NDP shadow minister hears local safety concerns

By Justin Seward - Lethbridge Herald on November 12, 2024.

David Shepherd, Alberta’s official opposition Shadow Minister for Public Safety and Emergency Services, visited Lethbridge on Saturday to speak with citizens about their concerns will public safety.
“Things have gotten exponentially worse over the last five years,” said Shepherd.
“There’s a lot of factors around that but I think a lot of that is decisions of this provincial government.”
A recent Alberta Municipalities survey showed that 60 per cent of Albertans feel unsafe in their communities.
“They feel that crime is on the rise,” said Shepherd.
“It’s higher among women. I think two-thirds of women are feeling unsafe, one in four Albertans have been a victim of crime and about 50 per cent of Albertans fear that they’re going to be the next victim.”
The Alberta NDP says public safety has degraded significantly under the Danielle Smith UCP government.
“I know here in Lethbridge, certainly that’s been a concern that we’ve heard from folks,” said Shepherd.
“I know it’s been a conversation with city council, certainly during the time that Shannon Phillips was my colleague and MLA here. (I) certainly heard from her about those concerns in this local community.”
Top concerns the NDP hear about is the current government not providing enough social services and supports for those needing them, the addictions crisis centred around drug poisonings and substance abuse struggles, the need for more police presence, affordability and income inequality.
“So folks really recognize that this is a complex crisis, there’s a numbers of things we need to do and the common thread through all of that, these are all issues that are within the responsibility and the control of the provincial government,” said Shepherd.
Shepherd thinks a lot of issues have stemmed from the UCP’s ideological approach.
“Where they want to control as much as possible, they’ve pulled back a lot of funding and they’re making it much more difficult for the people that actually have the expertise who are on the ground in the community to be actually able to help,” said Shepherd.
The Alberta NDP’s focus is taking real action and look into making real investments, he says.
“Police law enforcement, they are key partners in this, they’re absolutely (an) essential part of how we build safety in our communities but police are not social workers, police are not mental health workers,” said Shepherd.
“So if we want to support our frontline police officers, we need our provincial government to step up and provide the funding and the support to be able to provide those kinds of supports.”
Shepherd met with Team Lethbridge, Mayor Blaine Hyggen and councillors at last week’s Rural Municipalities Association conference in Edmonton.
“What I’m hearing is they feel there has been some improvement,” said Shepherd.
“The city, I think, has worked very hard. I’ve been reading some of the conversations and the records and certainly the city stepped up in a lot of ways. They recognized the provincial government was not stepping up, so the city did.”

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