Property crime on the rise in Whitehorse, according to RCMP — and businesses say they're feeling the strain
CBC
Property crime has been on the rise in Whitehorse, according to RCMP — and some local business owners say they're becoming increasingly frustrated.
Alina Knaack, the assistant manager of the Paradise Alley gift shop in downtown Whitehorse, estimates that there have been 12 incidents of attempted theft at her story in the past month alone.
"We haven't kept too much track of them because it is a little depressing," Knaack said.
"I would say it's probably about 60/40, percentage-wise, from unsuccessful to successful — unfortunately leaning more to the successful side, because they're unfortunately getting smarter, or they're getting a lot faster."
Last summer, the gift shop on Main Street used a large sidewalk sign to plead with thieves to stop. This summer the store has taken to hosting a "wall of shame," which Knaack says utilizes security-cam images to identify suspected thieves and harassers.
She believes some of the issues surrounding property crime are due to a lack of resources for the RCMP, and a lack of statutes such as trespassing legislation.
Pret Sidhu, the manager of Tags Food and Gas on Fourth Avenue, agrees that property crime has become a big problem. He believes Whitehorse is "going downhill."
"We're letting the people that are bad people keep committing the crimes," Sidhu said.
According to a news release from Yukon RCMP earlier this month, property crimes have been on the rise in Whitehorse. While businesses are most often the target of the crimes, police say the data shows that private property owners are experiencing it as well.
RCMP say that over half of the police calls related to property crime from April to June of this year stemmed from the downtown core.
Some of the most common crimes, according to police, included theft under $5,000, which saw a 28.6-per-cent increase compared to the same quarter last year, and thefts from a motor vehicle, which saw a 108-per-cent increase. Overall, police say property crimes from April to June increased by 44.7 per cent in Whitehorse compared to the same quarter last year.
Yukon's opposition parties have also weighed in recently, saying it's up to the territorial government to better address the issue.
In a news release last week, the Yukon Party called on the territorial government to "properly resource the RCMP" and identify property crime as a priority for the force.
The Yukon NDP also issued a statement, calling on the government to address the increasing crime rate. However, Lane Tredger, the NDP MLA for Whitehorse Centre, argues that an increase in police budgets doesn't necessarily correlate to a decrease in crime.
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