(Image Credit: CFJC News)

By Sydney Chisholm

2022 Citizen Satisfaction Survey

80 per cent feeling less safe: Kamloops 2022 Citizen Satisfaction Survey

Jan 18, 2023 | 4:59 PM

KAMLOOPS – According to the city’s 2022 Citizen Satisfaction Survey, eight out of ten people living in Kamloops feel less safe than they did three years ago.

“That’s a mandate, that is a mandate from the people of Kamloops to say, ‘This is how we feel, it is obvious and we want you to do something about it,’” Kamloops City Councillor Katie Neustaeter told CFJC News.

The survey was conducted in October and November 2022, by Forum Research Inc. and presented to Kamloops city council on Tuesday (Jan. 17).

According to the city, using telephone interviews with randomly selected residents representing the community’s demographics, the survey addresses a wide range of subjects and provides a detailed assessment of citizens’ attitudes, needs and priorities.

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Along with 80 per cent of residents saying they felt less safe, highlights of the survey also included a notable dip in quality of life.

Kamloops Mayor Reid Hamer-Jackson said the results weren’t surprising.

“I’ve been working on this – can see this happening quite big since 2019 and it just continued to get worse,” Hamer-Jackson said.

In 2019, 95 per cent of residents in the survey felt that their quality of life was good, while this time around that number dropped to 83 per cent.

“I think it’s unsafe. I think there’s not enough parking. I think there are too much homeless people, there’s a lot of theft and people will do anything to survive,” said Michelle Crawford, a Kamloops resident who spoke to CFJC News. “There’s a lot of vandalism and people getting jumped. It’s just not safe, and the closer you get into town the more unsafe it is.”

While the city says the quality of life responses are on par with other Canadian municipalities, Neustaeter said the dip is an opportunity for council to make improvements.

“I would also say that it’s very much in line with what we heard during the election that people were expressing,” Neustaeter said. “It is a very important piece of this conversation and it’s one of the largest topics that we will need to work on.”

The results of the survey will also influence the city’s next strategic plan.

“It is more than just, you know, safety as a topic and crime. It also means what are we doing about supporting the organizations that are working with vulnerable people,” the city councillor explained. “What are we doing to make sure that we are addressing the many, multifaceted needs do we have the recovery centres that we need and the bed available? Not yet, so we know where we need to advocate and what we need to do.”