June 9, 2011 3.49 pm This story is over 153 months old

High-five for city centre wardens

City guardians: Three men who help keep Lincoln’s city centre up-to-scratch are celebrating five years of service.
City Centre Wardens Steve Roney, Lance Hodgins and Martin Dunning on patrol

Three men who are part of a service designed to make Lincoln a cleaner, safer and more welcoming place to live, will be celebrating five years of service on Friday.

Lance Hodgins, Steve Roney and Martin Dunning are employed by Lincoln BIG for the City Centre Wardens scheme.

They will be in City Square on June 10 between 10am and 2pm, welcoming people to visit their exhibition about what they achieved over the past five years.

During its lifetime so far, the team has handled 3,356 jobs, including signposting visitors, assisting stores with cases of shoplifting, helping to reunite missing children with their parents and brightening up the streetscene.

Last year, the wardens, who are all First Aid and defibrillator-trained, made 3,779 patrols and removed 1,053 lots of graffiti. Their work also involves liaison with the city’s PCSOs, CCTV and Highways staff.

Lincoln CCTV staff have used radio contact to alert the wardens to incidents where they have been able to offer First Aid, deal with traffic problems and, on a lighter note, even return disorientated swans to Brayford Pool.

The wardens can also issue fixed penalty notices to people seen scattering litter or failing to clean-up their dog’s mess.

Lincoln BIG Operations Manager Mick Lake said the wardens deal with issues ranging from graffiti and flyposter removal through to the refurbishment of benches, railings and bollards.

“The wardens are out and about seven days a week, making the city a more pleasant place to visit. I can only imagine what it would look like if they had not already removed over 1,000 items of graffiti or 600 flyposters,” Lake said.

Warden Lance Hodgins said: “I used to be a school caretaker and that experience has held me in good stead when it comes to being a ‘caretaker’ for this lovely city, which is attracting more and more people all the time.”

Dunning added: “This job is so varied. One minute you can be busy painting a piece of street furniture and the next, assisting a store which is faced with dealing with a suspected shoplifter.”

Source: Lincoln BIG