BOYLE – If you notice a heavy police presence on the streets of Boyle this Halloween there’s no reason to be alarmed.
The Boyle RCMP Detachment has teamed up with three local businesses — Grassland Trailer Sales, Green Leaf Fuel and Nikipelo Services Inc. — to give RCMP members and staff a chance to interact with local trick-or-treaters and help form a lasting positive impression among the younger generation.
And what’s the fastest way to a trick-or-treaters heart on Halloween? That would be candy of course, and not only will members be handing out treats from the detachment itself from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m., they will also be out on the town afterwards to hand out the remaining treat bags.
It’s something Boyle detachment commander Sgt. Colin Folk was thrilled to have come across his desk when Boyle mayor (and Grassland Trailer Sales owner) Colin Derko brought him the idea.
“On Halloween Day, the kids can come to the detachment and we’re going to have someone here handing out candy. Those businesses sponsored a bunch of Halloween treat bags that we’ve made up and we’ll have our staff come in on Sunday to drive around and hand them out to the kids,” Folk said Oct. 27.
“We just wanted some positive community stuff with the kids.”
It’s something Derko said he has been thinking about for a long time and even brought the idea to council and administration several years ago and the community held a breakfast for first responders as a way of reaching out and showing appreciation.
At that event, Derko said he remembered meeting a man there who turned out to be an RCMP officer who had been in the village for five years. That got him thinking that if he, as a member of council, didn’t even know the local RCMP members, it might not be the most welcoming place for a newcomer to the community, and he set out to change that, not only for RCMP, but everyone.
“I thought, ‘You know what, these poor cops are coming from all places, they're just regular dudes with moms and dads and brothers and sisters and they're moving away from their family and they're coming into a small, little town and nobody's reaching out to them,’” Derko said, adding that by making it feel more welcoming, they may reconsider a transfer, or consider coming back to the community.
It’s also a positive interaction for the kids, who sometimes get the wrong idea about police early on, and carry those impressions into their adult lives, which both Derko and Folk see as a great first step to correcting those misconceptions.
“Instead of kids running away from the cops, maybe they should be running to them, like we used to,” said Derko.
Incidentally, the Boyle Fire Department will also be out and about treating the kids where they can in a separate effort but having all the first responders in the community come together on something like this next year is something Derko said he hopes to investigate further.
“This community is just so pro-police — community members, the village, the council — everybody around here is just so pro-police,” said Folk. “It makes it a lot easier to do your job.”
