Cairns Community Safety Plan Nears 2026 Conclusion: Key Decisions Ahead on Pilot Evaluation

Between 2023 and 2025, Cairns recorded 33,300 incidents of anti-social or disruptive behaviour in the CBD, including assaults, theft, and public drunkenness. This figure comes directly from council monitoring under the endorsed plan and highlights the scale of activity tracked in the city centre.

Why the timing matters for local responses

The Cairns Community Safety Plan (CBD Pilot 2022-2026) was endorsed on 1 June 2022 specifically to quantify behaviour levels and measure intervention performance. With the pilot period ending this year, council and partner agencies must decide how to review outcomes and whether to extend or modify the approach in 2026 and beyond.

Suburb rankings and crime types guide priorities

The most dangerous suburbs by crime rank are Cairns City, Portsmith, and Cairns North, with top crime types being theft, assault, and drug trafficking. These rankings, drawn from local data, direct attention to targeted measures in those areas rather than city-wide actions.

Recorded figures show mixed patterns

In 2025, Cairns saw 6,420 theft cases and 5 homicide cases, with overall crime increasing by 4.74% from 2024 to 2025. At the same time, new police data from late 2024 to early 2025 shows a 7.2% reduction in serious assault offences and a 52.2% fall in grievous bodily harm in Far North Queensland, including Cairns. These contrasting numbers provide concrete markers for evaluating which interventions produced measurable drops.

Decisions required as pilot ends

Council now faces choices on how to use the full set of incident data to judge the pilot's performance and shape any follow-on measures. Options include refining data collection methods, adjusting resources in Cairns City, Portsmith, and Cairns North, or maintaining the current framework for continued tracking of theft, assault, and related offences.