The longstanding RCMP liaison program in the school divisions has been rescued, with a deal now in place to keep it going well into the future.
Representatives from the school divisions as well as Mayor Ian Hamilton have agreed to a new program, and representatives signed the documents for that partnership Monday morning at City Hall.
The program, in which an RCMP Liaison officer was available to high schools in the Battlefords, had been in place for some time. The program was a partnership between the City and Light of Christ, Living Sky and Battlefords First Nation boards.
The program had been in jeopardy due to budget constraints, but talks were initiated by the City to find a way to save the program and a number of meetings were held.
With the latest agreement, the program will be revised to suit the requirements of the high schools, as well as removing some other previous duties that prevented the officer from being available to the schools at various times.
That had been the stumbling block before. Light of Christ board chair Glen Gantefoer told reporters “we weren’t getting the results we were looking for. So it was time to make it better, and this agreement makes it better.”
The key factor was to “have that officer spending as much time as he can within our schools.” The belief is that by having a more visible RCMP presence in the schools, that will assist in crime prevention in the Battlefords.
City officials expressed satisfaction in seeing the deal signed, citing the importance of youth to the City’s community safety plan.
Mayor Ian Hamilton cited the importance of making sure “that connection to the teens and the youth of the Battlefords is maintained.”
Hamilton signed the agreement along with Living Sky Director of Education Randy Fox, Light of Christ board chair Glen Gantefoer and principal of Sakewew High School Bev Barth.
“Our board sees the importance of making an upstream investment in our students,” said Gantefoer. “This partnership is going to be a proactive way in dealing with these situations, and we’re going to leave behind the ‘reactive’ responses we’ve been involved in.”
“I want to voice my pleasure and my happiness in a lot of ways that the City was prepared to renew the agreement that we had,” said Fox. “The agreement we came to is certainly one as a school division we’re happy with, and I think as far as our students go, we’re really happy to meet the needs of our students, and our communities.”
“We are so happy and thankful that this program is going to move forward,” said Barth. “Together with the Grad Coach Program, we are offering opportunities to make a change and to make a difference in the lives of our students, some of which come through some pretty heavy hurdles.”
Also in attendance was Community Safety Co-ordinator Herb Sutton and Battlefords RCMP Insp. John Sutherland. Sutherland introduced Cst. Garrett Dove, who will be taking on the RCMP school liaison role in September.
Dove said he was “really looking forward to working with the school divisions,” adding “I’m looking forward to it, I’m excited.”
Coming to the Battlefords from Pelican Narrows, Dove has been with the force locally for almost a year and has had experience working with youth in the community, including with the air cadets.
“It’ll be nice to delve into a different side of policing,” Dove said.
