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Rural crime watch plan gathers pace

Nov 24, 2017 | 11:00 AM

The idea of a rural crime watch program launched in the Lakeland region recently has quickly ballooned to include a much wider area. 

“We now encompass people from Duck Lake, St Louis, Candle Lake and everywhere in between,” said organizer and Christopher Lake cabin owner Elaine McMillan.

She started things off a month ago with a meeting that attracted over 130 people in Christopher Lake.

McMillan said the wider regional interest was “amazing” with more and more people wanting to be part of something bigger and more formal in the fight against the crime that has plagued rural communities. Cabins and seasonal properties are popular targets among thieves.

“There is a goal of getting a rural crime watch group spread basically right across the north which I think is really exciting,” she said.

McMillan hosted another meeting Thursday night where RCMP officers offered tips and training and the Lakeland citizens on patrol group passed on their advice.

“Anyone who will be on watch or patrol will need a criminal record check and training on how to report, what to look for, how best to describe vehicles and people,” McMillan said.

But she was quick to stress the need for residents to get to know their neighbours as well “because the vast majority of people coming to meetings still don’t even know each other’s phone numbers.”

She questioned what someone would do if they saw a strange vehicle in their neighbour’s driveway and didn’t have a contact number?

“If you did, then you could call and say ‘hey, there’s a blue truck in your driveway, do you have company, are your kids home, did you get a new truck?’”

McMillan said the next step in the rapidly expanding plans were to set up coordinators in each neighborhood who could then report in to a main body.

“Then that main body could pass that [coordinated] information onto RCMP,” she said. “Instead of them getting overwhelmed with 40 or 50 calls a day, maybe they’ll get two or three.”

Based on the positive response so far, McMillan figures there’ll be no problem finding people to step into those coordinator roles.

“By the looks of the e-mails and phone calls I’ve been getting I think there’ll be a lot of people ready to step up to coordinate the crime watch in their own neighborhoods which is fantastic.”

 

glenn.hicks@jpbg.ca

On Twitter:@princealbertnow