St. Albert may have been ranked the safest urban centre in Alberta, but that doesn't mean policing is easy, say both the city's former and current RCMP inspectors. For 2013, St. Albert scored 45.
St. Albert may have been ranked the safest urban centre in Alberta, but that doesn't mean policing is easy, say both the city's former and current RCMP inspectors.
For 2013, St. Albert scored 45.47 on the Crime Severity Index (CSI), which weighs crimes based on their relative seriousness. Crimes such as homicide and robbery are given a higher weight than offences such as vandalism or shoplifting.
St. Albert scored well below the provincial (83.68) and national averages (68.72) as well as in comparison to similar sized municipalities of Grande Prairie (148.67) and Red Deer (156.79).
The CSI score is further broken down to violent and non-violent crime, which shows St. Albert's violent ranked at 24.39 compared to 107. 8 in Grande Prairie and 122 in Red Deer.
“St. Albert is not even in the same league,” says detachment commander Insp. Kevin Murray.
Crime rates are dropping across Canada, he notes. Having worked extensively in B.C. before coming to St. Albert, the challenges facing a city such as Port Alberni (overall CSI 134.76/ violent 156.87/ non-violent 126), which is also inclusive of four First Nation communities, are much different than St. Albert.
The same can be said about Red Deer, says Warren Dosko, former detachment commander in St. Albert from 2006 to 2011. Dosko also served as detachment commander in Red Deer before retiring from the RCMP last year.
As reflected in the CSI, St. Albert and Red Deer are on opposite ends of the scale, remarks Dosko.
“(In Red Deer) there was a high demand for policing. There were a lot of high- end violent crime and reactive-type policing.”
At the time, Red Deer largely utilized a crime control policing model as “there was a real strap” for police resources and no policing plan, explains Dosko.
The demographics of Red Deer were also unique.
“Whereas St. Albert is a bedroom community to a large city, Red Deer is a complete city unto itself,” states Dosko.
Sitting between the major urban centres of Edmonton and Calgary, the larger Red Deer region could be seen to include as many as three million people. It is also has a “fast moving economy” with large oil and gas and service industry sectors, he explains.
Those demographics also factor into organized crime.
Organized crime
In February, the Alberta Law Enforcement Response Teams (ALERT) cracked down on the Hells Angels operating in the Edmonton region.
Police charged one member of the outlaw motorcycle gang as well as nine others after raiding four homes, including one on Eldorado Drive.
The trafficking of large amounts of cocaine in the area prompted the investigation.
Members of outlaw motorcycle gangs live in St. Albert, acknowledges Murray.
A Hell's Angels affiliate group tried to move into the city several years ago but were pushed out by good policing and community awareness, says Dosko.
“I think St. Albert has done a good job of keeping those types of groups away, they don't seem to gain traction.”
In comparison, says Dosko, there is a strong presence of organized crime in Red Deer.
A trend that became evident was the growth of non-traditional organized crime groups such as street gangs. Outlaw motorcycle gangs started to use non-traditional groups to do their “dirty work” such as drug trafficking, intimidation, use of force and “all the types of things that organized crime groups use to flex their muscles,” he explains.
“Traditionally if the Hells Angels were in that community you wouldn't see those groups at all, they were kept out. Now they are almost welcomed in to do the dirty work of the higher ups.”
“We started to see a lot of interconnectivity among those organized crime groups. It wasn't just local, but inter-provincial,” notes Dosko.
ALERT officials estimate there are between 300 and 360 Hells Angels members in Alberta. The group is growing and becoming heavily entrenched in the province.
“With evolving police tactics, they're evolving as well,” remarks Dosko.
Reduction and prevention
During his time as detachment commander in St. Albert, Dosko made changes to organizational structure, put focus on community policing and championed the 40 Developmental Assets for youth program.
Similarly in Red Deer, he helped develop the Red Deer Policing Plan and brought on a new crime analyst to propel intelligence level policing forward.
“In St. Albert there was a real opportunity to start to do the proactive and upstream work,” says Dosko.
Policing in St. Albert compared to Red Deer or B.C. isn't necessarily easier or more difficult, he explains.
“The demands for policing are … different. In St. Albert, there is a high demand for quality of service, high demand for policing satisfaction and high demand for ‘no call too small' and response times.”
“That can create a challenging policing environment.”
“Overall, residents in St. Albert pay attention to what is happening in their community and they have a high standard,” adds Murray.
Murray is looking to grow the community policing unit in St. Albert to work on crime prevention initiatives such as crime-free multi-housing and pay-before-you-pump.
