It’s been a quiet month in the High Country, our home in a paradise on the edge of the prairie somewhere west of Calgary. Here, we like to get away from the hustle and bustle of city living and relax in a more placid, wide-open environment.
Unfortunately, our wide-open spaces are also inviting to some with nefarious intentions Statistics Canada reported last year that in Canada as a whole, the rural crime rate was 23 per cent higher than the urban crime rate. That is particularly true for all the prairie provinces. In Alberta, we do things bigger but not necessarily better. Our rate was 38 per cent higher than that of urban areas. (The only province in Canada with more crime per capita last year was Saskatchewan.)
Those figures do not mean that there are more criminals in rural areas. Rather, it reflects the fact that rural police have a vastly larger area to cover than city police.
Another problem is that crime is growing in rural Alberta. In 2017, police reported 7,920 incidents per 100,000 persons while the following year the rate jumped more than 38% to 10,964 per 100,000 persons. Again, the R.C.M.P. simply cannot respond as quickly as can the police in urban areas.
So, clearly, our idyllic life in the country is not crime-free. The things that make it a beautiful place to live are also inviting to those who might have bad intentions. We are more likely to see crime here than in the city and our crime rate appears to be rising.
Our vulnerability was illustrated by a recent incident the H.C.R.C.W.A. reported to its membership last month.
On February 7, in the early morning hours, some persons drove a truck stolen out of Calgary to a Highway 762 residence near Plummers Road. They got into that property by cutting a lock off a gate, but their stolen vehicle got stuck between that location and a neighbour’s home. They knocked on that homeowner’s door, but when nobody answered, the intruders stole a truck from his property. They tried to drive it through a field, but it just got stuck, so they returned on foot and stole another truck. That was easy to do, since the owner had conveniently left his keys in the ignition. This time the visitors left by crashing through a locked front gate. The homeowner, hiding in his home, called the R.C.M.P. for help around 4:00 a.m. The police recovered two stolen vehicles at the scene and two days later recovered the third getaway stolen vehicle in Calgary. The suspect(s) are still at large. Life can be exciting in our Garden of Eden.
Considering episodes like that and the crime statistics, should we then admit defeat and move back to a condo in the city? By no means. There is also some good news: “Despite the growing gap between the rural and urban crime rates, both have fallen over the past ten years. In rural areas, the crime rate has dropped by 13 per cent, and in urban areas it is 19 per cent lower than it was in 2009.”
We can assist in our own safety through neighbourhood watch groups. By using messaging apps such as WhatsApp, members can quickly and securely let others in their neighborhood know of suspicious activity. Similarly, we can take individual responsibility by reporting unusual activity directly to the R.C.M.P. at 403.933.7227.
We all need to remember the acronym of our crime watch: ORR: Observe, Record and Report. I can attest that it is better to be safe than sorry. On an almost daily basis, I run our dog (“Dallas”) around the Coal Mine Road area. Once last month, my daughter went jogging with our dog, so I parked my car and waited for them to finish. A resident driving nearby noted me alone in a parked car for no apparent reason. She phoned her husband to warn him, and she also warned my daughter about the danger. My daughter assured the lady that I was her father. I was happy about what the neighbour had done, for had there actually been someone suspicious, the lady would have alerted the police to the danger.
If you would like to help in our fight against crime, join a Rural Crime Watch near you.
Membership in the High Country Rural Crime Watch Association is free for persons living in our area. The benefits are vast: no obligations; regular notices of criminal activity here; a free sign; and free tutorial presentations on how best to protect your property. If you live in the Foothills area, applications are available on our web site, www.hcrcwa.ca/membership.html, and our phone number is 403.931.2407, during office hours.
So that’s the news from our High Country, where all the grown-ups are perfect and all the children are even better.
John Robin (‘J.R.’) Allen
jrapriddis@gmail.com
