Moving problem around isn’t a solution
Two news features appearing in the Sept. 11 Herald proved an exercise in contradiction.
On the front page, Police Chief Davis, in the article “Police chief recommends ‘The Watch’ program to help cope with opioid crisis,” states in that piece, “We can staff appropriately to be constantly displacing drug users and crime,” and further along stating that until there’s “institutions in place” to deal with it and legislation that will allow people to be turned over to those institutions, the “best we can do is constantly displace it.” I can’t accept these words are factually based nor in alignment with “Canadian values.”
I take Chief Davis’ words to mean there currently is no legislation to control these crimes. There aren’t sufficient “institutions in place” either! So the mitigation he proposes is that citizens cough up $250,000 annually to organize a team of unpaid community snitches to supplement the tough and dangerous work officers are trained to deal with. This supposedly will keep crime drifting from place to place, as the chief prefers to “displace” the crime, the criminal and the anarchy.
On A2, same issue, is a story, “Suspect arrested in poisoning case at car dealership.” In Toronto, police charged a person with the crimes of “attempted murder” and “administering a noxious substance.” Allegedly a 20-year-old placed antifreeze in a water bottle, which was subsequently consumed, causing momentary discomfort.
So we have in this country laws, statutes, legislation, sufficient officers, courts, etc. in place to deal with a goof administering antifreeze, but haven’t the legislation, personnel on the ground nor institutions, arresting powers, etc. to remove from a community drug dealers who kill thousands each year with the plethora of killing “noxious substances” they “administer”! Instead we propose to deal with criminals and their activities by moving “it” around throughout the community, employing a civilian posse.
I’ve never felt more helpless, felt less safe, nor been more disappointed in an administration locally, provincially and federally than I am presently!
Alvin W. Shier
Lethbridge