CARSTAIRS - After being inactive for two years due to COVID, the Carstairs Citizens on Patrol (COP) volunteer organization is back on the streets and looking for volunteers, says president Danny Morrison.
“We are always looking for members. Like any other service-type club it’s sometimes hard to get new members,” Morrison told the Albertan.
“We continually try to recruit new members to ensure that we can provide patrols within the town at least two nights per week, generally on weekends.
“Ideally we would hope to patrol over 100 nights per year in 2023, with over 400 patrol hours and 800 volunteer hours.”
Between January and the end of October, COP members have logged 232 hours of patrol time and driven 3,054 kilometres using private vehicles.
COP officials appeared as a delegation at a recent council meeting, giving an update on some of the group’s activities and plans. The group currently has about 20 members, he said.
COP members help the community by being “extra eyes” in the community, reporting suspicious persons to police while keeping detail records of their observations, he said.
“We have enough members that we can go two nights a week,” he said. “Some people go 11 p.m. to 3 a.m. or 10 p.m. to 2 a.m. There are always two people who go out on patrol together and whoever drives we give them a $25 gas card, so that’s our major expense.”
Carstairs COP uses a computer program developed by Alberta COP that utilizes a GPS system to map out wherever members patrol in town, he siad.
“Let’s say, for example, we come to a house with the garage door open, the app shows us exactly the address and we just click on it open access and then we fill in the report,” he said. “We click on the app and fill in what we find.”
During a typical patrol, members check doors at properties such as town office, town shops, the arena, curling rink, museum, as well as keeping an eye out for suspicious activities, he said.
They also check a variety of businesses, check gates in the industrial park, and businesses that have restricted access after hours, such as car dealerships, he said.
The group’s volunteer coordinator sends the patrol schedule to the RCMP and the town peace officers “so they know who is going out and what date,” he said.
If members witness someone actually committing a crime they call the RCMP immediately, he said.
“We are not a police service and we are not to get involved with any policing so to say,” he said. We are just extra eyes in the community. Any time you can get a few more eyes out on the bad men it is a good thing.
“As volunteers we are unable to take direct action but we can and do observe, record and report to RCMP or non-emergency operators such as deemed appropriate.”
COP is not currently looking for financial support from the town, he said.
Anyone interested in becoming a Carstairs COP member can call Morrison at 403-651-2403.
All perspective members will need to undergo a police criminal record check, he noted.
