Richmond Review

Column of the week, by publisher Dave McCullough

The hottest thing in police tactics since photo radar is trendy, it's effective, and it's not coming to Richmond. It's community policing, and it's being touted by many, including the local RCMP, as the answer to many of our current law-enforcement problems. Wherever it's been tried, community policing has had a remarkable impact. By moving the decision-making processes and the physical space occupied by the police out into neighborhoods, it immediately improves police responsiveness to community issues. The reviews are glowing, and the pressure is mounting to bring the idea to Lulu Island. That's what two members of the RCMP were trying to do this week when they unveiled a plan for community stations in South Arm and Steveston. The two depots would cover almost half the city, and if they proved successful, they would pave the way for two more.

City council's response was utterly predictable and utterly reasonable: they liked everything but the price tag. Now the ball is back in the RCMP's court, right where it ought to be. They've proposed an idea that will undoubtedly improve the level of service they provide, but in so doing they've broken the one immutable law of business planning in the 1990s: do more with less. That law holds true at every level of every sector. No one, least of all public agencies like the police, is getting the green light to increase spending in these days of tightened belts and shrunken expectation. Under the circumstances, a proposal that city council find big chunks of cash for community policing is out of the question. Community policing should be subjected to a simple test. If it's merely a way to spend more money - which seems to be the thinking behind the proposal brought before council this week - then it fails. It should be relegated to the trashbin of great ideas that are beyond our means. If, on the other hand, it's a better investment for our limited resources than some of the existing ways RCMP spend our hard-earned cash, then funds should be taken from the current budget and redirected to community policing.

In the final analysis, Richmond doesn't need more policing; it needs better policing. The RCMP should go back to the drawing board with their proposal for a network of community police stations, and come back to us when they've decided whether scrimping and saving in other areas is worth the effort. Community policing is a great idea, but it shouldn't happen until city council is given a pledge that overall policing costs will not rise.