Williams Lake City Council endorses 6 Point Crime Action Plan

A six-point action plan tackling crime has received the support of Williams Lake City Council.

Council endorsed the plan at this week’s regular council meeting.

Mayor Walt Cobb says the first step will be at next week’s UBCM where Council will meet with the Attorney General and possibly Premier.

“And then the next step is when we get back we’ll start meeting with Crown Counsel and possibly the judges if we can, and see if we can get together and talk about some of the points,” Cobb said.

“The main point, of course, we’ve been pushing for how many years now is the monitoring of prolific offenders or repeat offenders.”

For the month of August, there were approximately 39 individuals on curfew conditions according to Williams Lake RCMP Inspector Jeff Pelley.

“Ninety-one curfew checks were conducted by multiple officers resulting in eighteen possible breaches being recommended for charge approval against eight offenders,” Pelley said.

“This was a priority due to a property crime and violent offender initiative given crime trends and increased offences….Currently, there are three of the fourteen prolific offenders that remain in custody.”

The Williams Lake 6 point Crime Action Plan seeks to use available technology including electronic monitoring devices to monitor released offenders, return proceeds of crime directly to the City, deploy cameras in strategically selected areas, and ask the courts to consider the rights of the community and explain in writing their rationale for releasing an offender without appropriate monitoring.

It also seeks to support the creation of a court watch program.

“We’re not trying to change the law,” Cobb said.

“We’re just telling them to uphold the laws that are there and quit interpreting them to suit themselves. We’re just saying adhere to it and when we have these prolific offenders you use every tool you have to make sure that they’re not out on the streets and our community is safe because it’s not right now.”