WESTLOCK – Westlock RCMP will join a provincial initiative dubbed ‘Operation Cold Start’ which aims to prevent the theft of idling vehicles.
The Jan. 31 to Feb. 6 campaign which is rolling out provincewide for the first time in 2022 aims to, “educate Albertans and work with the public to reduce auto theft by making it tougher on would-be thieves.”
According to an RCMP release, one quarter of stolen vehicles are pinched while idling, a situation far more prevalent in the winter — often thieves look for people who start their vehicles then leave them unattended as they return to their home or into a store.
Westlock RCMP Staff Sgt. Al Baird said they’ll be taking part in the program and officers will be patrolling for unattended idling vehicles to determine if they are locked and/or have the keys in the ignition. If they come across an idling car with the keys in the ignition, they’ll work to educate the owners.
“It’s about awareness, education and crime reduction,” said Baird. “It’s just another way to educate people so we can curb the theft of vehicles.”
In 2021, Westlock RCMP dealt with 34 vehicle thefts, which was actually down by two over the previous year. While Baird understands why people leave their vehicles idling, he recommends people get a command-start system which allows a vehicle to run without the keys in the ignition as these thefts are “crimes of opportunity” and can be prevented.
“I get it, who wants to sit in the car when it’s -30 C and let it warm up. But we’ve had people who’ve had their cars stolen downtown when they’ve run into a store for two seconds,” he said. “And then what if a child or a pet was left in the vehicle and it was stolen? We don’t want to see anything like that.”
Aside from command start, RCMP recommend steering wheel locking devices and removing valuable items like purses, wallets, keys or change. They also recommend keeping the keys to your vehicles in a safe place and out of plain sight in a secure location.
"Alberta has the highest per capita auto theft rate in the country and approximately 25 per cent of those vehicles are stolen while idling with the keys left in the vehicle,” said RCMP Supt. Mike McCauley of the Community Safety and Wellbeing Branch in a release. “This drives up insurance rates for Albertans and these files take a great deal of time to investigate. This project will prevent some of these crimes during the project and ideally thanks to the educational component of the project, will change Albertans’ habits. It is a small investment tackling one of the root causes of this crime."
