Prince George Mayor Simon Yu is striking a public safety standing committee to tackle crime.
The seven-member group will be focused primarily on the downtown core and at Monday’s city council meeting Yu outlined his plan to put that group together and why it is needed.
“We are a transportation hub of B.C. and over the years the crime statistics do not show us in a great light,” said Yu. “We do have issues the citizens want to address.
“The goal is to make every citizen feel safe in every part of Prince George. Using the past crime statistics as a reference point we need to understand the root cause of some of the issues and we as a community together will put forward action plans to reduce the crime rate.”
Yu appointed three city council members to the public safety committee – Brian Skakun, Trudy Klassen, and Ron Polillo – the maximum allowed.
Yu will also invite three community members to be part of the committee whose experience lies in First Nations relations, policing, corrections with insight into what leads to repeat offenders, and about security technology. The committee will take aim at the downtown core, including the light industrial area east of Queensway, which encompasses the Moccasin Flats encampment.
“We spent 37.1 per cent of our $180 million capital expenditure budget on public safety (policing) and it’s almost unsustainable,” said Yu. “It’s not saying that our police or bylaw (enforcement) are not doing a good job. A lot of times it takes a second set of eyes to learn from other jurisdictions that are facing similar issues.
“We have the crime statistics for the city for the last years and we want to identify the hot spots and use this committee to do advocacy work and actually make recommendations. Perhaps we have to have more RCMP auxiliary members to help in certain areas and look at working hours for bylaw officers during the weekends and evenings when it’s most needed.”
Yu welcomed public input on the topic and is inviting people to express their views privately through emails to the mayor’s office or the three councilors. He wants to have the committee in place by next week, ready for its first meeting sometime later this month.
In citing his council choices, Yu picked Skakun because he is the longest-serving councilor and his leadership skills will be looked upon to guide the committee to achieve its desired solutions. Klassen represented the city at a crime severity conference in Saskatoon in late February and is familiar with crime statistics and knows the problems other cities are facing and what they have done to try to address them. Yu said Polillo’s work as chair of Northern BC Crime Stoppers gives him unique insights that will be valuable to the committee.
“What I really appreciate about Mayor Yu’s initiative here is that we want to set the direction, we want crime to be reduced and we want everybody to feel safe, but there’s that acknowledgement that we may not get there but at least we want to set the direction and establish that hope and the feeling of community,” said Klassen.
“We will not get anything done if we do not have buy-in from the ground up.”
City manager Walter Babicz will also attend the public safety committee meetings and told council clerical staff that support the city’s legislative services department will be available to the committee.
The committee will work with the Downtown Improvement Business Association to highlight some of the problems. Coun. Cori Ramsay asked Yu about opportunities for more community groups to be represented.
“Nothing is cast in stone,” said Yu. “In the months and years ahead, if this committee is ineffective and we’re not seeing tangible results, then of course we can call other task forces to deal with maybe a more specific piece dealing with public safety.”
Councilors Ramsay, Kyle Sampson and Tim Bennett submitted a notice of motion which will be discussed at the April 22 council meeting which proposes the city host a town hall meeting on public safety to allow community members, business owners and other stakeholders to discuss with city staff and councilors their concerns about the Moccasin Flats encampment and social issues that are negatively affecting the city.
“We’ve been very focused on advocating for resources that are going to support some of the folks experiencing mental health issues, addiction issues and homelessness,” said Sampson.
“But what we haven’t been stellar on in the last year-and-a-half has been communicating more broadly with the public in areas surrounding the encampment, whether it’s (Millar Addition) residents up above, the businesses nearby or in the downtown, we need to open our dialogue better with those folks and better understand what their issues are and how we can improve that situation for them.”
