets even after midnight shouting obscenities. And Iexpect the same applies in many Housing Commission enclaves. They are

reported regularly to the Housing Commission and to Police. Nothing happens.

No-one will take action. No-one will take responsibility or make the

offenders responsible. It is all too hard - BUT IT IS NOT - All it takes is the

affirmation and enforcement of law which applies to all.

Centralisation of Police on the one hand and centralization of social

problematics into enclaves on the other, means that both become numb to each

other, and both monopolise resources whereby the rest of the community is

under-resourced.

DIRTY HARRY: Any police officer with moral initiative is worthy of the title

‘Dirty Harry’. One Police Officer out of uniform, walking the street one to twohours a day at opportune times, in opportune areas – notating illegal vehicles

and activity - can accomplish more for the community than any highly visual

and resource depleting operation, or any dynamic duo drive-by, isolated in ahighly visible marked police vehicle.

FOOTNOTE: After 10 months of failure by the DEC and local Police, I

forwarded a note to Katoomba Police Station that I was preparing a submission

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on the failure of Police in regard to Car Hoons. Following this note I was

contacted by a Highway Patrol Officer who undertook to initiate action re 2

specific vehicles. With one he was only successful; it underwent a DECinspection and became muffler quiet – what the DEC Hotline failed to do, he

was successful. The other vehicle continues its extreme noise. Other vehicles

are yet to be actioned. So it has taken 10 months to stop the illegal emissionfrom ONE vehicle. A reasonable success rate?

The problems that confront the world [or the local community] cannot be

solved by the level of thinking that created them.[or, the level of inaction] …

Einstein

The Victorian Government recently announced an increase of uniformed

police patrols at railway stations to curb violence. STUPID!. This policy

means that police will patrol in pairs – a waste of resources. And because of their high visibility the offences will take place elsewhere, and then statistics

will promote the exercise as successful on the railway stations. Police should

be in plain clothes, patrolling individually, thus covering twice the area, with

on-call priority back-up. The point is to catch the offenders not push themelsewhere as a public relations exercise to placate security concerns from

international students. The same ineffectual policies and application of law

enforcement agents pervade every urban street.

Likewise, increasing Highway Patrol numbers will increase highway

revenue, but won’t stop offences and hoons on the local streets. Not

because they can't but because there is no initiative to do so.

NSW Govt. is reported to be considering privatization of another public

service...?

If a govt. cannot rightly manage public assets, services and utilities, and needs

to privatize them for profit, so that profiteers can make more profit at therising loss and expense to the public, then it cannot rightly manage its

economy. Federal, State and Local govt. prove this daily.

COPIES OF THIS SUBMISSION WERE HANDED TO: KATOOMBA POLICE

STATION, HIGHWAY PATROL (LAWSON) and via these to REGIONAL

COMMAND SPRINGWOOD; RTA KATOOMBA and BLUE MOUNTAINS

COUNCIL KATOOMBA, with the request for their comments and/or corrections.

TO DATE - NONE COMMUNICATED.

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noise pollution, police, hoons, hoods - failure of law

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