Opportunity Lost? The RCMP and the future

  

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police - the Mounties and their worldwide famous musical ride. The RCMP is the national police force of Canada - photo Andrea_44, Leamington, Ontario. CC BY 2.0 via Wiki Commons

by John Lyons

John Lyons spent many years as a patrol officer living and working in northern Canadian communities. A member of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police for 28 years, he served as a major crime investigator. For 10 years he was an international crime analyst with Interpol Ottawa. Post policing he consulted government on health care fraud. Now he brings his extensive experience to SafeGrowth, particularly in conducting search conferences to prevent crime and build collaborative networks.

Sometimes it is worth opening a door into the past to see how things repeat themselves.

Over the years, this blog has written about problem-oriented policing, like the 2002 project to cut street drug dealing by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in Burnaby, British Columbia. We have also described the street disorder and tragedy of homelessness and street drugs plaguing so many cities, especially in my last blog on Prince George, BC 

What does a look back in history teach us?

LOOKING BACK

Some of us remember how economic stagflation and increasing crime rates decimated police resources in the 1970s. Like today, police leaders were told to do more with less, despite increases in crime. Then, as now, there were studies on how police services ought to be improved when officers were overworked and understaffed. Officers were facing intensive stress levels, a well-known problem reported in books and psychological studies. 

In that environment, problem-oriented policing (POP) emerged as a re-think about how to deliver police services. POP was seen as a way to cut street crime and decrease workloads during a time of high stress and under-resourced cops. Successful case studies began to appear at the annual POP conference pointing to a new way forward. Things seemed bright, indeed.

The Canadian Parliament buildings in Ottawa. The RCMP - Gendarmerie royale du Canada - was established by the Canadian federal government in 1873 as Canada's national police.

ENTER THE RCMP

Throughout the 1990s, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police launched a nationwide program to retrain its officers and introduce POP methods. They modified the curriculum at the national training academy incorporating a problem-solving model called CAPRA. Training teams traveled from coast to coast to teach problem-solving seminars in each RCMP Division. I know this because I was a coordinator and participant in those teams. 

As we traveled coast-to-coast, we noticed an interesting pattern: RCMP detachment commanders and supervisors rarely sat through the training, limiting themselves to guest appearances at the beginning or end. The only Commanding Officer who attended from all the Divisions we trained was in New Brunswick. To make matters worse, no one attended these regional seminars from the national policy center tasked with implementing community policing. 

What did this mean? 

It meant that RCMP commanders lost out on the informed ‘wisdom of the streets’ told by the operational police officers. The officers in our classes described their physical and emotional struggles – the stressors confronting them daily – as they effectively served their communities. They also told us how problem-oriented policing closely aligned with their own experiences – a message commanders did not hear. 

Thus, the major shift required in RCMP culture, from senior positions of command, never truly happened. Then, as now, problem-solving never really became embedded into the operations and organizational structure in cities like Prince George. Except in a few detachments, it did not happen in a systemic fashion.   

Graffiti on underpass walkway in Prince George

THIRTY YEARS LATER IN PRINCE GEORGE

We have been blogging about the street crisis of homelessness and drug abuse in Prince George, British Columbia. The Prince George Citizen labeled that city the crime capital of British Columbia 

Statistics seem to confirm that conclusion, like a government website showing an increasing crime severity index over the past 7 years. 

Conversely, a city website describes a reduced crime rate due to innovative policing strategies such as "community-oriented policing, increased patrols in high crime areas", and the "utilization of advanced technologies for surveillance and investigation". 

Nevertheless, in 2022 a consulting group was commissioned to produce an RCMP workload and resource study. That study was delivered to the city in 2023 –  the Resource Review of the Prince George RCMP.

The City Hall of Prince George, BC, employs the RCMP to deliver municipal policing services.

The study recommends adding 19 sworn officers and 12 support staff to improve efficiency. At a time when the city already spends 37% of its budget on public safety, it’s no surprise that city councilors are resisting throwing more money at the problem with no guarantee of success.

The study also indicated 20% of sworn officers were on leave, many for mental health and stress-related issues – an obvious red flag for city and police leaders. It was reminiscent of a similar situation in the 1970s and 1980s during the heyday of POP.

OPPORTUNITIES LOST

My sense of the RCMP community policing problem-solving model in Prince George is that it is more an ideal than a reality. The resource study confirmed this by claiming the Prince George RCMP had “near zero community policing capacity” and that it “does very little proactive, problem-solving policing”. 

Remember how we introduced problem-solving training and programming to the RCMP in the 1990s? Let’s not forget that RCMP detachments still have good problem-solving bones. Recruits are taught problem-solving through their CAPRA model.

How might they reclaim the lost opportunities of problem-solving that we describe in other cities? Simply adding more officers might seem like a simple fix. But that rarely works without more structural changes. Otherwise, it will fade away as it did before. How might they move forward? 

The 2024 International Problem-Oriented Policing Conference - retired deputy police chief, Dr. Ronald Glensor moderates alongside POP Center director, Michael Scott. Years ago, the RCMP submitted successful problem-solving projects at this conference and participated in sessions on crime prevention methods  

OPPORTUNITIES GAINED

1. No doubt the officers at Prince George, combined with trained support staff, are capable of installing a problem-solving infrastructure and culture. There are already plenty of successful case studies, in-service training programs, and examples where police/community POP has worked across North America. 
2. Problem-oriented policing projects by the RCMP have already been submitted to the International POP conference by other detachments in British Columbia. This includes projects on retail theft in Langley, BC in 2016, or dealing with prolific offenders in Kamloops, BC in 2010. Clearly, there is no lack of expertise.
3. Senior commanders and supervisors need help putting such programs into place. This will mean investment in leadership training, resource support, and the assistance of outside organizations (expertise from local universities, retired officers to help in key areas, community partnerships).
4. Finally, for the past 15 years, SafeGrowth has taught communities, residents, and their police across North America how to problem solve by establishing neighborhood safety plans. Police do not require additional officers to do this since the police do not lead the neighborhood planning process – neighbourhoods, business and downtown associations, and community groups do that. 

NEXT STEPS

The Prince George resource study sketched out a simplified version of this process titled the Community Safety and Well-being Plan. Fortunately, a model has already been tested and implemented in other cities through the SafeGrowth process. There is no need to reinvent the wheel.

One of the strategies included in the 1990s POP training was precisely this type of community safety planning. Sadly, that was lost to history. But it does not mean it cannot be rediscovered, this time with a large toolbox of updated and modern methods. Prince George citizens, its police officers, crime victims, and those suffering on the street deserve no less.  

 

Pictures in the sky - a vision for the unhoused in Prince George

  

Judge and Senator Calvin Murray Sinclair
- photo by Archkris, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wiki Commons

 by John Lyons

John Lyons spent many years as a patrol officer living and working in northern Canadian communities. A member of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police for 28 years, he served as a major crime investigator. For 10 years he was an international crime analyst with Interpol Ottawa. Post policing he consulted government on health care fraud. Now he brings his extensive experience to SafeGrowth, particularly in conducting search conferences to prevent crime and build collaborative networks.

This week, a giant died in Canada. I met him many years ago when I gave testimony in an inquiry that he headed as a judge. I have remained impressed by him ever since. How we could use his wise advice now! 

I speak of the Ojibway First Nations Judge and retired Canadian Senator Calvin Murray Sinclair who died on November 4th. His passing is a deep and huge loss to Canada. Judge Sinclair was a champion of crime prevention through First Nations community development. From 2009, he was a leader in Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission and he had a profound impact on how Canadians, such as myself, contextualize colonial abuse of First Nations peoples. 

He shaped my perspective on addressing crimes and incivilities by economic and socially marginalized First Nations people. The problems Judge Sinclair brought to light are still apparent in the cities across northern communities, especially in the northern Canadian city of Prince George, British Columbia, a community with problems of homelessness, street crime, illicit drugs, and drug overdoses. The blog "Innovations in responding to street drugs" described those issues last year. 

The Prince George story illustrates Judge Sinclair’s message most succinctly. Last year's blog was about the 2023 SafeGrowth Person of the Year, Jordan Steward, and her downtown safe inhalation, harm reduction site – The Pounds Project – which was largely defunded.

Aerial photo of Prince George, British Columbia
- photo by CPG1100, CC BY-SA via Wiki Commons

Today, when thousands of drug-addicted and unhoused people populate Canadian cities, far too many hail from Indigenous backgrounds. Where is Judge Sinclair’s perspective at this point in history when so many Canadian cities, like Prince George, are suffering from this social pain?  

WHAT NEEDS TO HAPPEN?

First, one of the persistent paradoxes we know that emerges from top-down government responses to the unhoused, especially with people from marginalized communities, is the problem of inaction and the false belief that one-size-fits-all. True to form, this paradox has now reared its head according to news stories about conflicts between the city of Prince George and the provincial government. 

Second, having spent a great deal of time in Prince George, I have learned that it is not enough to treat the problem as an eyesore disrupting downtown businesses. The city must go beyond displacing these troubled souls to accommodations outside the city centre. This blog has previously described cities like Wheat Ridge, Colorado and Victoria, British Columbia that experienced the futility of simply rehousing the homeless without wraparound services.

 

Housing encampment in Prince George

Third, bottom-up strategies were already emerging in Prince George, for example the harm reduction that Jordan Steward attempted through her Pounds Project. That is what should be expanded and supported. We know that relocating the unhoused and drug addicted must involve far more than pushing the problem around the city like some perverse board game. We also know, from prior blogs, that successful projects already exist in places like Finland.

All these examples teach us that any relocation plan needs to consider setting up safer physical environments using strategies like 1st and 2nd-generation CPTED. They must also reinforce historic Indigenous culture. If there is to be any hope of redemption, that is the way to make things right. 

The Grand Medicine Society in Ojibwa syllabics. Judge Sinclair combined his wisdom as a member of this traditional First Nations society and as a Judge,  Canadian Senator, and a Companion of the Order of Canada.  

LOCAL ACTION PLANS 

Over the years I have joined members of the SafeGrowth team in delivering search conferences precisely to create local visions of new approaches and to build local capacity to make them happen. This approach produces success. For example, last year SafeGrowth facilitator, Professor Tarah Hodgkinson finished a successful search conference for safety planning in Brantford, Ontario.  

I see the value of empowering those in the community by teaching skills in crime prevention, neighborhood planning, community investment, and rehabilitation. This is how you build local capacity. Diffuse government programs rarely fit the local context, as suggested by recent provincial/municipal government conflicts in Prince George.

Judge Sinclair was a member of a traditional Ojibway medicine society and his Ojibway name was Mizanay Gheezhik. That translates to "the One Who Speaks of Pictures in the Sky”. If there was ever a time when we needed a new vision of something bigger and better – new pictures in the sky – now is the time! 

Judge Sinclair, we miss your vision. 

Innovations in responding to street drugs - The SafeGrowth Person of the Year

The magnificent scenery of Prince George, BC, Canada 
- photo Creative Commons Wikipedia

by Gregory Saville

I recently visited Prince George, a beautiful city of 75,000 surrounded by the lush forests, rivers, and lakes of northern British Columbia. It is a northern regional rail center for Pacific freight to cities in the east and a major producer of lumber products. If you want an outdoor experience like no other, and friendly people to guide you, Prince George has lots to offer. 

It also suffers the same homelessness, toxic street drugs, and crime as every other major city in North America. Except, Prince George must also contend with climate refugees escaping towns and First Nations communities from the worst spring wildfire season on record. 

HARM REDUCTION

In some ways, Prince George is an innovator in responding to their blight issues, particularly the street drug situation. On one hand, Prince George suffers the same toxic street drugs, overdose deaths, crime and homelessness as cities everywhere. On the other hand, the British Columbia approach is rooted in harm reduction. Those knowledgeable in crime prevention and drug abuse know very well that the criminal justice system, as necessary as it is, cannot effectively dig at root problems that are better suited to social services and public health systems.

Prince George is one of many cities employing supervised safe injection sites, places where professional medical staff can supervise addicts to avoid overdoses and hopefully help them get off drugs (which also means getting them off of the offender/victimization wheel of crime). It is only a small step in the overall crime prevention/livability journey, but it is a necessary one that eases the suffering of street addicts. 

Downtown businesses suffer vandalism 

It also makes a major impact on overdose deaths and the resources to deal with them. A single overdose requires police, paramedics, hospital emergency nurses, doctors, and social workers. Last year alone, Prince George paramedics had over 1,000 calls for overdoses costing millions of dollars and, more importantly, terrible suffering for the addicts and their families. 

Safe places for harm reduction create a necessary first level of services to help addicts. The benefits are legion.

JORDAN STEWART

I met some remarkable community members in Prince George who were making a difference - city officials, business people, police, and by-law officers, people who are dedicated to making things better. I met provincial health officials from the safe injection site. Remarkable people, all.

Jordan Stewart, with her son, on a break at work 

And then I met Jordan Stewart, an indigenous First Nations woman who works downtown at a harm reduction storefront called The Pounds Project Society

Jordan is a former drug addict and homeless person herself. After struggling with her demons for years, she managed to claw her way back to a life of purpose. She got off drugs and off the street. She went to university, graduated with a nursing degree, and became a professional nurse focused on public health and drug addiction. She chose to pay it forward and confront a very dark part of the world that she herself knew all too well. She chose to make a difference. 

First, Jordan realized that half of the overdoses were from inhalation, a situation not yet addressed by the injection programs. Because she is a former drug addict, she knew that addicts who were inhaling were just as likely to die from an overdose. 

The Pounds Project - a comfortable, safe place (with a bathroom)
to supervise addicts and avoid overdoses

Then she founded a storefront project – the Pounds Project - with all the necessary approvals and volunteers, to help run it. She started small with a refurbished container and gradually located a storefront downtown where addicts could access services. She has been running this center for years and has not had overdoses at her center. Street people are able to find a safe space and a bathroom – something many communities forget to provide, and then wonder why they have public health issues near homeless encampments. 

A LEADER BY ANOTHER NAME 

It is a truly remarkable story of survival and commitment, superseded only by an inspiring young woman named Jordan Stewart. I doubt if Jordan would consider herself a community leader but, from what I could see, she is as impressive as any community leader I have seen in 30 years of doing this work.

Years ago I nominated people who represented all that is good in community leadership and SafeGrowth - outstanding citizens who give of themselves and make a better world. 

In 2009 it was Sarah Buffie in Cincinnati, and in 2015 it was Amelia Price in Philadelphia. I have not nominated anyone for SafeGrowth of the Year Award for a while, and Jordan has never been trained in the method. But it is obvious that Jordan Stewart fits into that rarified category of someone making a difference. 

People like this are hard to find. They inspire others. 

She certainly inspired me.

DEPRESSING POSTSCRIPT 

As I wrote this, I learned that the Pounds Project was defunded. Jordan and her team are faced with the unhappy choice of closing down their operations and turning away needy people in Prince George. It is hard to imagine the reasoning behind such a decision, especially given the inevitable increases in overdose deaths. There will no doubt be increases for police and hospital services, along with paramedic calls for services, as if those workloads were not already too high. What a shame. 

Jordan, her team, and the city of Prince George deserve better!