Dear Editor,

I am confused by this issue. Why would a Crime Reduction Unit (CRU) not be the key priority of the police? Is not the whole purpose of the police to reduce crime? I realize I am no expert in these things, but as average citizens the only police presence we tend to see is traffic duty. The article says the detachment consists of 24 officers of which three make up the CRU and the rest general duty. I realize that police are involved in many duties but I would like to know what those duties look like. What percentage of time is spent on traffic duty, what is spent actively investigating criminal activity such as the CRU is involved in and what portion is involved in patrol duty along with administrative duties etc?

A friend of mine used to work for the Calgary Police and told me that at least half of all Calgary Police officer time was spent on traffic duty. I was shocked. If this is the case in Okotoks we need to have an open discussion on priorities. I went to a presentation by an RCMP officer at one of the schools in Okotoks where he talked about how prevalent drugs were in our community. The front page story about the drug dealer busted by the CRU brought this issue front and centre for me again. We live in a beautiful community, one where I would personally prefer to see our police focusing on addressing crime and criminals. If this is not the case we need to know why not. It would be very distressing if the Okotoks RCMP was spending much of its timing cruising around rather than spending its time catching criminals and using budget constraints as an excuse. This article leaves the reader wondering what is really going on with our policing priorities. As citizens we all need to know the facts.

John Lowe

Millarville

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