I HAVE always been of the view that if you have a good story to tell then tell it to the media because they can pass it on to thousands of people.

In fact, this is a gross underestimate. Our initial calculations reveal that yesterday alone over 20 million people across Britain will have read about Middlesbrough's determination to tackle crime and anti-social behaviour.

It would have cost us £100,000 to gain through advertising the exposure the unveiling of our Hope initiative achieved in the local and national press

A cornerstone of our strategy is to boost the number of community wardens from 14 to 90 and an immediate benefit of the free plugs on the local television is that we have already received 200 applications.

Recruiting the right people is crucial to the success of our strategy. From my time in the police, I know that five dedicated people with a shared vision and the right attitude are better than 15 who simply want to go through the motions.

One example of someone with the right stuff is our community warden Darnell Ottis, who was raised in New York and now finds himself patrolling the streets of North Ormesby.

Like many people, Darnell believes we can look to the US now to see what is heading Britain's way in the future. But the good news is that Darnell firmly believes that community warden patrols can now prevent our towns and cities declining to the extent of parts of New York and other US cities.

So the unveiling has been a great success, but the hard work has only just begun.

It continues next week when I shall be lobbying in London for support for our initiatives to clamp down on aggressive begging and prostitution in residential areas.

The vagrancy laws in this country date back to the Victorian age and many were drawn up to prevent wounded soldiers from the Crimea exposing their horrific wounds in public to beg for sympathy and money.

Times have moved on and the simple fact now is that there is no need for anyone to be begging on the streets of Middlesbrough as our housing and welfare departments will help anyone in genuine need.

What we see too often is lowlifes aggressively haranguing anyone who refuses to hand over cash, and targeting lone women in particular. This is totally unacceptable.

With regard to prostitution, the council spends vast sums of money each year trying to guide young women away from this evil trade. Of course, we are concerned for their welfare. However, I also have regard for the welfare of hard-working residents of this town whose streets are blighted by the prostitutes, pimps and kerb-crawlers.

I find it appalling that residents are propositioned by prostitutes or kerb-crawlers as they walk home, and pimps trying to sell drugs to local teenagers and entice them into prostitution.

The nature of our democratic society is that our initiative to replace fear with hope will attract criticism, but I am still waiting for those critics to come up with a better alternative.