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IanO said:
Last night we held our annual friends Christmas party at The Gardens on 102st/s of Jasper.

A guy was inside, ordered beers, passed out, fell to the floor. A bunch of us went over to help, he gets up and starts trying to fight everyone, we tell him it's time to go, 'help' him outside and thank the two senior citizen men who initially tried to help.

Well this guy starts trying to come back in, trying to kick in the door, windows, saying he is going to 'kill us', and so the owner calls 911. This guy is a risk to the public, us, himself and yet even with blood for his efforts of trying to get back in, not a single EPS officer or car arrived. After about 10-15 minutes of fearing for his safety and ours, he walked off threatening others on the street with punches in their direction, falling over, kicking and breaking things.

I recognize that there was no visible weapon and perhaps there were other more serious incidents occurring pulling resources away, but he had assaulted two people, caused damage to a business, stole and was very much a high likelihood to 'reoffend' down the street.

Something is very, very wrong here with an inability to get to call like that in 15minutes on Jasper and 102st in the middle of your CBD.
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I am beginning to wonder if the EPS building prominently downtown is either now an empty shell or a hiding place for the police that they are reluctant to or afraid to leave.

Years ago, there was much talk of community policing, but these days there is no evidence of it in the downtown core, which is unfortunate because without more of a police presence more problems happen and get worse.

I don't know if our city council is afraid to direct the police to do more, or the police are misinforming them about what they are doing, but whatever the case is the current approach is really not working.
 
There isn't a willingness to call out EPS on their bad performance by anyone. The only time I've seen EPS on foot since moving DT in August was today. The officers were walking back to their car from the Oilers store.

EPS isn't good at their main job in the CBD, which is absolutely security
 
David A said:
I don't know if our city council is afraid to direct the police to do more, or the police are misinforming them about what they are doing, but whatever the case is the current approach is really not working.
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I don't know how the city council can direct the police to do more. Isn't that the police commission's responsibility?
 
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I am hearing about forthcoming beat officers to the core, but their last 5-6 yrs of redistribution and reaction has clearly failed.
 
Barnaby said:
There isn't a willingness to call out EPS on their bad performance by anyone. The only time I've seen EPS on foot since moving DT in August was today. The officers were walking back to their car from the Oilers store.

EPS isn't good at their main job in the CBD, which is absolutely security
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The only place I see them around Parkdale/Cromdale is lined up at the McDonalds for their free coffee. And yet they are always unavailable when we have someone break into our underground parkade. For one of the best funded police forces in the country they sure do make themselves scarce.
 
Barnaby said:
There isn't a willingness to call out EPS on their bad performance by anyone. The only time I've seen EPS on foot since moving DT in August was today. The officers were walking back to their car from the Oilers store.

EPS isn't good at their main job in the CBD, which is absolutely security
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During a marathon in the summer, I saw a team of EPS bike patrol officers gathered near 100 Ave and 109 Street... gathered by a cop car towing a trailer. I presume they there drove from the downtown location rather than biking. After the marathon they were gathered by the trailer again. There could very well be context I'm missing, but it just seemed a bit silly that they couldn't simply bike over from the downtown location to 100 Ave and 109 Street of all places. They'd pretty much have protected bike lanes the whole way.
 
Gus Haynes said:
I don't know how the city council can direct the police to do more. Isn't that the police commission's responsibility?
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Yes, but there are city councilors and representatives of the city on the police commission. Also, who funds the EPS?
 
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I agree its complicated and obviously politicians should try stay away from specific cases, but they do need to provide input or direction about general matters of concern to the community.

Probably via the police commission is the obvious and primary way. But I don't know if there is anything that forbids the Mayor or councilors from talking to the police administration.
 
I wonder if there would be value in having a couple smaller police stations scattered around the core. Like just a very small store front or something to show their presence. Maybe the beat officers could be based out of there.
 
husky said:
I wonder if there would be value in having a couple smaller police stations scattered around the core. Like just a very small store front or something to show their presence. Maybe the beat officers could be based out of there.
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Isn't there already a police station in the old 3 Bananas space on Churchill Square? Or has that not occurred yet?
 
^Peace Officer space that is completely opaque which is too bad as it could have been a nice service centre and have folks come in to report issues etc... let alone now having a big blank spot on our premier square.
 
Yesterday, I was walking from the library parkade through the underground pedway to Churchill. In the space between where the parkade connects to the pedway, there was two guys smoking crack. When I got near the LRT machines, I told the security guard. He was basically useless and told me the parkade has its own security. He did not offer to go contact those security guards or call in for help from a peace officer. Luckily, a little further down, I spotted two peace officers. I told them, and to their credit, they immediately turned around and headed to the area I advised them of. Not sure what the end result was, but yeah they need more people who can actually enforce the laws. Why would I ever take my wife and kid to downtown when I have to worry about walking through toxic smoke?
 
Less about 'crime' and more about 'impression'.

Had a nice night out to the ESO (symphony - movie music) last night with a family member who does not regularly come Downtown. Great to see it 80-90% full.

However, would it be too much to ask to have EPS or Peace Officers visibly present pre/post events in key traffic areas in pedways or around Churchill? How about a sweep before shows or even during them?

Concert goers literally had to walk around 2 guys doing meth or something as they walked up the underground pedway/stairs to the Winspear; some with kids. A lady with cart was blocking the elevator completely.

On the way out, we took the Milner exit via their stairwell and good lord it was disgusting. Smelled like urine or worse, garbage and refuse x 20, 30? littered the entire place and burn marks were present on multiple walls. You then exit and the front of the Milner looked like a war zone with broken things, garbage, a guy yelling.

Talk about making an impression. Letter sent.
 
^this has been an ongoing story for at least five years now. I have had numerous very similar encounters. Until the GoA/CoE/EPS/etc get serious about actually dealing with the root causes and subsequent effects, it will continue. No easy solutions, given all the parties involved/responsible and the asinine policies adopted by those parties over the last decade or so. Worst part is a number of these parties keep doubling down on those policies so I don't have much hope that this will improve anytime soon. An absolute disgrace on many fronts.
 
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