Response to a bad idea, badly timed

I'll admit that I've never been a big fan of the police -- just as I'm sure there've been times they've not been too fond of me. Still, I don't pretend for a minute that we don't need them. There've been times I've needed to call them, and times too when I wish someone had called them for me.

But whatever ambiguous feelings I may have about them, I'm not alone in worrying about proposed changes for the police force in our city.

Our mayor was elected at least partly on the promise of replacing our police force (the RCMP) with a local Surrey force. He hardly received an overwhelming mandate, winning only 41.1% of the votes. This was in part because there were two serious opponents, and though neither of them accrued a higher total than he did, the votes they received together (in other words, votes cast against McCallum) constituted 51% of the vote.

As you can see, there are signs on lawns opposing the move to oust the RCMP. And though petitions filled with many signatures (40,000 by February) have been presented, Mayor McCallum remains hell-bent on his plan for this new force. Despite petitions -- both online and on paper -- asking him to reconsider his stance, he continues his persistence, with pleas from the public falling on deaf (or perhaps plugged) ears.

Looking at the steps required to become a member of the RCMP, the process appears to take quite a while with interviews followed by training, which in itself takes half a year. Especially with recent events demonstrating a widespread call for better, extended training for those serving as officers, it isn't the right time to employ any shortcuts to selection or training.

Unless Mr McCallum plans to have a police force that's undergone a much less rigorous application and training process than the standards set for the RCMP, it looks like anyone wanting to apply will have to hurry up, as the timeline is getting awfully tight. Yet not even the website for getting information on how to apply is active yet -- only an announcement that a board has been hired.

Canada Day was barely a week ago. That day meant there were exactly nine months remaining until April 1, 2021, the day when this supposed police force is scheduled to take over from the RCMP.

While it may only take nine months for a human pregnancy to be fulfilled, I suspect the transformation of Canada's largest RCMP detachment will take longer. Maybe the gestation period of an elephant (the one in the room?) would be a more appropriate time span to allow.

What's up?

Even though I live in the middle of suburbia, I’m near enough Vancouver to get there in less than an hour by car. The trip’s about the same by transit, a combination of bus and train. All of this is, of course, dependent on traffic.

Considering this, it’s impossible not to get caught up in all that’s going on with the Olympics.

The event started on the worst possible note, with Nodar Kumaritashvili, the luger from Georgia, being killed during Friday’s practice.

While BC Place was filling with those who could afford (or were well-enough connected) to attend the opening ceremonies, protesters moved through the downtown streets.

In the tradition of those protesters in the early ’60s who first stood up against segregation by sitting down at lunch counters, when Vancouver's protesters were confronted by a line of police, they sat down in the street.

By Friday night, their numbers had grown to over 2,000.

Jevon was in the midst of the crowd outside BC Place. Like the Legal Observers, he was there to watch and witness and learn. He took this photo of a woman whose message is clear. Like me and so many others, it isn’t that she’s necessarily against the Olympics, but against the fact that 90% of arts funding has been cut from the provincial budget, apparently to facilitate these games. What we’re against is the way the event has been mounted on the backs of our schools, our health care system, and our programs for the poor.

But as I’ve said before, here in BC we have a government that’s by the rich and for the rich.

It sounds as though the police must have been getting messages on their headsets, clearly from someone somewhere else, not there on the streets. And yes, this sounds a lot like the way the military’s decision-makers too often command their troops from too far away from the reality of a situation. Even though Jev was on the sidewalk and not even in the street with the bulk of the protesters, he was shoved by a police officer. Not good, not necessary.

And then on Saturday, things got even uglier. I don’t like that store windows were smashed or that vehicles were spray-painted or otherwise vandalized.

I remember a T-shirt that read ‘Perfect Paranoia is Perfect Awareness.’ So I can’t help wonder just who it was that threw those newspaper bins into the windows of the official Olympic department store, the Bay. Since the people who did this were apparently wearing masks, it’s anybody’s guess who it might have been.

Where the police had so much of their original ‘security wish list’ cancelled, who’s to say the rowdies weren’t placed there by those who wanted to discredit the protesters? What a wonderful excuse to get out the big guns. Which, by the way, is exactly what they did.

When I hear that the police are armed with batons and riot shields, I am saddened. When I hear they’re pounding their sticks against those shields and shouting in unison at the crowd, I am ashamed. But when I learn that some of them are packing assault rifles, I wonder whose country I am in.

And almost lost in all the hooplah was the news that Joshua Caleb Baker became the 140th Canadian soldier killed in Afghanistan. It was a training accident, but one that probably wouldn’t have happened if he hadn’t been in Afghanistan. And even though it wasn’t an IED that killed him, he’s just as dead.

When I hear those helicopters – especially in the middle of the night – it’s hard for me to feel particularly safe. I wonder what they’re doing. And I wonder just how secure all these new measures are making us.