Region wants public input into community safety plan
Issues could include mental health, poverty, crime, human trafficking
Niagara Region is asking residents to share their thoughts about “the biggest issues in Niagara” that affect their safety.
Niagara’s associate medical officer of health Dr. Andrea Feller said the Region is working with community partners to develop a community safety and wellbeing plan by the end of the year.
It’s the result of recent amendments to the Police Services Act requiring municipalities to develop the plans.
“Their goal is to have a community where everyone is safe, has a sense of belonging, access to services, and is able to meet their needs for education, health care, food, housing,” Feller said.
For Niagara, however, she said the plan is also an opportunity to do things better.
“It’s not as though we’ve been sitting around in Niagara and not tackling any of this stuff. We want to leverage this opportunity to really pull together at another higher level a lot of the work that has already gone into things like health care … addictions … and mental health,” she said.
“By the end of the year, we will have a plan that fulfills the ministry’s requirement and the Police Services Act, but most especially amplifies and builds on the work that has already been started in Niagara in these areas.”
As part of the plan’s development, Niagara Region is asking residents to share their thoughts about their safety and well-being through an online survey.
Participants will be asked to identify issues such as addictions, affordable housing, crime prevention, homelessness, human trafficking, poverty, road safety and supports for older adults and vulnerable people.
Feller said there are many concerns within the community, such as used hypodermic needles being left in public areas, as well as access and availability of services.
The survey, she said, is “an overarching way to make sure we capture the community’s
feedback on the biggest issues in Niagara,” she said.
It’s available online at www.niagararegion.ca/projects/community-safety-well-being.
The information will allow members of Niagara’s community safety and well-being plan advisory committee — with representatives from numerous community agencies, municipal governments, and educators — to collaborate and refine the roles the groups play in addressing the issues.
“I would say it’s already much more co-ordinated than we’ve ever been able to be, and I’ve
been here 13 years in Niagara,” Feller said.
“There is a level of coordination … but it applies an enhanced level that we can tie things together, even better than we could without this requirement and process that mandates this work that we have to do together in a different way.”
She said the plan will ultimately mean more than just an increased presence of law enforcement to enhance community safety.
“The answers to most of these really complex, socially rooted issues is about the social determinants of health,” she said.
“This plan is really about how
can we as a community continue to keep these issues from having to get to the point where police are required in the first place.”
She compared it to system transformations being implemented by Niagara Emergency Medical Services, opting for preventative measures rather than the typical response of responding to all calls as emergencies.
“It’s a very similar process,” she said, adding about 75 per cent of calls for ambulances “are not the traditional lights and sirens you need somebody there in two minutes. We’ve gotten far away from that.” Allan.Benner@niagaradailies.com 905-225-1629 | @abenner1