RCMP say dealing with downtown Kelowna’s ‘social disorder’ is going to take more than policing

Kelowna RCMP’s top cop said they are going to crack down on “social disorder” downtown with more patrols, but the public needs to report every crime to help tackle the problem.

RCMP Supt. Chris Goebel and Kelowna’s community safety director Darren Caul said at a news conference today, Jan. 13, authorities are listening to the mounting concerns from downtown businesses about crime and homelessness.

“Some of our strategies will include, and you will see, proactive, intelligence-led patrols on foot and in vehicles in the most high-impact areas using both uniformed and plainclothes officers,” Goebel said. “We have dedicated property crime teams targeting prolific offenders and disrupting criminal activity.”

He said “non-criminal social disorder” amounted to unwanted persons and that tackling the problems downtown is about more than just policing.

“Social disorder is not a policing issue alone. It is tied to complex and intersecting factors such as untreated mental health challenges, addiction, homelessness and repeat offending,” he said.

The RCMP’s plan is to increase police presence downtown, continue targeted enforcement efforts and work with alternatives to policing to handle social disorder like the Downtown Kelowna On-Call team, bylaw officers and the new mental health crisis response community led team. Goebel wouldn’t say how many more patrols there’ll be downtown, nor when they’ll be on patrol to avoid tipping people off on how to avoid officers.

Both Goebel and Caul said it’s important for people to report crime, even if they think the RCMP won’t be able to do anything.

“Some incidents are reported for insurance purposes while others are not because it is quicker or less costly to repair the damage directly and the belief that calling the police won’t make a difference,” Goebel said.

Caul said that more reporting would help manage the situation downtown.

“We also know that there’s more to do, particularly around social disorder, particularly in our downtown. This is where we need your help. First, please report issues promptly and consistently. If the RCMP don’t know, they can’t go,” he said.

Ryder Davis is the project manager for Heathrow Security, a private company that responds to calls from business owners.

He said business has been booming for his company as people are already turning to alternate options to protect their businesses like private security.

“I think that people are probably turning to alternative methods or trying to find ways to handle the situation on their own, which is never the best case scenario,” he said.

Davis said security guards try to deal with problems on their own to allow the RCMP to focus on other things.

“If we can handle it, which we typically can, we try to avoid calling them and let them do the work that they need to,” he said.

Davis said more and more businesses are calling for private security.

“The extra presence of the police would be a welcome sight there. I think the downtown area could use all the help it could get right now,” he said.

Eric Lee owns two restaurants downtown, and he previously told iNFOnews.ca a lot of business owners don’t call the police anymore for petty crimes, and when they do it can take hours for officers to arrive.

The city’s community safety director said it’s important to have various alternatives to calling the police to free up limited resources.

“We must free up our police. We must de-task our police from being the default first responders in situations that are non-criminal,” Caul said.