While we are all hoping the pandemic is over within the next few months; North Bay's Police Chief cannot give the same type of timeline regarding the crime issues within the Gateway City.
"Unfortunately, it is a long-term plan, there is no quick short-term plan to address the issues that are associated with crime as a result of homelessness, addiction, poverty, mental health and education," noted Scott Tod, North Bay's Police Chief.
Tod addressed the issue after Tuesday's Police Board Meeting where the service revealed a 10 per cent rise in violent crime in March of 2021 compared to a year ago,
North Bay has also seen three separate homicides already in 2021 and gun crimes continue to be on the rise as well.
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As part of Police Week, the Service addressed a handful of initiatives such as SCRAM, Neighbourhood watch and #9pmRoutine in hopes of getting the public to help prevent crimes from occurring.
He admits though, more needs to be done.
"We do have an urgent need to do more preventative measures with the community through engagement and also working with the collaboration tables we have in town, whether it be through the Health Unit or through the Gateway Hub there is an urgent need for us to better with social services to help identify the elevated situations fo risk and harm and crime and deal with those," said Tod.
"But there really needs to be a long-term look at how we reduce crime in our community. It is something that is not going to happen this year or next year, it is a long-term approach that we need to have to truly reduce it."
Tod says throughout Ontario, statistics indicate a majority of crime precipitates from homelessness, poverty, addictions mental health and education.
Of course, the pandemic did not help decrease those numbers.
"If we can deal with what they call 'Up-Stream' factors determining social success, we can work on those and then we can decrease crime," said Tod.
Tod believes the local community drug strategy is an important part of the long-term solution. The local organization is looking to restructure at the end of the month.
"The importance of the recognition of the community collaboration tables and the various tables in itself to work together toward a common good in North Bay is really important," said Tod.
"There is a lot of effort going on to help people in crisis in North Bay. Unfortunately, a lot of those efforts are localized and isolated from each other so part of the re-organization is going on across all the various social groups and committees in North Bay is to collaborate together and have the best resources applied to the greatest situations across North Bay so yes I think there is a big change happening and it is going to continue to happen in North Bay.."
