In 2001, vandalism at the Kanata Youth Centre
sparked a well-attended community/police Town Hall meeting organized by the
local city councillor. Residents expressed frustration with growing vandalism,
break-ins and a general lack of respect for others in the western Ottawa
residential area.
The
Kanata Community Safety Partnership (KCSP) was formed to obtain all
perspectives, then develop and implement practical short and long-term
solutions to identified problems. The KCSP included police, key City of Ottawa
staff, the Western Ottawa Community Resource Centre, Kanata Youth Centre,
Kanata Community Justice Committee, and representatives of the community
including the Chamber of Commerce, Neighbourhood Watch, community associations
and concerned residents.
Significant,
positive outcomes flowed from the Partnership’s action plan, developed in
January 2002.
The coordinated,
proactive measures combined with appropriate reactive responses produced
measurable results.
Calls to the city councillor’s office decreased dramatically in 2002.
Residents voiced only a few complaints at the 2002 Town Hall meeting compared
to the large number identified in 2001(and these complaints were addressed to
the satisfaction of the community).
Community associations reported far fewer police-related complaints. And
more community members became involved in crime prevention activities, through
the Neighbourhood Watch program or as police volunteers.
2. Strong
Human Connections Key to Success of Ottawa South Community Police Centre
Ottawa South is a sprawling area of
multicultural, residential communities mixed with commercial and industrial
complexes. It is the setting of a
prime, urban example of effective policing from a Community Police Centre, in
this case the Ottawa South Police Community Centre.
As a local resident explained in a letter to the
editor of the Ottawa Citizen (dated May 13, 2002): “When we were beset by a string of morning break-ins and attempted
break-ins in 1998, we were in almost daily contact with our community police
centre officer until the thief was caught (in a stolen car that was loaded to
the roof with loot.” The writer
described the community police officers she had worked with over the years as
“exceptional.”
As well, centre staff responded to other
recurring vandalism and robbery concerns with a Partnership in Action focus on
crime prevention. Community members,
key agencies and the police come together to problem-solve and look for root
causes of crime.
The Neighbourhood Watch Community Association of
Ottawa South, an outgrowth of the Neighbourhood Watch renewal project, developed
in 2001. Operating from the Community Police Centre, it is the umbrella group
for about 60 volunteer watches in the area.
The association, which meets quarterly, is now a forum for local
problem-solving.
A multi-partner project, spawned by incidents
near the South Keys Mall and adjacent Transitway a few years ago, generated the
first annual Community Safety Awareness Fun Day at the mall, in May 2004. Face painting, prizes and a barbecue shared
the billing with important crime prevention outreach: more than 175 children
were fingerprinted at the Child Print booth, and adults signed up for home
security inspections. The Youth-on-the-Move team’s on-site basketball
tournament involved many young people from area community centres.
Dedicated police continue to focus patrols on
problem areas for vandalism and theft (parks and sports fields, schoolyards,
residential complexes, transitways and shopping malls). They also offer all of
the other core crime prevention programs in addition to Neighbourhood Watch:
Business Crime Prevention (formerly Business Watch), Child Print, Home Security
Inspection, and Operation Identification.
The Ottawa South Community Police Centre is
located in a Minto Developments high rise on Cedarwood Drive just off Walkley
Road and is very accessible to patrol officers working in the south end of the
city.
3. Project Benefiting
Tenants in 30 High-Rises Wins Major Crime-Free Award
Vandalism, theft and vehicle-related calls for
police service decreased substantially as a result of an Ottawa Police pilot
project built on a partnership between the police, a multi-unit housing
landlord and the buildings’ tenants.
In 1997, the police and Minto Developments Inc.
launched the Crime Free Multi-Housing Program (CFMHP) in an effort to reduce
recurring crime problems.
Under the program, police provided all building
staff with eight hours of training on identifying and responding to crime and
creating a safe working and living environment.
Next, participating buildings received a Crime
Prevention Through Environment Design (CPTED) audit. A building was certified if it met a minimum standard (the audit
must be done annually, to maintain certification).
Finally, the landlord agreed to organize an
annual “safety social,” providing a forum for tenants to discuss safety issues
together.
All partners agreed the pilot project was a
success:
·
Calls for police service dropped by 79 per cent
in some of the participating buildings;
·
The landlord said tenants were more content,
apartment turnover had decreased and property crime was down; and
·
Residents who took an active part in identifying
and reporting crime said they now felt more secure in their communities.
Program
expands
As a result, participants expanded certification
to four high-rises in 1999 and 30 high-rises in 2003. The goal is to certify 14 more buildings by early 2005.
For its part in the program, Minto Developments
Inc. received the Crime Free Landlord of the Year Award from the International
Crime Free Association at its conference in Minnesota, U.S.A., in July 2004.
4. Advances in Tackling Partner Abuse Recognized Internationally
Partner abuse incidents are one of the most
numerous and serious crimes occurring on a daily basis in Ottawa, as in other
Canadian cities.
The Partner Assault Section uses a now
internationally- recognized approach to reduce the risk of domestic violence
and partner homicide in Ottawa.
Acting
on recommendations from the 1998 Coroner’s Inquest into the fatal shooting of
Arlene May by her estranged, common-law husband, the Partner Assault Section
enhanced risk assessment procedures and expanded outreach efforts to achieve a
close working relationship with community partners from diverse
communities. The goal is to increase
access to services for everyone, in particular those who are members of
minority communities.
The Ottawa Police centralized its approach to
partner assault investigations as a result of extensive consultation with
community groups and service providers working in the domestic violence
field. The section provides consistent
and timely response to adult domestic violence and conflict incidents,
including parental abductions and custody disputes.
The Partner Assault Section is a key contributor
to the intersectoral Criminal Justice Round Table Against Violence Against
Women and its offshoot, the Partner Assault Support Team (PAST), as well as the
Regional Coordinating Committee to End Violence Against Women (RCCEVAW), an
umbrella group involving local shelters for women who are victims of abuse,
Immigrant Women Services and other service providers.
Commitment
is crucial
In addition to committed community partners,
other success-building ingredients include: professional patrol response;
carefully selected and trained investigators; the existence in Ottawa of a
special Domestic Violence Court and prosecutors who specialize in domestic
violence; and skilled support workers.
The section name change itself -- from Spousal
Abuse to Partner Assault -- better reflects the diversity of the community.
5. Outreach Recruitment Project is Reaching
its Diversity Objectives
To better serve the community, the Ottawa Police
Service aims to reflect the community better in the composition of its police
service.
This is the key principle underlying the current
Outreach Recruitment Project.
It is the stated goal of the Ottawa Police
Service to increase the representation of visible minorities, women,
Aboriginal, gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered people.
The highly visible recruiting message at the
second annual Open House, held during Police Week on May 15, 2004, was: “We’re
actively recruiting officers and other police personnel over the next couple
of years and we want a more diverse
police service – including various skill sets, levels of experience, cultural
and linguistic profiles.”
The well-publicized, well-attended event offered
a comprehensive range of information and presentations. A guest panel discussed what it is like for
a police officer to work in a diverse, multi-cultural environment. There were demonstrations of the machines
and the circuit used for the physical readiness portion of the qualifying
police test. There was also information
about English as a Second Language training one can access to prepare to become
a police officer.
By the end of the day, more than 150 people had
signed up for more information.
“The diversity of the crowd was a great
indication to all our recruiters that there is a great deal of interest from
all our communities to become police officers and civilian members of our
police service,” reported Ottawa Recruitment Project Manager S/Sgt. Syd Gravel.
The event, as other outreach activities,
involved police officers, civilian staff and community volunteers.
The “Join Us” area of the Ottawa Police Web site
at ottawapolice.ca features officer testimonials and presentations in
addition to an on-line application.
6. Follow the Trailer to this Rural Policing Centre’s Success with Youth
The Metcalfe Community Police Centre and its
many partners in the eastern region of Ottawa are helping local youth put their
energy into skateboarding instead of petty vandalism and theft, for the benefit
of everyone.
Sr. Cst. Mark Scharfe describes the Community
Police Centre’s move into the Client Services Centre in the former Osgoode Town
Hall, in June 2002, as the major catalyst.
Proximity with a range of other city services,
plus a public health nurse and the Ward’s city councillor, spawned the multi partner coordinated mobile skateboard
park initiative.
The innovative project, launched in the summer
of 2003, serves a wide range of young people because it is literally on the
move during school vacation, from the end of June to the end of August. On a scheduled daily basis, the trailer
transports the mobile skateboarding park to parking lots of community centres
or the cement pad of outdoor skating rinks in Metcalfe, Vernon, Osgoode
Village, Greely and Kenmor.
The low cost, supervised park, which draws a
minimum of 30 young people a day, consists of ramps and jumps. Even bikes are available, if needed. The program expanded in its second year, the
summer of 2004, to include video games, movies and refreshments as well.
Park equipment, safety helmets and supervisory
staff are provided by the project’s numerous partners, including local service
clubs and a business, the Ward’s councillor,
the city’s recreation department, plus the public health nurse noted
earlier. The city department in charge of roads trailers the mobile skateboard
park to its various locations.
Important
mentoring opportunity
Since
the park began, vandalism calls have “decreased substantially” according to Sr.
Cst. Scharfe. Equally important, the
popular park gives him and other police personnel an opportunity to get to know
area youth personally, so they can act as mentors. He was quick to point out that most community police centres have
some kind of program geared, as this one, to young people with little spending
money and a lot of time on their hands.
7. Commitment to Dialogue Leads to Improved Relations
Freedom from fear is central to building trust.
After more than three years of preparation and
public consultation, the police and members of Ottawa’s visible minority and
aboriginal communities set up the Community Police Action Committee (COMPAC) in
March 2000.
Communication, respect and accountability are
key ingredients of the trust-building, advisory and coordinating committee
which enables the community and police to define common challenges and
solutions to the challenges.
Special
response teams created
Critical Incident/Critical Situation (CI/CS)
Teams, established in 2002, are an important outcome of COMPAC’s work.
The teams are part of a strategy for
de-escalating difficult situations between minority communities and the Ottawa
Police; the approach centres on specially-trained officers and community
members.
When the threat of war in the Middle East was
escalating early in 2003, COMPAC members were there – to guide Police in
reassuring members of the Ottawa Muslim community, and to provide Police with a
better understanding of Muslims and the Islamic faith. Tensions eased when
Police visited places of worship to outline the Police commitment to everyone’s
safety and security.
In January 2004, the Ontario Police College’s
held its first Anti-Discrimination and Diversity in Policing Forum, in which
COMPAC participated. The Forum
confirmed Ottawa as a pro-active leader in community-police cooperation on race
issues.
COMPAC’s long list of accomplishments includes
development of a recruiting guide to help expand membership in, and knowledge
about, the advisory committee. It
worked. In 2003, COMPAC broadened its reach into the community by welcoming new
members from Aboriginal, Caribbean, Chinese, Haitian, Jewish and Latino
communities, among others. It also
added police representation from the RCMP.
8. Police
in League with Somali-Canadian Youth
Young Somali who’ve been displaced from Africa
are putting down solid roots in Ottawa, their new home, with the support of a
project involving the Somali community, the City of Ottawa and the Ottawa
Police Service.
The long-term goal of the Mayor’s Task Force – Somali Youth Initiative is to empower young Somali-Canadian
women and men and strengthen their capacity to integrate productively into the
life of the capital.
A number of service providers, community
agencies and other partners are now also involved in action plan development
and implementation.
Priority areas identified by members of the
Somali community include education, employment, social investment and crime
prevention/diversion. Youth and
community focus groups then identified barriers, needs and solutions for each
area. The next step: to implement
solutions in the form of short and long-term initiatives and recommendations.
Basketball
league promotes team building
A related new initiative is the Somali Youth
Basketball League (SYBL), the volunteer-based brainchild of three Ottawa Police
employees originally from Somalia. At
Lynx Stadium on July 18, 2004, a Day at
the Park with the Ottawa Police and the Somali Community event raised more than $3,000 for the league to help
offset costs. Team-building, physical
activity that develops positive thinking and helps prevent youth crime is the
goal of the league.
The League is now well underway with 144 youth
from across Ottawa competing at Junior and Senior boy’s levels and a girl’s
league. The League plays every Saturday
at Lisgar Collegiate Institute in downtown Ottawa.
9. Mayor
Views Liaison Committee as “Invaluable” to the Police Service
In 1989, the murder of Alain Brosseau by
attackers who thought he was gay and the subsequent attack on a gay couple in
their home galvanized the gay, lesbian and bisexual communities and the police
to address hate crime issues. Within
three years, members of the transgender community became active participants as
well.
Regular
public meetings of the Liaison Committee for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and
Transgender (LGBT) Communities increase the reporting and follow-up on hate
crime incidents. The Liaison committee
provides a forum to discuss complaints and other LGBT-related policing issues
and activities and also assists in the development of policies and procedures
that affect the LGBT communities.
Cooperation with other organizations, participation in community
events (such as Pride Week), communication through the media and research
activities all create better mutual understanding of both LGBT and policing
issues.
Leadership
overcomes history of mistrust
Leadership is crucial. According to a Poli-fax
(1994) on Innovations in Canadian Policing by the Canadian Police College,
“there are a number of lessons to be learned from Ottawa’s experience. Perhaps the most important is that
determined leadership on the part of the police and community can overcome a
history marked by mistrust. When conducted with integrity, consultation creates
the trust which makes possible concrete improvements in policing services.”
As Mayor Bob Chiarelli has noted: “The
partnership and assistance with Ottawa’s LGBT communities is invaluable to our
city’s police service. I am reminded once again that the Liaison Committee is a
leader in developing and sustaining positive relations between the police and
the community.”
The Liaison Committee is a prime example of
Partnership in Action (PIA), one of four essential ingredients of police
problem solving. The others are
District Level Policing, Information and Intelligence, and Crime Analysis.