If you have an opinion about whether or not North Cowichan/Duncan and Shawnigan Lake RCMP detachments should combine into one, you’d better let the government know soon.
We got the distinct impression when the paper talked to officials last week about when a decision might be coming down the pike that the choice was all but made, and that amalgamation is the name of the game.
They say they haven’t made the decision yet, but the wind is definitely blowing in the direction of consolidating the two detachments.
When the idea was first floated we said we thought it was a mistake, and that has not changed with time. We’d have to see some pretty convincing evidence that service to what would become outlying communities would not dramatically decline under such an arrangement.
While there’s no information stating as much at this point, it’s hard to imagine the new detachment building would be constructed anywhere but in the urban Duncan area. To date there’s been no indication other offices would be retained for officers to work from in the Shawnigan Lake, Mill Bay, Malahat area. That puts police services an awfully long way away for south end residents.
It also puts police a long way from the Malahat Highway 1 corridor, where serious crashes regularly occur, requiring police presence.
Anyone who’s driven the highway from Duncan to Mill Bay on a busy summer day (like we’re experiencing right now) knows how much traffic would impede response time, even with lights and sirens clearing the way. One would hope that patrols would be scheduled regularly so there would always be at least one car in the south end area at all times, but that’s not the same as having a detachment to pull from.
This feels a bit like a classic case of officials from afar drawing lines on a map. Contact your MLA and MP if you’ve got something to say about it.