Crime stats down, or are they?

By FRED DAVIES
News Reporter
September 21^st, 2007

The numbers say crime is on the decline but that's no reason for law enforcement to let their guard down, said RCMP Sergeant Dennis O'Gorman. In the RCMP's quarterly report, delivered to a City of Parksville protective services committee, O'Gorman stated, despite indications local crime rates are trending downwards, there's reason to doubt whether that's actually the case. "We ran these statistics just last week,"he said. "Since we've switched to a new records management system the numbers were very cumbersome to compile. I don't think we're capturing all the data yet." All detachments have recently done a mandatory switchover to the Police Records Information Management Environment (PRIME). It involves use of a common database that facilitates sharing of information among jurisdictions but O'Gorman said, so far, the new system has proven unwieldy. "I know the numbers aren't right because we have seasonal policing statistics that just don't jive,"he said. "We've had a slower year but I don't believe we're seeing this positive reduction in crime." Though the available data suggests markedly fewer criminal infractions, O'Gorman didn't provide the committee with any actual numbers. Mayor Sandy Herle expressed concern on what the ambiguous statistics might mean for future council policy directives. "We operate a lot by the statistics,"she said. "It's important to us as a council whether or not these numbers are accurate." O'Gorman replied that staff is working to improve data capture under PRIME's new system and that he hoped to see improvements. "It's a very good investigative tool but there's got to be a better way to get the numbers from it,"he said, adding time spent by staff towards PRIME's full implementation is considerable. reporter@pqbnews.com


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