PENHOLD – With rising crime continuing to be on the minds of many Penholders, the town is committing itself to stay one step ahead of the problem that is plaguing all of Central Alberta.
Penhold's Safe Community Task Force was introduced at a recent council meeting and a call was put out to Penhold residents to help establish the community-driven Safe Community Committee.
“We are in the process of creating the task force. We have to have a bylaw because we are creating a new committee,” said Mike Yargeau, Penhold mayor. “We want to have some terms of reference. We want to sit down and really define what exactly we're looking for as a committee.
“We want resident input, we want them to be a part of it, but we need to set the rules for how they do that,” he added.
Dealing with crime in Penhold was a hot topic during the recent election campaign, said Yargeau, noting the extensive dialogue amongst the community over the past several months.
“We talked a lot about how to involve the community in this because it really is a community issue. We all need to be a part of it and work to address this,” he said. “We wanted to come up with a way to tackle this (issue) that works for Penhold.”
To help inform Penhold citizens and future task force committee members, council recently asked administration to post Innisfail RCMP crime stats on the town's website.
“The stats are on the website in the council package but it can be hard to find,” said Yargeau. “Because it is such a hot topic and a concern for people we wanted to make it easier for people to find so residents can see what we see (in reports).”
In recent RCMP crime stats for Penhold from January to September 2014 to 2017, total property crime incidents this year are down from 181 cases reported in 2014 to 162 reported in 2017. However, the 2017 stats are up over the two previous years that saw 155 in 2015 and 145 cases in 2016.
A total of 15 incidents of possession of stolen goods was reported in 2017. That's a slight increase from 2014 at 14 cases, but a decrease over the last two years, where 31 cases were reported in 2015 and 18 reported in 2016.
Theft of motor vehicles has seen a steady increase since 2014 with 10 incidents reported, 17 in 2015 and 16 in 2016. That number jumped to 19 in 2017.
Break and enter reports have remained steady over the past three years with 22 incidents in 2014, 18 in 2015, just 12 in 2016 and 19 cases in 2017.
The month of September for the same period of 2014 to 2017 also saw increases in all areas, with the exception of possession of stolen goods, which saw a slight decrease from the previous two years.
Yargeau said establishing Penhold's Safe Community Task Force over the coming months may include several areas that will help make Penhold a safer place to live.
“It could lead to a citizens on patrol, it could lead to more awareness sessions where we invite the public in with some feedback,” said Yargeau. “(We could) talk about things that the RCMP are doing, what the town is doing and about some crime reduction techniques.”
Mike Yargeau, Penhold mayor
"We talked a lot about how to involve the community in this because it really is a community issue. We all need to be a part of it and work to address this."
