Crime prevention committee chairperson Glenn Taylor said he was not surprised by a recent online poll that showed 80 per cent of people supported early closure of late night venues.
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The poll was posted on the Central Western Daily website on Wednesday, March 27 and 510 votes were recoreded in four days.
The call for an early closure of late night trading venues came from the Minister’s Fraternal, a group of church leaders from across the Orange district.
The call came after the Central Western Daily’s series of articles detailing a Saturday night spent at The Occidental Hotel in February.
During that evening there was an assault and police used capsicum spray to subdue the offender.
Despite the poll results, Cr Taylor could not confirm when council would hold a public forum for members of the community to have their say on alcohol-related violence.
“At the moment we are going to endeavour to meet with all stakeholders such as taxis and late night traders and so forth,” he said.
“We have to respect that at the moment they are legitimate businesses operating. It is an emotive issue, but we have no power to force them to close early.”
Cr Taylor said once council had discussed the wide variety of issues surrounding alcohol-related violence, a date would be set to hold a public forum where the community could have their say on potential solutions.
“Some ideas might be to discuss better lighting and maybe relocating the taxi ranks in peak times,” he said.
Cr Taylor said there was a need for a forum and that raw results from online polls were not an accurate reflection of community opinion.
The Central Western Daily poll only allowed one vote per computer, however, the poll did not stop people from voting multiple times using different computers or portable devices.
Of the 510 votes, 413 said they would support the early closure of licensed venues in Orange and 96 said they would not.
The poll also asked voters if venues should close at midnight, 12.30am, 1am, 1.30am or 2am.
Nearly 60 per cent of voters said pubs should close at 12am and 10 per cent said they should close at 12.30am.
Only nine people wanted to see venues close at 1am and one person said 1.30am, while two people chose 2am.
nicole.kuter@fairfaxmedia.com.au
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