Suspicious package calls costing city thousands Hazmat was called twice Monday after powder sent to hotel office, cancer centre
Robin Kusch and eight of her colleagues spent about two hours in quarantine Monday after a package containing white powder was delivered to a hotel company headquartered in their downtown office building.
It was the second time in four months.
“The first time that this happened, I think everyone was calm, and this time it seems just the same,” said Kusch, who handles communications for Yancoal Canada Resources Co. The situation is growing “wearisome,” Kusch added.
Saskatoon police said they will “certainly” look into whether the suspicious packages delivered on the same day to the Fourth Avenue office of Airline Hotels and Resorts Ltd. and the Saskatoon Cancer Centre on the University of Saskatchewan campus are related.
The packages, discovered within hours of each other, triggered major responses from city police and the fire department’s hazardous materials unit, which subsequently declared the white powder “non-hazardous.”
Airline Hotels and Resorts’ office and one of its hotels were among five businesses that received packages containing talcum powder and baking soda on Nov. 29. A representative of the locally owned company declined to comment on Monday.
Since January, city crews have responded to similar reports at Buena Vista school, a River Landing office building on Second Avenue South and the downtown UPS Store in MNP Place. All of the packages were eventually deemed harmless.
“I don’t know what the motivation is,” Saskatoon police spokeswoman Alyson Edwards told reporters.
Edwards and fire department spokesman Wayne Rodger said they are concerned about the calls becoming a drain on valuable resources. Rodgers said the fire department had to call in extra employees as “backfill.”
“At this point, it never becomes routine,” Rodger said, referring to the string of similar calls over the last several months. “We take each and every one of these seriously.”
During Monday’s city council meeting, city solicitor Patricia Warwick told Coun. Darren Hill the city can try to recoup costs if charges are laid in an incident. Hill said the November multi-location incident cost $66,000, but added he’s not just concerned about the money.
“My concern is that a message needs to be sent,” he said.
In November, deputy fire chief Andy Kotelmach estimated the fire and emergency response cost for the Nov. 29 incident was about $53,300 — $39,470 for “direct apparatus costs” and $13,850 for overtime costs.
At the time, police spokeswoman Kelsie Fraser said the incident cost police about $13,500 — including about $8,100 in overtime pay and call-out expenses.
Edwards said one of the packages on Monday was delivered via Canada Post. The package at the Cancer Centre was discovered in a “relatively confined area,” allowing the hazmat team to investigate while normal operations at the centre continued, she said.
“If we find this is being done maliciously, done by somebody who is seeking attention, we would follow the steps we need to, to hopefully see it doesn’t happen again,” Edwards said, noting packages sent on Nov. 29 were found to be connected.
Alexa Emerson, previously known as Amanda Totchek, is accused of sending the packages containing white powder to five Saskatoon businesses while she was in custody on separate criminal harassment charges. She is set to stand trial in May on charges of public mischief and uttering threats to cause bodily harm in connection to the incident on Nov. 29, when she allegedly hired two unsuspecting people to deliver the threatening packages.
Defence lawyer Brian Pfefferle, who represents Emerson, said Monday there has been no suggestion his client is involved in any hazardous material incident except those for which she is already facing charges.