THERE are hopes that a funding pot of £15,000 for CCTV could see an end to anti-social behaviour and vandalism in the Glen.

Councillor James Calder, convener of the City of Dunfermline area committee, says that the sum would be used for "detecting and dealing with offenders".

Funding was agreed in principle for cameras in Pittencrieff Park at the committee meeting on February 7, but the Liberal Democrat politician admitted it could be some time before the project comes to fruition.

Council officers will now complete a full proposal and business case as the plan moves into its next stage.

Cllr Calder said: "There's been a spate of anti-social behaviour in the Glen which is extremely concerning.

"We are seeing vandalism and graffiti, we obviously had the awful incident last year with the peacocks as well.

"Unfortunately we know that there are problems and I think it's really important as we look at building on city status that we make sure that Pittencrieff Park is a safe and enjoyable place to be.

"We need to make sure there is better security so that we don't have the unpleasant anti-social behaviour taking place.

"CCTV will hopefully act as a deterrent and if there are incidents taking place it will help with detecting and dealing with offenders."

He added that there has not been a decision made on which committee will deal with the project and that little more information on where the cameras will be or when they are to be installed will be available until the business case process is completed.

He said: "We need to let the work be done, make sure it's done properly, and hopefully we will get some more information in due course."

During the February committee meeting, community manager Andrew Gallacher said: "There's been a few iterations of the set up because, as you can probably appreciate, costs are quite significant for the installation of CCTV, so I will go back to the working group and ascertain what the current configuration is."

Concerns over CCTV in the city centre had been raised in the Press last year by restaurant owners Michelle and Bryan Coghill, who own Jack 'O' Bryan's on Chalmers Street, after hundreds of pounds worth of damage was caused to their outdoor seating.

Cllr Calder has in the past pushed for a report to be created to uncover where there are gaps in Dunfermline's CCTV security system.

He hopes that this will be made available to the area committee in the future and commented: "Fundamentally I think there are areas where we have had anti-social behaviour and CCTV is a tool of preventing and detecting it.

"We need to get a report into the area committee so that we can determine where the hotspots are and where this can make a difference.

"There have been issues in Abbeyview as well and the CCTV has been deactivated there for some time, I'm hoping that maybe with us getting the new centre there built it will be something that can be looked into as well."