Barrington RCMP to meet with communities

BY CARLA ALLEN

The Coast Guard

NovaNewsNow.com

The Barrington RCMP detachment will be holding several community meetings this spring in an effort to establish and maintain open lines of communication with residents.

The first meeting is scheduled for the Woods Harbour Fire Hall on Tuesday, May 8 at 7 p.m. Residents from Charlesville, Woods Harbour and Shag Harbour are invited to attend. A date will soon be set for Clark’s Harbour.

Cpl Doug Brannen hopes the public forums will address one of the difficulties they face as peace officers - limited exposure to community members.

“Too often, the only times we have the opportunity to interact with people is when they need our help for a specific incident,” he said.

“While we are happy to provide this service, the backgrounds of these incidents limit our interactions to a kind of "just the facts" - type thing due to the requirements of the law. As a result, we often don't get to interact on as personal level as we'd like.”

The meetings will enable officers and residents to bring up and brainstorm ways to combat problems and encourage positive behaviour.

Because of modern technology (cell phones, email and text messaging) Cpl. Brannen feels that many people no longer take the time to talk.

“Nothing can replace personal contact to help build trust and familiarity as well as developing a general good feeling between parties,” he said.

Cpl. Brannen expects a large turnout at the Woods Harbour meeting, where some residents armed themselves with baseball bats out of fear last Halloween as vandals moved through the community, pelting RCMP officers and fire department volunteers with rocks, eggs and liquor bottles.

Establishing more lines for communication and changing the public’s perception of the RCMP may help to prevent such occurrences.

Sir Robert Peel, founder of the Metropolitan Police in London, England, and generally thought of as being the father of modern-day policing, coined the phrase "the police are the public and the public are the police".

“This is the concept we feel we have inadvertently gotten away from and the reason behind our meetings,” said Cpl. Brannen.

“We need to move away from the situation where a parent tells his child, "if you're not good, the cops will lock you up," to a place where parents teach their children that police officers are approachable members of the community who are there to help not to punish.”