A group of rural residents living south of the city of Estevan have had enough and they're doing something about their problem. Plagued by a series of thefts, vandalism incidents and erratic drivers, a group of about 50 residents have decided to set up a Rural Crime Watch program with the blessing of the Estevan detachment of the RCMP. Dennis Blackburn, a Division 3 councillor for the RM of Estevan and area resident/farmer Jason LeBlanc have provided the impetus for the movement and when they called a meeting at LeBlanc's farm on July 26 they were stunned to see more than 50 people show up to lend credence to their plan. "The RM of Estevan can't be involved officially because of liability and insurance issues, but we as citizens can do it and they'll support us," said Blackburn.For now the Rural Crime Watch project that has been set in motion will extend only to an area south, southwest and southeast of Estevan. Residents from the RM of Cymri also attended the meeting and Blackburn said he wouldn't be surprised to see them carry the concept into a larger geographic base. The RM of Estevan will supply signs proclaiming the area as a Rural Crime Watch zone and then volunteer citizen patrols will begin with two people per vehicle making nightly rounds, especially during the peak vandalism hours of 11 p.m. to 4 a.m. "A lot of machinery has been damaged this year. This equipment can't always be driven home at night because of size, fuel costs and time so it has to be left on approaches or fields. Then the vandals come along and shoot out windows or wreck tires or smash into it. Just stupid stuff," said Blackburn. Some items, including cattle have been shot and/or stolen. "People are getting tired of the damages," Blackburn added. Sergeant Darryl Milo of the Estevan detachment of the RCMP attended the meeting to provide advice on the legal issues. Both men emphasized that the mandate for the citizen patrols is not for apprehension of the criminals but rather to serve as a deterrent. "If they (criminals) see our vehicles out there checking on them, they'll probably move out," said Blackburn. "The more eyes we can get out there, the better," said Milo, noting that international border patrol agents are always on the lookout for unusual activities, besides illegal border jumpers and smugglers. "The sheer size of the region is a problem and there is so much activity going on around here 24-hours a day. We have mine workers, power plant workers, oil industry workers moving around all the time and they're all around the clock schedules," said Milo. "So there is already a lot of traffic in the night and we've noticed on our crime reports that the majority of these crimes are not just happening on a Thursday, Friday or Saturday night. We're getting reports of all kinds of crimes on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday nights too. The area south of Estevan is not unique, the regions north of the city and most places near the city are witnessing increases in illegal activity too," the RCMP officer said. It's just that the citizens south of the city are taking action to curb some of the bad stuff. "We're not thinking about being any kind of police force," said Blackburn with a grin, "but if we can get a good vehicle description or a license plate number or simply make them take off because they see our trucks or cars coming, that's good." Blackburn said he, for one, would not be shy to follow up by making a witness report for a court case if arrests follow. He doesn't think he's alone either, as evidenced by the number of people who showed up at the meeting. "We'll work with the RCMP for sure," he said. Milo said that his team rarely has an opportunity to do random drives through rural areas, so this program would only help them. He said the Estevan detachment handles over 2,000 files a year, looking after crimes and incidents that do find themselves in a courtroom or a continued investigation. Milo said that summer weather does bring out more of certain events such as erratic driving and petty vandalism incidents, but there are still some crazy things going on throughout the entire year. Blackburn and LeBlanc will start organizing the pairings for the random drives with the hopes that once the word gets out that the local residents have stepped up surveillance, the small time criminals will think twice about their activities. He added that even such things as drivers of four-wheel vehicles taking to the dirt rural roads (not the gravel, graded grid roads) after a rain to "see what their jacked up trucks can do," ends up costing the rural taxpayers tonnes of money. They think it's fun to slip and slide and power their way out of a muddy ditch, but the ratepayers just think it's expensive. "We have so many transient people around now, it gets us thinking. We drive around and see the number of beer cans thrown out along the roads I don't know, maybe they think that once they get out in the country they can try crazy things. So now we're just going to try to curb a little bit of the crime spree," Blackburn said. The random drives will include daylight treks as well, since the Estevan area farmer said "we've had dugout pumps and augers stolen in daylight." He said he hoped the interest in curbing crime will remain high. Milo said if the group does witness some success, they'll probably stay motivated. "They know they're not going to be vigilantes. They don't want to take the law into their own hands. They want to observe, report and help reduce crime in their neighbourhood, just like a suburban neighbourhood watch," said Milo, adding that if particular areas appear to be a hot spot, enforcement agencies can set up additional surveillance equipment and that would include international incidents thanks to a joint agreement between the United States and Canada. "Surveillance systems can work and alarm systems certainly work. If a criminal has any kind of intelligence and sees an alarm system or video system installed, they'll flee," said Milo, noting that over the past year they have seen increases in thefts, vandalism and impaired driving incidents while violent crimes have remained about steady. "The statistical end of it will be difficult to monitor because we'll never really know how much crime was deterred due to these patrols, but if crimes come down, maybe these people can relax a bit, knowing that they have a better control of the neighbourhood," said Milo. With the 2,000 incidents to handle annually and with a temporarily reduced personnel situation, Milo said this assistance is appreciated. He said in the past few months alone the local detachment has had to deal with five fatalities on local highways or grid roads and those items, coupled with all kinds of additional investigations, keep them busy. Active policing plus paperwork, makes for a full day for all officers. "So if we have somebody out there checking our grid roads, our rural roads and reporting unusual activities, that'll be great," Milo said. "We won't stop crime , but we can maybe slow it down just by letting potential criminals know that we'll be out there being extra alert and spreading the word. Maybe we'll attract more people to the plan," said Blackburn. The Rural Crime Watch program got underway in southeast Saskatchewan in late July.
