THE woman behind a team of five council officers dedicated to keeping the streets clean says her team is upping patrols to 600 hours a year.
Joanne Grimley, Chelmsford City Council's public health protection lead officer, also says the pan-Essex campaign will "raise awareness".
She said: "It raises awareness for people who think of littering as something they see people do walking down the street, but they do not necessarily make the same link in parks where they end up littering."
Within Joanne's first year as lead officer the staff went out on 146 patrols accumulating about 500 hours between April 2013 and April 2014.
The team however, who aim to have upped the patrols to 600 hours by next April, only handed out 153 penalty notices in that period, much of them for offences in High Chelmer, outside Superdrug in the High Street and outside McDonald's.
Joanne said: "We don't go out to do patrols to catch people, we don't hide around street corners and follow people, it's more about a presence.
"Last month when I went out on the patrols in the city centre people did recognise us and made a point of putting litter they had in their hand in the bin.
"But if they see people littering, and walking away, they will always approach the person and will always give them a fixed penalty notice.
"We have to be confident. While some people think it's unfair and want a warning or a first notice, this is a first notice considering this is an offence in magistrates' court and can land you with a £2,000 fine."
Joanne, whose team also go into schools and speak to student groups in the parks to educate them, say they face abusive responses.
"Some of them I've heard is 'you should go and get a proper job' but at the time of issuing most people accept it," she said.
"You do get people who call me up after accusing the officers of being rude and aggressive but they all wear body cameras and I can check the video footage."
