Corman Park residents are seeing an increased police presence as officers step up patrols throughout the municipality.
“People may be wondering why they’re seeing a steady diet of police cars these days,” said Corman Park Police Chief Warren Gherasim in an interview April 14. “Since the start of the COVID-19 restrictions, I’ve directed our officers to increase the number of subdivision patrols.
“We’ve upped our game in recent weeks. We now regularly get to 32 locations throughout the RM, including residential, commercial and industrial areas.
“We’ve boosted our visibility because we want to reassure people that we’re prepared to respond to whatever emergency might come down the pipe.”
Gherasim said the police service is deploying all officers on regular patrols to ensure 24-hour police coverage of the RM.
“I put myself into the regular rotation to help spread out the workload,” said Gherasim. “One of the things that has struck me as extremely odd when I’m on patrol is the almost total absence of traffic.
“It’s encouraging to see that people are obviously following the directive from health authorities to stay at home to try and stop the spread of the COVID-19 virus,” he added. “Another bright spot is the drop in gas prices. That helps our budget because our guys are putting a lot of kilometers on the patrol cars these days.”
He noted that during night shifts in particular, a vehicle being driven in a suspicious manner stands out like a sore thumb.
“When an officer sees a car at an odd time on a rarely-travelled road, it certainly piques his curiosity, and he’s going to follow it up,” he said.
Gherasim said during the first week of the COVID-19 restrictions in mid-March, Corman Park Police responded to seven complaints about people not self-isolating.
“We took a stance consistent with other police departments,” said Gherasim. “We started with an educational approach, and then if people still don’t get it, then we would have to do some enforcement.
“Fortunately, the public by and large were very compliant, and we didn’t have to do any enforcement on those initial complaints. More recently, we did have one complaint, and it turned out to be a religious-based facility whose members were coming together to box meals for people who were shut in.
“They were well-intentioned and took steps to be in compliance right away. Obviously, we encourage people to help others during this time; we just want to make sure people are educated about the health guidelines.”
Gherasim said the volume of emergency response calls has dramatically declined since mid-March.
However, he noted, as the weather warms up, there’s likely to be an increase in “transient crime” such as property crime and thefts in the region.
“We have made a few arrests,” said Gherasim. “Drug users particularly have come out into the area, and we’ve seen a few stolen vehicles. When we stop them we find things like break-in tools and bear spray.
“These are people that are looking for trouble. We also suspect that their drug supply lines are diminishing so they’re turning to other drugs and fuelling their habit through criminal activity.”
Gherasim said police officers have personal protective equipment, including surgical masks, disposable gloves and disposable haz-mat suits, in their patrol cars.
“We also have been fortunate to have had a large donation of hand sanitizer from LB Distilling,” he said. “The vehicles are cleaned thoroughly by the operator with sanitizer at the beginning and end of every shift, so there’s no chance of passing on the virus.
“If we have a prisoner in the back seat, it is cleaned before and after. We’re confident we’re taking all the precautions we can.”
He said none of the police officers have experienced any symptoms consistent with COVID-19.
“Our officers are instructed that if they encounter any symptoms, they are to stay home and put in a request for testing,” he said. “Police are considered an essential service and will have priority for testing if required.”