The Town of Athabasca may be looking to the business community to help fund a new Community Peace Officer (CPO) for the town.
“We're looking at providing enhanced coverage throughout the community, especially in the evenings,” said Town of Athabasca chief administrative officer Josh Pyrcz. “What we've done is we're approaching our partners in the business community (and) the chamber … to see if there's any indications out there that they would be willing to support a program like this.”
According to Pyrcz, there’s been a lot of support from the business community, as well as from Thorhild County, which is looking for a part-time CPO for a similar problem.
“The evenings and overnight is when we see a lot of theft, a lot of vandalism, a lot of mischief,” Pyrcz continued. “And to be honest, our RCMP are extremely busy and we understand that.”
The hope is the final project will be a partnership between regional municipalities, the Town and local businesses, so the final cost to the Town will be small or perhaps nothing at all.
“There is no arrangement on (how the business community will pay) yet,” Pyrcz said. “At this point, details need to be discussed and a plan presented that makes fiscal sense for all partners.”
There’s going to be a public meeting on Aug. 12 at 6:30 p.m. in the Athabasca Senior’s Centre that will answer questions about the costs and what a second CPO’s duties would be.
“From what I understand, (the cost is) going to come from the businesses,” said Todd Dutchak, Athabasca and District Chamber of Commerce president. “I don't know how they're going to split the bill.”
However, Dutchak said the chamber supports of notion of added community policing.
“As a chamber, we're good with (getting a second CPO),” he said. “We understand that there's going to be costs, (but) what's the costs compared to getting broken into?”
The idea of a second CPO is purely administration-driven – something Pyrcz says he’s “undertaken myself” – and was brought forward to Athabasca town council during last Tuesday’s meeting.
“This is not something that council asked for,” he said. “This is something that we're looking at administratively, and we'll provide council the information that they need and they can make a final decision.
“So nothing is set is stone is the best way of saying it.”
The reaction from the councillors last Tuesday was mixed, with councillors Nichole Adams and Tanu Tyszka-Evans very much opposed to the idea.
“The number one being that municipalities are not mandated to provide security or policing until we reach 5,000 people. This is downloading of a provincial responsibility onto municipalities,” said Tyszka-Evans.
“While I understand that community safety and putting a stop to the threat is a paramount issue to many people in this community, I think going about developing another CPO position and utilizing town staff and town resources to do so is the wrong thing to do.”
He suggested that the town should lobby the province to increase the RCMP presence in the community.
“If there is a theft issue in this area or a violence issue, etc, etc, community safety, however you want to put it, it is the RCMP's mandate to do something about that, not the municipality’s. We are not a community of 5,000 people,” he said.
Pyrcz agreed with this statement in a later interview.
“(Lobbying the province) is something that we will undertake,” he said. “However, in the meantime, with some of the recent occurrences, we need to be looking at what we can do locally to provide the safety and security of the citizens.”
Councillor Shelly Gurba, on the other hand, supported it.
“I think that as we say that our businesses are taxeds so heavily and this is one of the perks, it's a benefit to them to keep their businesses safe,” she said.
