Opinion
Election 2017 is a week old. What do candidates say about our high crime rate?

Election 2017 is one week old with three weeks remaining. A big issue and resonates with everyone is crime. There is evidence of increased crime every where and facts can be found at Statscan and other reports.
You can watch it on CBC or read about it in the Red Deer Advocate, the Huffington Post, and Maclean’s magazine.
Tara Veer our mayor and candidate has well articulated platform on her website;
Red Deerians have identified crime and public safety as their priority concern, so it is imperative that additional strategies are undertaken to ensure crime prevention and enforcement efforts are effective to respond to the safety challenges Red Deer is faced with. If re-elected as Mayor, Tara will continue to actively work to:
Ensure that local community policing priorities are established and enforced through the RCMP’s annual policing plan.
Strengthen the integration between municipal enforcement units and the RCMP to ensure common objectives, efficiency, and quality of service in all delegation of duties.
Prioritize reduction of organized crime, persons crime and property crime in the policing plan.
Identify consistent service standards for non-emergency calls to police.
Reduce the case load per officer and improve officers to population ratio by supporting the addition of new officers.
Reinforce enforcement allocations to foot patrols downtown and in the parks system.
Support the safety continuum from crime prevention through to emergency enforcement.
Increase citizen reporting to help inform crime analysis, intelligence-led policing and patrols.
Establish a strong local and regional regulatory response to the Federal Government’s legalization of marijuana.
Advocate for additional Crown Prosecutors to prevent criminal charges from being “stayed” because of capacity issues at the Red Deer Courthouse.
Hold the Provincial Government accountable for drug needle debris causing general community safety risks.
Quite a large stand on the issue but several candidates think it is not enough or possibly in the wrong direction.
Jason Habouza was informed enough to direct me to the Huffington Report on the 10 safest cities in Canada. These are based on Statscan Crime Severity Index, a new tool for measuring police-reported crime in Canada that for the first time tracks changes in the severity of crime, not just volume.
The report also examines how crime is measured in Canada, as well as recent improvements to statistics on crime that are gathered from the police.
The ten safest cities though of various sizes are all located in Ontario and Quebec and do not solely rely on the RCMP. Ontario and Quebec have provincial police departments.
#1 Quebec City, population 800,296 CSI-41.8
#2 Barrie, population 135,711 CSI-43.3
#3 Toronto, population 6 million, CSI-45.7
#4 Ottawa, population 1.25 million, CSI-46.5
#5 Guelph, population 131,794, CSI-48.4
#6 Sherbrooke, population 161,323 CSI-49.2
#7 Hamilton, population 747,545 CSI-50.5
#8 St. Catharine-Niagars, population 406,074, CSI-52.2
#9 Gatineau, population 276,245 CSI-53.6
#10 Saguenay, population 145,365, CSI-53.8
Then we have Canada, Population 36.29 million, CSI-70.96
At 5,224 incidents per 100,000 population, the police-reported crime rate, which measures the volume of police-reported crime, was virtually unchanged in 2016. This rate was 28% lower than a decade earlier in 2006.
Then we continue down to the second highest city in Canada and you guessed it.
Red Deer, population 99,832 CSI -182.03. Which translates to about 13,400 incidents per 100,000.
Alberta, as a province, did experience the largest increase (+18 per cent), which was largely attributed to more reported incidents of breaking and entering, theft of $5,000 or under, and motor vehicle theft. Grande Prairie Alberta is the city with the highest CSI in Canada.
Canada’s CSI-70.96, P.E.I. -48.52, Ontario-52.71, Alberta-102.49, Manitoba-114.44, Saskatchewan- 148.84 but Northwest Territories with a population of 41,462 had a CSI – 291.72. Which translates into 21,476 incidents per 100,000 or or 8904 incidents in 2016.
Red Deer under the current model has gone from 15 position in 2011 to the second highest Crime Severity Index across Canada in 2016. Do we look at other models.
Councillor Buck Buchanan has been advocating for looking at a more hybrid model. He encouraged Councillor Dianne Wyntjes to propose a Notice of Motion this last term regarding a Hybrid. Unfortunately the Vote went 4-4 hence lost.
What the hope was, was to get the Response Policing taken over by the Municipality and Contracting the Specialist & Federal Policing Contracted by the Force (GIS, Drugs, Intelligence etc, etc). right now we have (160) one hundred and Sixty members (80) eighty of those do Response Policing (Responding to Calls) and the other (80) eighty do other jobs. They have always said they are 12-15 short in the Response area my solution, take (110) one hundred and ten or so and do Response Policing and contract for the other 40-50 for what he called Big City Copping.
There were 2 issues that were concerns that may have led to motion being lost.
1) another Union/Association
2) having the Capacity to do same Recruiting, Hiring, Training, Equipping.
The other thing that concerned the City is a Police Commission which comes with a Municipal Force.
The hopes and plans may have led to a better Service Delivery (more control locally) and (2) two may have gotten us into the game in regards to cost, if we get much bigger manpower wise we will not be in a position to afford to have any other option, other than the Force.
The big issue initially would be the start up cost as there will be a cost associated with same.
Remember this is the biggest Municipal Detachment. the Force has outside of B.C. and for the Force it is about positions in a lot of instances.
So the incumbents and challengers are starting to formulate different positions and the voters need to look at all and decide which way to go. Should we advocate for a provincial police force, a municipal police force, a hybrid model, or stay with the RCMP? Should we study this?
conflict
Despite shaky start, ceasefire shows signs of holding

Chief of the General Staff LTG Eyal Zamir during a situational assessment following the beginning of the ceasefire with Iran
Quick Hit:
A fragile ceasefire between Israel and Iran appeared to hold Tuesday after early strikes from both sides threatened to unravel it. President Trump, who brokered the deal, criticized the violations and pushed both nations to stand down.
Key Details:
- Trump declared a “complete and total ceasefire” late Monday after Iran fired missiles at a U.S. base in Qatar in response to American strikes on its nuclear sites.
- Hours after the ceasefire was set to begin, Israel accused Iran of violating it by firing missiles into its territory—claims Tehran denied, even as explosions and air raid sirens rocked northern Israel.
- Trump publicly criticized both nations, stating “they don’t know what the f*** they’re doing,” and later confirmed that Israeli warplanes would turn back instead of launching a broader retaliation.
Diving Deeper:
Calm returned to parts of the Middle East Tuesday as a U.S.-brokered ceasefire between Israel and Iran began to settle in—though not without incident. For nearly two weeks, the region was on the brink of a broader war, ignited by Israeli strikes on Iranian nuclear and military targets and exacerbated by retaliatory attacks from Tehran.
President Donald Trump took credit for halting the hostilities. “ISRAEL is not going to attack Iran,” he wrote on Truth Social. “All planes will turn around and head home, while doing a friendly ‘Plane Wave’ to Iran. Nobody will be hurt, the Ceasefire is in effect!”
Despite the ceasefire’s official start early Tuesday morning, it nearly unraveled within hours. Israeli officials said Iran launched at least two missiles after the truce deadline, though they were intercepted before impact. Iran, meanwhile, denied any post-deadline strikes and blamed Israel for earlier attacks.
Speaking before leaving for a NATO summit, Trump said both sides had violated the agreement and did not hold back his frustration. “We basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don’t know what the f*** they’re doing,” he said, adding that he was “not happy with Israel.”
Still, the agreement held. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said the country stood down from further attacks following a direct conversation with Trump. Israel claimed to have achieved its objectives, including weakening Iran’s nuclear and missile capabilities.
The conflict’s origin traces back to Israeli fears that Iran was nearing the threshold of building nuclear weapons, despite Tehran’s insistence that its program is for peaceful energy purposes. Over the weekend, the U.S. deepened its involvement by launching bunker-buster bombs on Iranian nuclear sites. Iran responded with a limited strike on a U.S. base in Qatar—an attack Washington said came with advance warning and caused no casualties.
Meanwhile, fallout from the war continues to spread. Israeli officials said at least 28 of their citizens have been killed and over 1,000 injured. Iranian casualty estimates are far higher, with nearly 1,000 reported dead, including hundreds of civilians and military personnel, according to the Human Rights Activists group.
Even as the ceasefire sets in, the risk of broader conflict remains. Pro-Iran militias in Iraq reportedly launched drone attacks on U.S. bases overnight, though they were intercepted without casualties. The U.S. has begun evacuating American citizens from Israel, and China—one of Iran’s few remaining oil buyers—has condemned the U.S. strikes, warning of a dangerous cycle of escalation.
Trump said he is not seeking regime change in Iran, walking back prior comments. “Regime change takes chaos and, ideally, we don’t want to see much chaos,” he told reporters aboard Air Force One.
Still, the situation remains volatile. The ceasefire, while welcomed, remains fragile—held together largely by Trump’s pressure campaign and the willingness of both sides to pause, if only momentarily, from what could have spiraled into an uncontrollable regional war.
Business
Potential For Abuse Embedded In Bill C-5

From the National Citizens Coalition
By Peter Coleman
“The Liberal government’s latest economic bill could cut red tape — or entrench central planning and ideological pet projects.”
On the final day of Parliament’s session before its September return, and with Conservative support, the Liberal government rushed through Bill C-5, ambitiously titled “One Canadian Economy: An Act to enact the Free Trade and Labour Mobility in Canada Act and the Building Canada Act.”
Beneath the lofty rhetoric, the bill aims to dismantle interprovincial trade barriers, enhance labour mobility, and streamline infrastructure projects. In principle, these are worthy goals. In a functional economy, free trade between provinces and the ability of workers to move without bureaucratic roadblocks would be standard practice. Yet, in Canada, decades of entrenched Liberal and Liberal-lite interests, along with red tape, have made such basics a pipe dream.
If Bill C-5 is indeed wielded for good, and delivers by cutting through this morass, it could unlock vast, wasted economic potential. For instance, enabling pipelines to bypass endless environmental challenges and the usual hand-out seeking gatekeepers — who often demand their cut to greenlight projects — would be a win. But here’s where optimism wanes, this bill does nothing to fix the deeper rot of Canada’s Laurentian economy: a failing system propped up by central and upper Canadian elitism and cronyism. Rather than addressing these structural flaws of non-competitiveness, Bill C-5 risks becoming a tool for the Liberal government to pick more winners and losers, funneling benefits to pet progressive projects while sidelining the needs of most Canadians, and in particular Canada’s ever-expanding missing middle-class.
Worse, the bill’s broad powers raise alarms about government overreach. Coming from a Liberal government that recently fear-mongered an “elbows up” emergency to conveniently secure an electoral advantage, this is no small concern. The lingering influence of eco-radicals like former Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault, still at the cabinet table, only heightens suspicion. Guilbeault and his allies, who cling to fantasies like eliminating gas-powered cars in a decade, could steer Bill C-5’s powers toward ideological crusades rather than pragmatic economic gains. The potential for emergency powers embedded in this legislation to be misused is chilling, especially from a government with a track record of exploiting crises for political gain – as they also did during Covid.
For Bill C-5 to succeed, it requires more than good intentions. It demands a seismic shift in mindset, and a government willing to grow a spine, confront far-left, de-growth special-interest groups, and prioritize Canada’s resource-driven economy and its future over progressive pipe dreams. The Liberals’ history under former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, marked by economic mismanagement and job-killing policies, offers little reassurance. The National Citizens Coalition views this bill with caution, and encourages the public to remain vigilant. Any hint of overreach, of again kowtowing to hand-out obsessed interests, or abuse of these emergency-like powers must be met with fierce scrutiny.
Canadians deserve a government that delivers results, not one that manipulates crises or picks favourites. Bill C-5 could be a step toward a freer, stronger economy, but only if it’s wielded with accountability and restraint, something the Liberals have failed at time and time again. We’ll be watching closely. The time for empty promises is over; concrete action is what Canadians demand.
Let’s hope the Liberals don’t squander this chance. And let’s hope that we’re wrong about the potential for disaster.
Peter Coleman is the President of the National Citizens Coalition, Canada’s longest-serving conservative non-profit advocacy group.
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