There was a “significant increase in property crime” — especially motor vehicle thefts — in Sundre last year, said the local RCMP detachment's commander.
“Crime stats you have to be somewhat a little bit careful with. It's easy to draw conclusions that may not always be completely accurate or paint a full picture,” said Sgt. Jim Lank.
“But clearly in 2015 we had a significant increase in property crime. Especially theft of motor vehicles — Ford F-350s were a big choice for thieves — but other motor vehicles, equipment, trailers” as well as off-highway vehicles, he said.
The sergeant spoke to council during its May 2 meeting to present the local RCMP detachment's annual performance plan.
There has also been an increase of break-ins to businesses and private residences in town as well as the surrounding rural areas, he said.
“That clearly was the big increase from the previous year,” he said about property crimes.
“This isn't just a Sundre issue or area issue — it's an issue across Alberta, for whatever reason. In any event, it's a problem that clearly had to be addressed in this performance plan.”
The annual performance plan allows the local detachment to focus on some areas over and above its normal response to calls, he told town officials.
“So what we want to do is look at the main issues that are in the community and in our detachment area, which includes parts of Mountain View County and Clearwater County.”
The annual performance plan, which features four priorities and runs over the course of a year from April to April, is largely created through consultations with different stakeholders in the community including municipal and school officials, he said.
“This annual performance plan is based on those consultations along with looking at the statistics relevant to crime trends, crime patterns, what we're seeing statistically as well as just a working knowledge of the big issues that we're faced with on a day-to-day basis — that forms the basis for developing a plan each year.”
The plan has to consider — and to an extent accommodate — all the stakeholders that were consulted, and the sergeant said he strives to develop a plan that will as much as possible meet everybody's needs and expectations. Considering last year's increase in property crimes, “one of our new objectives or priorities will be to address property crime.”
The plan is twofold, he said.
“The first part being investigation and enforcement. With that, our plan is to utilize some various investigative techniques to try and proactively investigate, identify and prosecute individuals who are committing these acts. I'm not at liberty to discuss what some of those techniques might be because that would compromise the integrity of the investigation.”
But if there is a known area or product being targeted, police may take measures to try and catch the people who are stealing these items, he said.
“That's more of a proactive approach rather than investigating an incident after it's occurred.”
The second part is education and awareness, he said. That will include media releases to the Round Up, the Town of Sundre's website, as well as in several newsletters wherein police will be able to regularly provide the public with information regarding recent crime reports, he said.
“That's just to keep the community better informed because awareness is a big thing. A lot of people simply don't realize or understand the extent of property crime that's happened in the last year. But if they're more aware of it, they're maybe more apt to do something about it to prevent it.”
Efforts to educate the public will include messaging on how to prevent or at least deter property crimes, such as ensuring vehicles or buildings are locked, not leaving valuables in vehicles in plain view, as well as additional steps that might be taken around the home to better secure a property, he said.
“Hopefully we can have at least some impact on apprehending some of these individuals who are clearly involved in that kind of crime.”
The remaining three priorities in the local detachment's performance plan are carry-overs from last year's plan. In no particular order, those priorities are to remain focused on positive police-youth relations, traffic safety enforcement and education as well as the Habitual Offender Management program, he said.
The sergeant expressed his firm belief that positive engagements between officers and youth are important, “whether it be in the school, the arena, skateboard park, being coaches, on and off duty — anything where there's good, positive interaction.”
Last year's goal was to achieve more than 100 such interactions, and the detachment ended up with about 300, he said.
“I was really happy with that.”
The other part of this priority will be to provide presentations and talks with the youth in schools or even clubs or organizations like Scouts and 4-H on various important topics that relate to public and youth safety, positive lifestyles, drugs and alcohol, as well as Internet issues that are now increasingly common with the younger generations and even adults, he said.
Regarding traffic safety, police will continue to focus on both enforcement and education, he said.
“The high-risk areas for traffic safety would be impaired driving, and then what's commonly referred to as traffic offences — speeding, seatbelt use, distracted driving, stop signs and intersection related offences. Probably the biggest are speed and distracted driving now, as well as impaired driving.
“Distracted driving is probably our number 1 issue now with traffic safety. It's starting to become more of a problem than impaired driving with regard to accidents, so that's a big one.”
Although officers will be expected to write at least 10 “traffic contacts” per month, “it's not a quota for money — it's an expectation to ensure public safety and road safety,” he said.
“So that can be either a violation ticket for a traffic offence or it can be a written warning. But it also includes criminal charges that are laid as well, like impaired driving for example.”
As for the Habitual Offender Management program, authorities have identified individuals who meet the criteria.
“They can be a youth or an adult, and they have to have a history of criminal activity. Typically they'll have long criminal records and they continue to commit crime,” he said.
“They represent about five to 10 per cent of the offenders that we deal with, but they commit about 80 to 90 per cent of the crime. So if we can identify those individuals and keep a closer tab on them, (the program is shown to work) in other communities where they're starting to see some substantial reductions in crime rates, including property crime.”
Anyone placed on the program is subsequently notified and asked to complete a lifestyle questionnaire, which is part of helping police to better understand the individual, he said.
“It also gives the individual an opportunity to rehabilitate. So all the support services are provided to them should they choose to get help or start going down the right path.”
These individuals also have to be on some kind of conditions such as parole or probation. With that, the police can do regular conditions checks to ensure compliance, he said.
“If they don't comply with the condition, let's say they have a curfew to be home at night and they're not at home, then we can reach them on that and they're back in the system.”
Council carried the sergeant's presentation for information.
