Councillor Shawn Mesheau says he’d like to see the RCMP appearing before council again to explain its quarterly reports on policing in Sackville.

“I think it would be really important if the RCMP was actually presenting this report to help break down the information they’re providing and also to be able to answer any questions of the public or council,” Mesheau said during Monday’s monthly council meeting.

The RCMP stopped appearing before council after the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in March when council meetings moved online.

Mesheau also called attention to RCMP opinion surveys in the last year showing that the force needs to do a better job providing information and service to its contract partners which include the town of Sackville.

“I just found some of the results quite interesting because 22% of the respondents thought that the value of money spent on the policing services was good,” Mesheau said. “That’s not a really high mark,” he added.

He also pointed out that only 41% felt that the RCMP was providing useful information about its work.

The RCMP surveyed 52 contract partners in New Brunswick during 2019-20 including mayors, Indigenous leaders, as well as local and provincial representatives responsible for RCMP policing contracts within their jurisdictions.

Overall summary

The numbers below show the percentage of respondents who agree or strongly agree:

When Mesheau asked about Sackville’s participation in the survey, Treasurer Michael Beal said that he, then-CAO Phil Handrahan and public safety liaison councillors Allison Butcher and Joyce O’Neil filled it out together online.

Beal explained that the town does not have a copy of its responses because survey pages disappeared from the screen as soon as they were submitted.

More specific results

The RCMP surveys of its contract partners produced mixed results (click to enlarge)

The RCMP also surveyed 162 New Brunswick residents and 24 policing partners including other police services, government agencies and departments the RCMP works with, as well as non-governmental organizations such as civil liberties associations and legal organizations.

It says that while overall results show a general level of satisfaction with RCMP services in New Brunswick, they also point to areas for improvement such as the need for “increasing transparency, increasing involvement or visibility within the community and sharing information with our partners.”

To view all of the survey results, click here.

The latest RCMP report for the town of Sackville covers the first two quarters of the force’s 2021 reporting year which began on April 1, 2020. To read it, click here.