ELK POINT – Five weeks after their first annual general meeting since before the COVID-19 pandemic, the Greater Lakeland Rural Crime Watch Association gathered in Elk Point to plan for a more active role than they have played in keeping Lakeland communities safe during that time.
First on their agenda was a housekeeping detail of changing the group’s signing authority over to the new executive, made up of president Jonny Nielsen, vice president Orest Sereda, treasurer Anna Leskiw and secretary Yvonne Weinmeier.
A project that was just getting rolling before the pandemic shutdown was the offering to members of marking pens to be used to mark equipment and other possessions that could only be read with the special readers that were to be distributed to RCMP detachments in the area. Sgt. Andrew Druhan of the St. Paul Detachment told the group that Staff Sgt. David Henry of the Two Hills Detachment says his detachment “is using them with success for to determine the owners of found property.” Greater Lakeland’s pens and readers have been in the group’s storage room at the County of St. Paul office since they were purchased and the pens will now have to be checked out by Sereda and Weinmeier to see if they are still working, with a motion passed to replace them if they are not.
The group’s long hiatus has resulted in the misplacement of the bylaws, the need for its corporate registry search to be updated and the membership and insurance through Alberta Provincial Rural Crime Watch Association all to be taken care of.
Over the five years, the organization’s membership list, at that time without email addresses, has become seriously outdated, and volunteers at the meeting were asked to share the big task of going through the original list to bring it up to date.
Connecting with the communities and their residents in the Greater Lakeland area will be done by Facebook, with Nielsen and Weinmeier as the monitors who will have the ability to post items of interest on the page, making sure to have the facts prior to posting. The organization now also has a Google account where documents can be stored so they do not get misplaced.
Partnerships were also a point of discussion, with two representatives of the St. Paul Citizens on Patrol (COPS) on hand to explain their duties and to ask for additional volunteers to share their load of trips around town to monitor activities. Two residents from the St. Lina area were also on hand to give input.
Both Sgt. Druhan and Elk Point RCMP Staff Sgt. Stephen Nolan were in attendance and spoke on policing efforts in their communities, with drugs a major issue throughout the area and the failure to jail offenders adding to the problem. Even though drug treatment centres do exist, many of those who are treated return to their former habits when they return to their communities, the group was told.
Keeping residents safe from scams is a major priority, and Nielsen will look into getting the Wise Owl Program, aimed at protecting seniors from scammers, to come to Elk Point and St. Paul in the near future.
With Sereda stepping down to vice president from his long-held position as Greater Lakeland’s president, Sgt. Druhan presented a plaque honouring his long and devoted service with the group.
The RCMP Road Race is coming up once again, and Greater Lakeland agreed to once again sponsor the event, which they feel is a “really good promoter” of the ongoing efforts of the area’s RCMP detachments.
