MLA CANDIDATE ISSUE #1 — The province’s role in public safety

“Poverty, lack of housing and people not having their basic needs met, need to be addressed first if we want to address crime effectively,” said Annelise Beach, BC Green candidate for Kamloops Centre. “We need to address systemic racism is the public health systems, increase harm reduction and things like that.”

OneBC said the province needs to close the ‘drug dens’ and address open drug use, calling it a free-for-all in communities.

“The province’s role would be to close the drug dens, the open drug use on the streets. People who are sick or homeless, they need to be looked after. They need to be taken to a place where they can be looked after properly instead of fending for themselves. It’s a free-for-all out there,” said Rocky McAfee, OneBC candidate for Kamloops Centre. “I just bought a lady a coffee downtown. Yesterday, I bought a guy a hamburger who was eating out of the trash bins.”

“If you think this province, the government is looking after people – not so. And as far as the crime, I don’t know how many times I’ve been to downtown walking into a store and there is somebody walking out with their arms full of stuff. And it’s the soft-on-crime policy with the NDP government. The stores basically can’t do anything. Their hands are tied. Sometimes the police don’t even show up. So it’s not good. OneBC wants to correct all that.”

Running as an independent, Thealo Proctor brings the issue back to economics, saying it’s harder than ever for the working class. He wants to see people helped before they fall through the cracks.

“I think we live in a time when our economy is harder than ever for everyday working-class people,” said Proctor, running in Kamloops Centre. “And yes, there are root problems like mental health, like drug abuse and we do need to be investing in those things to reduce the (amount of) people going onto the street. We also need to be empowering police officers to be able to create the order and police the people who are doing damage.”

“But really, every dollar invested before the police, before the jail system, is money saved to small business owners. It’s money saved to everyday people. Because not only are we housing people, we are not paying for the damages people cause and not paying for the guards to keep people in prison. And I would just like to see helping people before policing them, but also empowering the police to help them. And just overall economy – right now, we are being taxed more than ever. If your car breaks and you are being taxed at $2,000 a month, that is going to put you on the street, potentially. These are things, if we just had a system working for everyday working-class people, small businesses. I think our homeless rate would be going down just if our economy was more stable”

The two Kamloops incumbents are running for the BC Conservatives, a party pledging to add more RCMP officers, Crown prosecutors and trial judges, while ending safe supply.

“I think a lot of it comes down to not only that we have had free drugs for so long – they call it an experiment, but really they shouldn’t have done it in the first place,” said Ward Stamer, running in Kamloops-North-Thompson. “Now we are trying to clean up the mess. And not only do we have to make sure we have proper places for people to get off the streets but have the wrap-around care they need to get them off the addictions, get them the treatment they need and then be able to get a job and back into society. That is really what we are missing through the whole equation. Not only did we get a bunch of people hooked on hard drugs but we had no way of being able to give them the treatment they actually needed.”

“We have to enhance and ramp up treatment options so we can actually have involuntary care options for those who need that critical medical help whether they want to acknowledge it or not,” added Peter Milobar, running in Kamloops Centre.

The BC NDP are running on their record of hiring 250 more police officers, while working with the federal government to bring in stronger laws around bail. They have also promised to bring involuntary care to the Okanagan.

“A lot of the safety issues come from issues like housing and drugs, those kind of things, and those are provincial,” said Mike Wisla, NDP candidate in Kamloops Centre. “As a provincial rep, I do take my responsibility very seriously. The public safety is one of the biggest reasons I got into this. I’m a safety person – that is my trade – and I really believe we have to keep moving forward with what we have started on this and keep going. Keep building our shelters, keep building our substance-abuse housing and keep going forward.”

Advance polls are running through Wednesday (Oct. 21). Final voting day in October 24.

NDP candidate for Kamloops-North-Thompson Kory Clark was not available. OneBC Kamloops North-Thompson candidate Deborah Friesen did not wish to be interviewed.

by Michael Reeve

MLA CANDIDATE ISSUE #1 — The province’s role in public safety

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