City drops in Crime Severity Index

By Steffanie Costigan - Lethbridge Herald Local Journalism Initiative Reporter on July 29, 2023.

Lethbridge is no longer No. 1 – in crime at least.
Statistics Canada has released new data showing that crime is dropping in Lethbridge. In the census metropolitan areas (CMA) Lethbridge is now ranked as Number Three in the country.
Winnipeg, Manitoba is now at No. 1 with a CSI of 136.62 followed by Kelowna, B.C. at 128.02.
The City of Lethbridge and Lethbridge Police Services (LPS) shared the 2022 Crime Severity Index information at City Hall on Thursday.
LPS Chief Shahin Mehdizadeh said safety in the community is important to the police.
“A safe community for all our residents is a police service’s Number One mission and priority.”
When reviewing CSI data the chief said it’s important for residents to understand the city is ranked in two ways.
It is ranked as a single municipality, which is just the City of Lethbridge itself, and as a census metropolitan area which Statistics Canada defines as Lethbridge, Coaldale, and Picture Butte – even though the rural communities are policed by the RCMP, said Mehdizadeh.
The CSI dropped by 8.12 per cent with Lethbridge overall crime decreasing by five per cent. Violent crimes, however, increased by 1.43 per cent. Non-violent crimes have decreased by 11.22 per cent compared to 2021.
Lethbridge had a CSI of 118.97 in 2022, compared to 129.48 in 2021 and 138.65 in 2020. Its CSI in 2019 was 141.67.
Mehdizadeh expressed his pride in calling Lethbridge his home and the funding to increase police force capacity on the streets.
“I’m very proud to call this community my home as we are moving certainly towards a good direction. We had additional funding provided by council to the LPS budget. We continue to work to increase our street strength and capacity.”
Mehdizadeh said the LPS has implemented a crime analysis unit, which has assisted with the lowering of the CSI.
“We’ve implemented a dedicated crime analysis unit to support and further enhance ComStat efforts.”
He said the police is focusing greater efforts and attention on the management of prolific offenders, including monitoring individuals in the community and added this is “working very well.”
Mehdizadeh said crime issues in Lethbridge are complex and require “a collaborative approach.” He stated the social issues contributing to crime include addiction, homelessness, and mental health.
“The opioid crisis, in particular, has had a significant impact. With respect to spin-off crime in our community, we will continue to work with and support the City of Lethbridge in their efforts to advocate for much-needed social services, supportive housing, and treatment programs to help break the cycle of crime for many individuals here.”
Mehdizadeh said a high spike in this year’s crime has been analyzed to be located in the downtown south zone. The west and north parts of Lethbridge have had a significant decrease in crime.
Mayor Blaine Hyggen said work still needs to be done but is celebrating the decreasing crime rate.
“There’s so much work still to be done. But there’s times that I think it’s important to celebrate some of these, I don’t know if you’d call them a win, but they are when our Crime Severity Index is going down,” said Hyggen.
Hyggen expressed his gratitude towards the LPS and acknowledged their work has not being easy, especially with the ongoing issues in the past few years.
“I look at our police service and the work that they do, and I want to make sure that I give a shout-out to each and every one of them because it’s not easy.
“It’s not easy to be in that line of work, especially in these last few years when there’s a lot of different issues that have come out. We’ve heard about the opioid crisis, we’ve been coming through a pandemic, and they still put on that uniform and go into work each day, which is extremely impressive.”
Hyggen acknowledged challenges with the judicial system and offenders being continually released in the community and then being rearrested.
“I’ve said time and time again that the judicial system, in my opinion, is broken. The judicial system is broken, our officers do their work, they take these perpetrators in, and many of the times these officers are back rearresting that same offender time and time again.”
Despite the ongoing work, Lethbridge needs to continue workng, Hyggen emphasized,to be a safe community.
“Lethbridge is a safe community, and it’s proven with the different stats we’d heard a couple of weeks ago another report that was done that (Lethbridge) is one of the safest communities in Canada.
“And again, is there more than we can do? Absolutely. But we need to celebrate those wins when we have something that comes in and states that we’re the safest community, and in Canada, we need to be proud of that.”
Nationwide, the Violent CSI rose five per cent in 2022 after a six per cent increase in the previous year.
For 2022, the Violent CSI had higher rates of robbery which was up 15 per cent, extortion (39 per cent) and homicide (eight per cent). The homicide rate increased for the fourth straight year.
StatsCan says Indigenous people are overrepresented among violence victims, including homicide. There were 225 reported Indigenous homicide victims last year, 32 more than in 2021, There were 265 homicide victims identified as racialized, meaning they belong to one of the visible minority groups that are defined by the Employment Equity Act.
The Non-violent CSI rose four per cent in 2022 but was six per cent lower than in 2019.
Alberta’s overall CSI was 103.21 in 2022, and increase of 1.92 per cent over 2021. The Violent CSI dropped by 3.21 per cent while non-violent crime increased by 4.32 per cent last year over 2021.

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