INNISFAIL – After a year and a half of organizing with Innisfail RCMP, the resurrected Innisfail chapter of Citizens On Patrol (C.O.P.) will be back on local streets this week.
The official public announcement came from Innisfail RCMP Staff Sgt. Ian Ihme during his detachment’s first town hall meeting of 2024 on Jan. 22 at the Innisfail Royal Canadian Legion Branch #104.
“This came up at the first ever town hall that I did about a year and a half ago and one of the things that came up was, ‘why doesn't Innisfail have Citizens on Patrol?’ At that time, I said, ‘I don't know,” said Ihme to his audience at the recent town hall meeting. “I said, ‘let's start it.
“So, we've got a good core group of citizens that have stepped up, and they have started and incorporated a new Innisfail Citizens On Patrol group,” he added. “In December, they finally got the paperwork through the provincial government. They are now registered as a not-for-profit organization.
“We did all their inaugural training just last week,” said Ihme. “They're all trained up.”
The new Innisfail C.O.P. begins with eight active members. Ihme said it is hoped the local chapter can get up to 25 active members later this year.
The mandated role of citizen members of the C.O.P. program is to act as additional “eyes and ears” for their community and the police, with an ultimate goal of reducing crime in the community.
The role of C.O.P. members on the street is to assist RCMP and report anything suspicious to their law enforcement partners. They work in pairs and never go out alone.
Izetta Sellors, the new local C.O.P. chapter’s first president, attended the town hall meeting on Jan. 22.
She agreed it has been a “long road” to get the new chapter up and running but said it was an “exciting” time for her and the new C.O.P. members.
“It'll be great to get out into the community, and now that the community is starting to know that we are active, and we are actually starting, I've handed out quite a few applications tonight,” said Sellors.
She said there was some initial skepticism from the public about resurrecting the C.O.P. chapter but that is now changing.
“In the beginning it was kind of here and there. It was a little bit of negative and a little bit of positive. But lately, we've been getting a lot of positive that people are excited that we're active again and going,” said Sellors, adding the group’s biggest priority for members on the Feb. 1 start date is to continue spreading the message that Innisfail’s Citizens On Patrol has returned.
“We just want to get the word out that we are here and we are starting to patrol and we're not a vigilante group,” said Sellors. “We’re the eyes and ears to help the RCMP, and help our community feel safe again.”
For more information about C.O.P., the local chapter has an active Facebook page called Innisfail Citizens On Patrol Association.
Citizens who are interested in supporting or volunteering can email the group at [email protected]
