BARRHEAD-The gift for someone celebrating their 25th anniversary is silver, but what if it is a not-for-profit association?
The answer for the Barrhead RCMP Detachment and Alberta's 'K' Division is a large frame print of the first North-West Mounted Police, the forebears of the modern RCMP, coming to Alberta.
On May 25, Barrhead Sgt. Bob Dodds and Cpl. Fil Vicente presented the Barrhead Community Victim Services Unit (VSU) with the print during a brief COVID-19 muted ceremony outside the detachment.
The VSU is an organization that helps support individuals who are the victims of crime, trauma, death or other emergencies in Barrhead, Swan Hills, Fort Assiniboine and Big Lakes County. Most often VSU volunteers are called upon at the request of the RCMP. However, they also receive referrals from fire services, the Crown Prosecutor’s office, healthcare centres, and ambulance crews.
Program manager Kristina Kyllonen and VSU board chair Margaret Osborne was joined by one of the original board members, Betty Garvey, to accept the award.
"I am so honoured to be able to accept this award," Kyllonen said. "The longevity of the Barrhead Community Victim Services is a testament to the efforts of all their volunteers. It is because of them we are still able to help people victim of a crime or serious trauma."
Although the VSU is being recognized for 25 years of service, Garvey said the organization is older than that, adding the first board members were approached by the local police commission in 1993.
Specifically, she remembers being asked by Barry Marshall, who also asked Glen Bell, to serve on the board.
After going through the process of becoming a society, the board started the process of looking for their first program manager, Joel Rossman.
"Before then we had a coordinator who was basically on loan from another VSU, but it was Joel that got us up and running, recruiting victim advocates, getting them trained," she said. "But we had a group of really dedicated volunteers and they got us off on the right foot."
Impact of the VSU
Dodds said he cannot overstate the impact the VSU has had, on the people they help, whether they are a victim of a crime or other trauma or tragedy.
However, VSUs and the service they provide are also an integral part of policing. Dodds said consoling victims of trauma is something police are trained for and are often called upon to do, but it takes an emotional toll on an officer.
"It also takes an enormous workload off our plate," he said, recalling the time early in his career when victim services did not exist. "I am the only person on shift and I have to do a NOK (next of kin notification), where I tell someone that their family member has just passed away ... and while I am doing my best to console someone, I get another call."
That is why he hopes the government continues to let VSUs, specifically the Barrhead Community VSU to continue to operate as they have been.
Currently, the government is looking at changing the way VSUs provide service and the type of traumas they respond to.
"Victim services units have become an indispensable resource for us," Dodds said. " I understand the need to look for efficiencies, but in our case, I am not sure a change is necessary. The procedures and the organization is in place and it is working, why would you mess with that?"
