EAST CENTRAL — Due to a staff shortage as a result of Covid-19, the Melfort and Tisdale RCMP detachments are temporarily combining their schedules.
Cpl. Mike Benjamin, with the Tisdale RCMP, said that due to Covid-19, the police training centre in Regina had a temporary shutdown, resulting in no more cadets being absorbed into the divisions.
“With the transfers that are occurring in the division, members retiring, those members weren’t being replaced by newly trained police officers,” Benjamin said.
With the academy resuming training new cadets, he said that they expect the shortage to only last the next six to nine months.
“For the next six to nine months we’re going to be working together to ensure that our staffing levels are met… that we have adequate response times to calls,” Benjamin said. “This will also mean that we will be looking at a 24-hour policing scenario.”
As a result of this, officers will be travelling between both communities.
Previously, Benjamin said patrol night shifts would end at 4 a.m.
“If you have 24-hour policing, you’ll have police on the road at all the time— which should put police officers on the road during your peak times of crime at nighttime.”
