311_Sergeant-Wallace_60-Years-SSI-Policing_2010.mp3

otter.ai

8.02.2024

no

Unknown Speaker 0:00
And what are your regular opening hours?

Unknown Speaker 0:02
Monday through

Unknown Speaker 0:05
Wednesday 10 to 12, Thursday 10.

Unknown Speaker 0:09
And that's in the basement of the library. And their quarters in the new library will be upstairs. I'm not sure we have a membership report. Any count today, Susan are actually

Unknown Speaker 0:21
quite a few people came in and didn't sign in. So I would appreciate if you just signed in. That's the only way we know how many people in here.

Unknown Speaker 0:34
We have their cards ready.

Unknown Speaker 0:35
Okay. Good. Thank you. Refreshments today, it's the first meeting of the year a little bit disorganized because the new quarters are away. So we have excellent goodies to eat, but I'm afraid we don't have access to kitchen so nothing to drink. But Emily Hepburn and Jeanne rush provided them for today. And I think Janie's Got a signup sheet. And we would very much like to volunteers breaching the meetings from now till May, and in particular for the October meeting. So if

Unknown Speaker 1:15
so I think yeah, the sheets going around and appreciate your cooperation here. One more sign up sheet for you the fall fair. Traditionally, this assignee provides people to manage the people person, the museum through fall fair. And it's really pleasant job actually, to greet the visitors just keep an eye on things and encourage them to sign the guestbook, and no other duties required or particular experience. So I'm going to start around the signup sheet as well for that. So if you could spare an hour and a half, on one of the two days of the vault fair, we greatly appreciated. This sort of zigzag back and forth. And if you're interested on either of those, you can get the sheet please come and see us later as well. One very sad note, Tom Wright passed away this morning, a long standing member and a life member of society, very keen on the history of the island. And as I know, I've done a tremendous amount of work on the HMS Ganges connection. So I'm sure we'll miss him for sure. On a much happier note, we'll get on to the today's presentation, Sergeant Dan Wallace of the local RCMP. Dennis Ritchie from Victoria, he's had 33 years in the service, which is very commendable. And he's not Saltspring for five years. And sergeant is us, right. And his topic is 60 years of policing on SSI. But if you're interested in details, thank you.

Unknown Speaker 3:04
Change rates just confuse everybody is now Staff Sergeant. So I have four stripes there three. Really bad, right? That means I have to move somewhere to where I've ever sold my house, which in this market may be a while so it could be around for a few more days. I know that. One was more interested in Salt Springs in particular, but we don't have a lot of history of Salt Spring in policing on the islands who above asked me to do is kind of start from the beginning. And I've got a presentation here that I got from Ottawa, that's 25 years old. But nice thing about history is, even though it was written 25 years ago, it's still accurate. So I'm gonna go through it a little bit quickly. I'm not gonna read the whole pages and pages they sent me a lot of people know what our history is, from the gloss over some of it. If you have questions about that, or anything, raise your hand and I'll slow down and answer those points. I don't want to bore you with some of the stuff from way back. But I don't want to gloss over the things that have occurred and why we came about. Fortunately, I'm kind of a history buff myself. So I paid a lot of attention to history both in the forest and I mean the genealogy as well. So I'm doing the patient and family history. So anything along those lines we have a question about just feel free to ask. I'm gonna remember since February of 1978. When I first joined the mountain police they sent me to Regina were they send all the cadets to train one of the finest training facilities in the world and probably what helps us keep our reputation despite what you may hear in some local papers now and again, some of the high profile Well incidents, we're still very proud of the work we do and the service we provide for Canada. And we're known for that around the world. It's really mind boggling for a lot of people and other countries to see. A policeman is the national symbol. A policeman in red Serge is recognized as a Canadian symbol. A lot of countries were police are corrupt, and they have lots of issues. The people in those countries are just amazed what we have here. It's tough to go into Regina in those days, and I was talking to some people earlier about the changes flip flops all the time. Those days were a lot of back your home province. So you're the one from Victoria BC, I wasn't allowed to come back to Korea. So they sent this to me to determine Saskatchewan. And no offense to you people from Saskatchewan was a wonderful experience these great people in Saskatchewan. People there were good foreign people didn't bend over backwards for you. You're new to town and didn't matter the they welcome you as a member of the community and family. So we really had a good time in Saskatchewan for 10 years, went from Regina Saskatoon to Luke place called Watrous into Fort Capelle and are actually marked with the charlatan. And then the Ford propel. And then my kids said the allergy issues with the green Dustin Saskatchewan. So basically, after 10 years, I come back to BC. So they sent me to Richmond, small town, Saskatchewan to the big city. 151 men in Richmond at the time, they went to Kitimat, Midway, new Denver, C sharp, and now Salzburg. So I've been in everything from A to man detachment, we see a few 100 people to the big city of Richmond. So I have what they call a well rounded career. And as I say, I've kept the interest in policing. All through that in the history we've ever any questions, feel free to ask like one

Unknown Speaker 7:05
or two of these graphics. Now back to the start of Canada. As we all know, our history is we had Quebec and Ontario which are Upper and Lower Canada at the time. And the rest of was pretty much open territory to North West territory Rupert's land, and there wasn't much going on there. But Canada want to do exert sovereignty over that they wanted to take that as part of candidates up Americans from coming up. So there's a lot of debate about what they're going to do and what was to happen. And then, in 1873, the Cypress Hills massacre happened in Cypress Hills massacre was a bunch of whiskey peddlers down in the States or in Fort Benton, Montana had some horses stolen from natives that were from north of what was known as the United States at that point in time. So they came up to get the horses and managed to kill off a whole bunch of the natives. And that kind of spurred up a lot of interest, but the sovereignty of Canada, and how are they going to manage that? So what they did is decided that they were going to police it. Now one of the big key differences to the American frontier and Kadian. Front here was settlement drove out from eastern United States went into the lawless parts of the West. And as the Selwyn grew up, then they would hire marshals and sheriffs, and they will police it after the people got there. Kevin did a little differently. They decided to have the policeman out there first. So even though there wasn't a lot of settlement, they wanted to have sovereignty over that part of the country. So they set up recruit posters and formed the Northwest Mounted Police. what's called the march West is what came about and how the Northwest Ohio police came forward into the front of your country and kind of took over the sovereignty and made Canada these private credit Canada, Canada 275 recruits and men were put together and formed the first contingent coming out and the great march West is as they brought their supplies and all manpower and left from was called Fort different at the time, which was Winnipeg floor for Gary and head into what was then called pile of bones which is now Regina for Bupa was the place that one of the first places that they went to stand in the states you see the American flag there that's where the American whiskey Panthers were they were right close to the border.

Unknown Speaker 10:05
The first commissioner was commissioned McLeod and him along with his 2075 men started setting up camp and dividing up into detachments, and started to patrol along the border. Again, to exert sovereignty, to keep the natives the time from rebelling intergrade uprising thing to make sure the locking towards safer settlers become. Another thing that the Acadian government did that was a little different than the Americans. Again, because we had the law coming out first before the settlers, they didn't have as much conflict with the Americans, they have lots of history and lots of movies and whatnot about the Indian Wars, and Toronto and Senegal and all that, while in Canada, mostly in the prairies, not so much in BC here, what they did is they went out in settled treaties with native bands at the time, so that there was rules in place of how they were going to coexist in this land.

Unknown Speaker 11:17
One of the kind of binding things in Canadian history is, government decided they want the country to be united. So they created the railway that was going right across the country, of course, this Canadian Pacific Railway. But again, that needs to be policed. So they police that by selling a bunch of Monroe Police along the roadway to make sure when and the gold rush in the North was also a big problem, whether it was prospect is coming in through Alaska, and coming into the planting gold fields. And they wanted to make sure again, the policeman was there first. So they sent members into the children pass and the white pass, and you had to have certain amount of food and supplies on you before you're allowed to come to Canada, there was a model in place to check that and make sure before they let you into the country. That'd be the real all the customs immigration. Now, the one interesting about marketplaces, we've been tasked over the decades and decades of doing you name it, when it comes to government is not just what we think of today as traditional policing. Our members act in remote communities and then lots of areas as immigration as customs, as law enforcement of any nature. Big or small, they all get involved. Northwest rebellion in 1885. Again, our members were involved in that and working with the city government, the Canadian militia, and reinforcing their members and their members reinforcing ours and trying to keep the violence down the rebellion or even to the Chilkoot pass.

Unknown Speaker 13:14
In post, don't respond, please, King 79. Eastern post is the east end of the Cypress Hills, Fort Macleod were the main post was and on the east end and Cypress Hills was Pinnacle east and there's still a detachment there today. Our stakes to the tribe and we stand with our neighbor to the west. As you will see names are always what they seem you have to kind of figure out what relation they have. As they wanted to escape across the country in order to effectively police it they had to break into detachments and that's what are the catchments are called how they came about. We have Salzburger Casper here where he catchment up the main force. So the main force was divided up and went into what we call divisions. Each division is BC and then from divisions, it's gone through a number of different things. We were subdivisions, subdivisions became districts for the district, and then the those broke the smaller into detachments. 1999 when the Boer War was happening down in Africa, and England was sending lots of troops there, there was a contingent amount of police. And because of that contingency, and its efforts in the Boer War in Nigeria, for the distinction of royal was added to the model police and we've given the royal police in each of the wars, we've had contingents going instead of just resigning to my place and joining us forces which happened to some extent. Members were would sign up for duty and mostly doing Provos duties in the foreign countries that were attached to different Army Corps

Unknown Speaker 15:17
and for that, force duties included virtually any enemy aliens in any of those other associated duties.

Unknown Speaker 15:32
This is a print shop in Ukraine. And one of the things the battle police got into because said we do everything was getting into intelligence and into what was the security services or before what is now CSIS all the spy tech stuff the CIA stuff, is what the police were involved with in some degree. The United States have the DEA, Drug Enforcement Administration, the ATF Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, CIA, Central Intelligence Agency, FBI, county, sheriff's, city police, municipal police, the RCMP does all of those functions are the IRS has done all of those functions. There's a general strike in Winnipeg. And of course, Mario police were called into to call the strike, which unfortunately became one of the more violent outbursts that were involved in. In World War Two, the promo scores, things were one registering enemy aliens, who were customs immigration work before there was a customs immigration branch, we did all of that. This is kind of a funny slide, we talked about modernization of the forest was 25 years old. The traditions of the forests have pretty much been the same beginning. We're very proud of the efforts that we put forward. And our drill and or discipline is second to none in the world, our members are taught, put up with lots of abuse in situations and also being looked after themselves, and keep themselves in the community safe. As society evolves, in order to be relevant, we have to evolve as well. So there's lots of different terms that come forward. But it's important that we keep up with what's going on in the world, and in our communities and and change for that. We became very adept and very good at certain scientific innovations. And this is fingerprinting where the catalog can figure out the fingerprints and Canada has always been on the leading edge of doing fingerprint work. Which one of the members here probably tell more about than I can take with you. And again, branching into different services making use of dogs for dog service or marine service, again with the sovereignty and keeping patrolling the waters. Air Services again, so they can fly north we have word more than no most most. Detachment is in the Arctic Circle. So we will right from below the 49th parallel into the Arctic Circle and from coast to coast. Northern dog patrols it's a rock was a supply vessel that's well known repeating history that went through the Northwest Passage many years ago. Because Inca affairs slammed on the ground as well, but that's basically a Russian the fact that and came to Canada and really gave us a heads up on what the spider one is all all about. This is what they call one of the modern day policemen. Back then 20 years ago, we have a lot of the the uniform and then one in the suit. We have what we have here is the culture. In fact, in the head of the legend at the marketplace, was of course built out of Hollywood and Hollywood movies and the old adage the money always gets there man. All comes from that impact. And a lot of those different things that happen were they were shown as second half of the kingdom the west of Canada was having romances of heroes Murray was one of the most famous movies

Unknown Speaker 19:47
other cultural things are the band has started up back in the beginning in the 1800s and we've had different bands and part of that because that was a lot of stuff. As to whether it has any value or not in modern policing, because we're supposed to be out there, but again, trying to show a different side of the people that we deal with. And of course, the famous Musical Ride, which has that same debate, and all the members of us provide our police, persons, men and women, but they're not actually in policing duties, but they're out there giving that image. And the image is important. Because the image is what gives us a lot of connections, a lot of networking, versus a lot of value in other countries. When we want information. We want cooperation, because we're highly respected organization, and we have this image, we get much better cooperation than we would be if we were just another country asking for help. When we came into the RCMP 1974 I believe before that, the one we were allowed. Welcome back then you couldn't be married for a number of years, and you had to ask permission to get married. And you had to have initially seven years of service and $2,000 in the bank before you're allowed to be married. Again, with the rules changes and 1975 I believe it was, we accepted married members probably heard lots about CSIS, the introduction of the creation of many Security Intelligence Service, which was kind of what RCA is now, the amount of police were doing security services under the RCMP Security Services section. And through the FL Q crisis, a lot of other things in manage that they were doing the intelligence and information. The real advantage of having the one police force that did everything was that we had a lot of networking, a lot of connections, people would start out in the field, learning how to do basic policeman and then go into these other fields, and have a better understanding of how policing worked and how communications work. If there's a lot of politics in those years that created the separate agency, being CSIS. And of course, we have a separate agency, you have these these riffs and these turf wars that aren't as bad as what the Americans are, but it still hampers what we can do whatever he was under the same roof, even though we're different sections, the different reporting lines, the commissioners boss at the end of the day, and any type of turf word grievance could end up in the commissioner's desk. And he was selling it for both sides. So you didn't have to go and pick up of arbitration or any political area to get that work done. Finally, we did step over here. Repaying Nikki 73 The doctor, model presuppose form that can afford to keep the Royal North West Monroe Police, which was a designation granted by Mark in England and the 1920. It there wasn't a demeaning police force that looked after the Capitol Region Ottawa in that area. And they're well known for its final piece was out doing rural areas in Western Canada. And as time went on, the Dominion police was absorbed in the 1920, the Dominion police the Earth, the Royal Northwest Mounted Police joined become the Canadian Mounted Police. That's the same designation we have now. The original uniform in 1874 with pillbox helmet, and that's what they wore. It was based after European in which the English uniforms, and the red Serge is so that when you're shot, nobody can see your blood. Nobody can tell you hurt. That's where that history comes from. So they went to the pillbox helmet in 1897, which was more of the the timeframe what the uniforms would look like. So it is a paramilitary organization that was following military lines. And then in 1920, when the joined the police force, they wanted to get a bit away from the military and be more seen as policing, and went to the Stetson and a different look than what a military uniform was. So in 1984, this was written that was the end, but there's been lots going on since that. So I'll just add to it. The big thing about policing is that we have to be relevant to what the needs of the community are. And we have to have programs and interactions with the community so that we're actually policing the way it wants to be policed. We're not the military dictatorship. People have rights. We have to respect those rights. And as policing goes along, we have After you've adapt to all the different changes, the biggest change in policing came in 1984. I believe it was when the Canadian Charter was introduced. And then came a whole new set of rules that we had to abide by. And charter issues became part of court cases. That goes, What's up of lino goes around around in policing and things change. But really, it's not that much different than it was way back when a number of years ago, 20 years ago started talking about community policing. And especially in the cities, they need to get community policing, and they have these little officers you see in malls and whatnot. But most small places, community policing never changed. It wasn't a new innovation. We've been community policing since 1873. Community policing means being involved in your community. And that's what we tried to do here on Saltspring. In many of the provinces, had their own provincial police PC had the BC provincial police to 1950. And as time goes on, different political factions have looked for ways to save money and to get better service for their dollar. And they found for one reason other than they wanted to contract the amount of police didn't work. And by doing that, we've taken over BC, Saskatchewan, Alberta, Manitoba, the Maritime Provinces, mostly Newfoundland that came into Confederation came policed by monopolies. So the only big police forces out of the model police provincially is the opp and our provincial police. And Quebec has Quebec provincial police. So they do all the stuff in the provincial capitals such as Salzburg, if we were in Ontario, you'd have opp here. Correct, you'd have to PP here. The following still has the following constabulary but they mostly just do. The bigger cities. They don't do the outlying areas. Some cities, the bigger cities across Metro Toronto, Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Regina, they have their own police forces, Surrey Burnaby, which are just as big as some of those others have elected to stay with the mountain police, mostly because it's, it's cheaper. It's a cost savings. The philosophy of the mountain police is a little different than many municipal police forces. We take our recruits, we send them to smaller detachments, hopefully, somebody assigned to the bigger detaches right away. But then after a few years, we tried to move them around and give them different experience. If you had a small police force, such as in Salzburg Island, and something big would happen once in 37 years, like a murder, we had 2007 Diamond Fulford who had no experience in that, because it only happens when I'm 31 to 37 years, then you're gonna get a disadvantage to do it properly and get to the right answers. But because we've been moved from detachment, detachment, over the years, and they have different experience, than the detachment was only for two policemen, and castles were 151. I've been to a number of murders, and know what procedures for that. And when that whatever happened here, we were able to guide people who had never been to one and make sure that things were done properly. So that's one of the bigger advantages for the smaller communities and have them out of police is we get a variety of experiments is by making all these moves. The downside is we don't connect as well as the community. Sometimes some of our members come in because they're, they're strangers, and we're here for a number of years, then they move on, you lose all that information about who's who and who's connected to whom, and those things that are important. When you're trying to investigate something, especially, we are as late as somebody who's learned the rule or having a whole different people, or where's this location. Most people in Salisbury know, Central is the intersection of sight here, the central avenues, way up off London harbor. So if you get somebody that doesn't know when you're gonna settle, they're gonna go to the wrong place. So those little nuances are important for the device to learn. And there's only learning by interacting with the community and getting to know. So that's what we tried to do. We try to instill that in the members, we've tried to give them the education they need in the smaller places. And so they've been learned slowly. And the steps for investigating and murder

Unknown Speaker 29:42
are the same as the steps for investigating a common assault. Somebody gets slapped in the face. steps are the same. The gravity of the offense and the injury is different, and how much time and resources you put into it are different. But you can use the same Steps for pretty much all policing. So we'd like to teach them on all the things that we do to do things in the right order. And when you get to the bigger things that know how to do it, because it's the same basic procedure, you need to talk to people need to take statements need to collect evidence, need to secure the scene, need to get the experts that you need, such as autopsy and pathology, to do their thing. But it's only works if you keep the chain of events, the chain of evidence going. So saucepan is a very good community for young people to learn. Because we do have enough to happen to be able to train them. Not enough, it's gonna overwhelm them. And it all comes back to the city school community policing. But again, it's what we've been doing for 107 years is interacting with the community, and knowing what you will do once. There's lots of different laws out there, there's literally 1000s of laws. There's federal law, which is criminal code as part of here's provincial laws such as traffic X BD, is municipal laws, which we don't have as municipal laws, because we're not going to spell it. But we do have bylaws, such scaffold, Regional District, Regional District has laws that we're helping to enforce. And live in need. There's hundreds and hundreds and 1000s of different laws and all different sections. We can't know them all. We know a lot of them. We have to figure out what the law is and what's the intent of the law, and then trying to play it. And one of the best examples I can probably give you the hitchhiking. Hitchhiking is culturally acceptable on Saltspring. Island. You see it all the time, it's against the law. Everybody that hatrocks I can even. But would I really be serving this community is this community want me to spend my hours flight please from their hours picking on hitchhikers and giving them tickets? I've come to the opinion that that's not this community wants even though it is a law that we couldn't enforce, we don't guess the community will have to play some part of it. There's laws on books, in many different places, especially in bylaws that are made from long time ago. That really, you'd be laughed at, we tried to enforce this law laws, especially in some prairie towns, about horses in town where you can give somebody a tariff or having a horse in the bar. You're not gonna see that. But if you want to expend time, taking every lock to the nth degree, you want to deal with that stuff, you could. But we don't do that. We try and make it relevant to what the community wants. Some things some fraction community may want, I was done. Again, Salzburg another good one there would be marijuana use. And the debate between those should be legal or it up. Now for us, it's not an issue until they make it legal, which is for those that have a license. And those people have a license. We don't do anything with we don't give them a hard time. We don't ask them because they do have it. It's legal. If they don't, it's right. For us, it's against the law as something that we will enforce. So even though there's a debate in the community, it's not clear cut one way or the other, we have to follow what the law says. So it's a very fine line sometimes between give the community what they want, and what the law says and not getting into the political end of things. So we try and do what we call being without fear or favor, from not trying to make everybody happy in the liking us. We're not afraid to innovate yet. So we do what we think is right, and go down the middle of the road, as much as possible, enforcing those laws, stringently, they need it, and less stringently, they don't. And that is what policing on especially on Saltspring Island has evolved in the last number of years. Hopefully, we're making headway and keeping everybody happy with being safe. Safe Communities is our number one mandate is making sure everybody's safe. And we do it using the tools of the law as ways to kind of penalize you or convince you that you need to follow what the law says. Any questions?

Unknown Speaker 34:25
What are the qualifications for recruitment nowadays? How do you advance? Besides? Well, that's

Unknown Speaker 34:33
very complex question because there's no answer. Recruiting is easy. There's a recruiting process where they have to write an exam and then go through the interview process. Again, historically really started to head and be certain height. Couldn't be married, you had to be single. You had to be a good character, and good health and all these things came into play. You're female, until 1974. Now, we can just go anybody that passes the test, of course through the due process and chose to have an aptitude for this job. Once they get in, so you're to depo, as we almost always have, and then take six months of training there. The time is very good in a few weeks, so many different years when they tried to condense or expand things. But for the most part, it's nine months or six months of training was nine months for wild horses, but they got rid of those six to five. So once you go to depo, and you train, then you go anywhere in Canada, there was many periods of time, that's when I joined where you couldn't come back your home province. And currently, you can come back your home province, you come back home home. And there's lots of debate on that that's a good thing or not. Once you've done your six months of driving, you get assigned to a detachment. And then you're assigned to a season police officer for another six months, and you're on probation for two years. But the first six months of that two years, you have to be monitored by a seasoned police officer, initially riding side by side to get him in the car. And then as you progress and show that you're able to do the job, you get your leash lengthened, and you're gonna be grown a bit. From day one, as soon as you get your New Testament, you're a policeman full differential arrest people do whatever you please, please do. But you're still not fully training. In Regina, they teach you the theory of police work. But now you have to learn to practice. So after six months in company with another police officer, they assess you, and you pass that now your next year and a half a probationary member. And unless you do something grossly wrong, you're likely going to get passed on from that into the next level of pay for the pay scale at the beginning. So that you start off with less pay. And then after three years, we have to have full customer salary. And promotion comes along the way, there's really no set term or time. It's changed over the years again. And depending on what your interests are, and what your aptitudes are, and your skills. Different jobs have different ranks. So if you want a different job, three different things even apply for different positions. And that process changes constantly. On Saltspring, here, we have one sergeant, that's an honor to be here, one, four, and six customers. So there's a policeman on the island. And the sergeant is the boss. And then Corporal is second in charge, obviously. And he's called the ops NCO because Microsoft's in charge of operations, and it's his job to make sure everything's running smoothly, all the files are monitored. Well, I like to tell the the customers on the road is kind of like independent businessman, I don't tell them everything, what they're gonna do. They know what the job is, whether they're gonna write speeding tickets, whether they have files need to work on as people call them with complaints, they get assigned to different police officers, and they go out and investigate the file. And they keep a list in their queue on their computer as to what they have to do with the diary system, they make sure that nothing falls through the cracks. And then once it's done has to be approved by the supervisor who's the Ops Center are usually. So they go out every day with their queue of files, what gets phoned in that day, plus anything else they want to do? We keep them active in school liaison, trying to be interactive with the community. And track enforcement, of course, is important. So we keep accidents down to a minimum. But they may management themselves for large part because we supervise. So they have a real big responsibility and have a lot of rope to go out and do what they want to do individually. And some will excel in certain things. And that'll be something of interest to them. So put a lot of energy into that, and others works on something else. So hopefully, by having a blend of these different people from different detachments across the country to come together with different knowledge and expertise, we can share that amongst ourselves. And those who have particular interests can help those that don't have the knowledge in that area. And we get everything done that needs to be done. Plus the simple philosophy of language requirements. Other languages and aside from French, officially we're a bilingual country and French and English are you need one or the other. You don't need both. I don't speak French until I don't have an aptitude in the languages which I believe If you speak another language, it's a bonus at different times of recruitment, there's times when we need lots of recruits, and don't have many. So the competition is a very fierce, there's other times that we don't need that many recruits. And we have a lot of Africans. And that's quite rare right now. So only the best are chosen, or what I believe to be the best. So if you have more language capabilities, that's going to be seen as an extra asset. And if you're in those times where it's a real tough choice, that may get those people in little soother. The downside of that, is without all that, why is this an organization sometimes, and even that gets you in the door, doesn't necessarily mean they're gonna put you somewhere you can use your language. Because once you sign on the dotted line when you were in Canada, hopefully, our staffing people kind of marry those up but it doesn't always happen that way. And, but it doesn't matter where you are, you can be finally language very useful. When I was fresh out of Regina, Saskatoon, that was giving me a train that had 11 year service. And he was actually born in Germany, came to Canada when he was young, and then joined the police. But he married a French university teacher. So we're driving down the road one day, we stopped this hippie bus, and old school bus that was all made categorized at these hippies. And, of course, going on searching looking for drugs and whatnot. And they start talking French. So he says a couple of words from the French, because I don't know what he's saying, because I unfortunately speak to one language. So then I start talking German. He talks to me German. Just remember all that much Germans when he was a boy, but enough to get by. So they looked at one another. There was two guys and the girl What the hell am I still talk English because I knew what they were saying. But language is a very useful skill to have. And I'd love to be bilingual and trilingual. I worked with one guy that spoke eight different languages. And he was great. We're in a small town in Saskatchewan working on in reserve that language for the most part was of any value to him there because we didn't have a lot of those cultures. But he could speak those languages that that present, folks, but he was only there for years. And he will go on to over his career, hopefully with languages will come into into play.

Unknown Speaker 42:35
What year was attachment started on Salt Spring?

Unknown Speaker 42:42
Well, I don't know what year started. It's changed rubedo more than I do. She's been around longer. When I was the Northwest Mounted Police, there was an office or BC provincial police station here. So probably in 1950, when it switched, they would have had somebody here shortly thereafter. And the changes under the Gulf Islands that I do know is that the detachment here, it used to be called Ganges detachment, because it was in was the settlement of Ganges and changed the Salzburg in 1991. They change the name and that's something that the the force did to try and more represent the different detachments across the province or across the country. It's just because you happen to be in one little town you place the bigger area, they want the names, the coorporate, the bigger area, not just where you have to you have your office many years ago, before the changes to the other Gulf Island detachments generally I don't was policed actually by Saltspring. And it was a period of number of years that there was a vessel in Salzburg and they were policing the waters around the different islands from the vessel from here. There's also one in C Sharp and in around the neck team II think it could have been earlier than that is they amalgamated all those pulled them out of the smaller detachments put them all in than I will in Prince Rupert and got the big catamarans and started policing up and down the coast. Instead of having the little marine detachments, the make to big green catalyst as a whole. So that changed the complexity of what the police force on Saltspring was and then when they formed the outer golf violence, they took the boat from here that we used to have and target Galliano and gave Pender another policeman and made that the Otago Highlands and now that's what they manage right now is one three is going to Ghana Want to mean into an Pender, the Ergo islands detachment, and they work together and went to the forum to please the other islands other than Saltspring. But some of the local changes to what used to be happening here, because we used to send the policeman over Geylang on patrol. And from here, now, when we pleased Saltspring Island, and a couple of small islands around. So we probably have an easier time of it. As far as transportation goes, than what we had before we actually had to be voting over have nobody left here. The numbers change. When I came here, five years ago, there were seven members here. Now there's a it's very difficult to change those numbers. The provincial government pays for placement provincially. And they tell either version, which is Vancouver headquarters, for BC, you have X number of positions for policemen, to do all the provincial policing in the province. You put them wherever you think you need them. So we have to fight with all of the rest of BC to get any increase in policing here. The good side of that is that because we have a low crime rate, and we have a very good community here, our crime rate numbers are two thirds of our provincial averages. So we don't have as much crime here as other areas. The bad side of that is when we go to fight for more police resources, they use that against us. Well, yeah, population wise, you should have more policemen. Because there's very few policemen doing lots of populations, but you have fun as citizens, basically, you don't have all the primary to these others have. So we have to suddenly lose resources there. So it's very complex, and kind of being penalized for your good work, be able to keep the primary down. So you don't get the extra bodies to perpetuate that. But some of the politics of policing and how that gets managed.

Unknown Speaker 47:02
I noticed last couple of years that you have foot patrols in the downtown area, is that something that's paying off for you?

Unknown Speaker 47:11
We think it is one of the things that again, policing changes, they have all these different buzzwords and terms that come up and do a different thing. But three years earlier, he came up with what they call annual performance planning. And it's gone by different names over different years, anybody that's been involved in any corporation knows that management by objectives in different terms come about. What we're trying to do is focus on what issues we see and try and be proactive in dealing with the issues so that we're not just reactive and having lots of problems, and then go and try to fix the problem. So we examine the community. We had a community survey here. Four years ago, I think we sent it out to all around town. And you got to check off the boxes of what you felt and drop it off. And we took all that information. And because we're going to and figuring out what are the things that the community wants us to do back to connecting with the community like I was talking about, and putting our resources where you think that you need it. So we took all that one of the things that we were being told by everybody is that they retire. The young lovers were tired of not being able to go to the park and be able to play because they didn't want the kids hanging around and they have all these undesirable people they're drinking in the park and smoking marijuana and getting into fights and just wasn't a comfortable family park. And they weren't happy with that. So to try and combat that and bring the product back into a family atmosphere. We went to the CRD parks people. And we said one of the problems that we have is when we drive by the park, people hiding in the bushes, and we can't see what's going on. So maybe to trim the bushes and cut them back to the original nice, it's still a friendly, pleasant part, but to cut down some of the bushes so it wasn't as easy for the undesirables to hide from us. Another thing we did is to to as many foot patrols as we can and get the foot patrols in there so that when we're in there, they know that you're being watched, they're being seen, and hopefully they're gonna not know when we're there or whether we're close by and you can look over your shoulder all the time, so they just go somewhere else. The downside of policing that exact way is not really fixing the property, just displacing it. So when we first did that three years ago, we ended up pushing them all over to behind the propane tank, and then further out along the beach turned over to an area where there's some trees and went over there. And what was it says I'm going up in arms because the hell these people move from the park and now they're less inhibited because nobody wants you. And they're trading fires and bonfires and drinking and crashing over there. And now people are worried about their homes catching fire because all these fires are going on check. So then we had to go and deal with that issue. And they formed a little for a year, a community group that was patrolling the beaches, and 20. Other people have another green watch. So it's difficult problem. With the marine people coming up and down the coast this year, they've agreed when they're in fourth, they will do for us as well, because that's part of our enemy performance plan. And being a war were one of their clients. They're here to help service, the whole cost and the cost of the cashiers. So because that's one of our big plans, they agreed to persist for this video. Sometimes he clicks in there just in the coveralls, the overalls. Those are off the one of the boats that have come in off the marine section. And they're doing the same thing that we are checking people drinking smoking, being unrelated in the park. So that's how that's all come about. And again, it's trying to be responsive to your needs. And listen to what we're being told and manage our resources so we can try and accomplish those things so that we're proactive. So we think it's working

Unknown Speaker 51:21
Yeah, when I was growing up, just please, please for the for Salt Spring Island. So it's quite different now, but I'm remembering when was the last time it was 1964 and tsunami in Alberni inlet. And because of the initiative, the RCMP, the type H attempted in in Tofino notified them that there was some strange behavior, the ocean and smoking, I happen to out earning it, oh, put people out of their houses. And so nobody was killed. And the water came in 10 feet 10 feet high over the ground. For the scope mass comes into the canal. And that was really impressive to me, because they acted on their own initiative to do that, and save everybody's life. And for contrast, last night on the TV, that was a special what happened in New Orleans, and Canada did send RCMP out there. But the chaos that ensued, because people didn't. There was no coordination to look after the people. Nobody seemed to know what you're doing. There were people dying, there were people getting ignored. It was a disaster. And I know, the RCMP out there to start with. You couldn't have been anywhere near. Thank you.

Unknown Speaker 53:37
It wouldn't have been. And one of the things that we do on this island is work with all the different service agencies and emergency management series created the Emergency Management Commission, which I sit on as a board member, along with the fire chief, the ambulance, much community people, and any disaster that were to befall you on this island via an earthquake, plane crash, flooding, bad weather. We have plans in place that we've spent hours and hours putting together so that if it ever happens, we hope to be prepared. And we hope of course never to put that into practice. But then being proactive and looking to what could happen. It's really no good closing the door after the horses escaped to we have to be ready for any eventuality. So we've worked on that. Constantly. We meet once or twice other once a month or every second month. We planned scenarios where we practice how we would deal with certain situations. And the emergency service resources you have in this island are great. There's no way if you really think about it, that a policeman can protect you from all it's possibly going to happen. I mean, just the logistics of that is staggering to his mind. But it's not just eight of us stuff Fire Department that does lots of work that in most communities, they don't do, we go into a car accident. Car collisions are not accidents, company causes. So percolation and most detachments I've worked at, felt like we have to investigate the policemen find out what happened and why. And probably my tips to ever defend the party is we have to, of course, first manage the traffic. Well, there's only one policeman a true police, we're working as hard to investigate something and manage the traffic, we don't do that. And your fire service does that for us, every accident or collision we go to, they manage the traffic for us. So the services here have worked very well together, and make everybody safer and much, much more pleasant place to work. And another thing I want to pass on to you is your your young people here. The only people here that we deal with are far and away the best people that I've ever police. In that category, we do not have a youth crime problem on Saltspring. We have lots of youth from the schools that we have into little bit trouble now again, but we don't have gang violence, we don't have lots of bullying. I mean, some of that's going to happen. And we try and deal with it when it does. But the general demeanor of youth on the island that we deal with is positive. members come from from Surrey and Langley and other communities. And they're here a couple of weeks. And they're what's wrong with the kids at the time they actually talk to us where it's going, okay? community. So soft. Salzburg has a very, very lot going for it. It's a good community, to police, it's a good place to live. And most of the members that come here, come back time and time again, the listeners have gone, that's been the Forgotten places have been going.

Unknown Speaker 56:54
What percentage of the police resources goes into the drug? Prohibition?

Unknown Speaker 57:02
Well, there is no set percentage anything. As I said, each member of managers there, they're policing somewhat independently. And we're collaborating together so that everybody does what they like, some are more keen on the drug stuff than others. Some are more keen on the traffic stuff for depending on the members you have and the information that you have coming, what the resources, were, number one, that community says it's needed. And number two, where we get information or complaints about things happening. Every community has a drug problem, I don't think you'll find a community in North America that doesn't have a drug problem. The resources that are put into it are based on how much information comes forward. If people tell us things that we can act on, then we can do something if people tell us you know, we have a direct quote, yeah, well, we know that. But we can't do anything about it. I hear Senator, we need information. We're very happy with the level of enforcement that we've been able to do in the last five years on Saltspring. We have lots of information coming forward. And we act on that as quickly as we can. And we've managed to arrest and charge at least two drug dealers every year for the five years I've been here. And that takes a lot of effort from members and a lot of effort from the community. It's not us against them. Again, in policing over the years, it's it's it used to be in, especially in the cities where it got to be us against them, you got the police were up there trying to be enforcement minded, and the communities were starting to rebel because the police weren't listening. In small communities, we haven't had that problem, because we have to work together to make it work, we just don't have the the dynamics and the resources to do it any other way. So we try and respond to those people that tell us information and with the resources we have, we have to prioritize and decide what we can do. The big thing I concentrate on is as the manager and the leader of the cash to here is I tell all the Gospels and the members to come here. We are problem solvers. Whatever you do, here to solve a problem. I don't want you out there writing tickets to some cigarette in tickets. There's a purpose to that. We need to educate the public, that the laws are there for a reason. And if you don't abide by the laws, you're gonna get a ticket or you're gonna get stopped, you can be warned. That's a choice that they have, every time they stop an event. They don't have to make them. They can warn them. They have to, in your mind, justify to me that whatever they did, is gonna make that person think, okay, do something wrong. Sometimes you give somebody a ticket, they just get mad at you. And no, we're not gonna change the behavior just for the angry so you're not really helping the situation by reading tickets all the time, you can just heard for some people doesn't matter what you do the doctor change. So, you know, if you haven't heard of a ticket, other people may have worn their seatbelt everyday their license today they forgot. Now sometimes if you believe that, then you say, Well, I don't really take and get away. Oh, yeah, I will. And you believe that you don't have to protect other people, you're stopping them? Well, no, I don't believe in seatbelts, I'm never gonna work. Well, I'm already kicking them because those that's telling you, because you're not going to change your behavior just by me telling you. But whether it's traffic enforcement, whether it's dealing with shoplifters, whether it's dealing with ones in the home, whatever it happens to be, the mandate they have for me is to be a problem solver. We don't want to be Robo cops go in cookie cutter, this is false. In this category, we're going to A, B and C because that's what the book says. Every situation is different. One of the nicest things about police work is you get to meet lots of people. And every situation is different. No two snares are the same. So they're their mandate is go in and problem solve. So assess the situation, figure out what's going on. Now, what's gonna be the best resolution? Can we use restorative justice? is F word court? Can it be done with a warning isn't needed ticket? All of these are options and different things that they have?

Unknown Speaker 1:01:24
No, but I think it's split the time we usually stopped

Unknown Speaker 1:01:28
for five minutes or five hours.

Unknown Speaker 1:01:31
can also see why you get community spirit and

Unknown Speaker 1:01:40
how much they appreciate it.

Unknown Speaker 1:01:45
Well, I have an announcement on that point. Hopefully today. If not three more, we have a calendar coming up. We've produced a calendar, we've cooperation with some business people and we're raising money for Meals on Wheels, selling the calendars for $10. And all that money is going to support the Meals on Wheels program. And every month has the buffalo on a different day. And in the center is the story of how the buffalo came about and why it was created and how it developed and also bought some of our community policing program. So thank you and she loves getting the comments and make sure you buy a calendar No, no, it's a calendar with the Buffalo and different costumes uses a different costume every month. We didn't want to insult anybody with having bare chested policemen.

Unknown Speaker 1:02:38
Thank you very much

Unknown Speaker 1:02:45
to your coffee, please feel free to

Unknown Speaker 1:02:49
ask any questions. I'm not running away.

Unknown Speaker 1:03:02
The past