A new province-wide poll says British Columbians think "the level of criminal activity in their community has increased," but it paints a very different picture from Statistics Canada data.
The Save Our Streets campaign released its findings Tuesday (Sept. 24) from a commissioned survey by Research Co. on issues around addiction, retail crime and public safety. The group, which says it is non-partisan, is "providing the convincing data that residents across the province don't feel safe in their communities and don't believe in the justice system."
Save Our Streets co-founder Jess Ketchum said "every corner of British Columbia came together to tell government at every level that they needed to find solutions to these problems, to the deterioration of crime and violence we were experiencing in our communities."
Retail crime is a big concern for Save Our Streets, with the majority of its 100-plus members being businesses or business groups.
London Drugs president Clint Mahlman is a co-founder. He said Save Our Streets is a "non-political, fact-based organization" that strongly believes issues such as "crime, public safety, street disorder, open drug use, violence, and criminal and gang activity deserve to be a part of this election campaign."
"The fact is that today, in every corner of the province, every community, big or small, have found themselves having their own version of the Downtown Eastside."
Eighty-seven per cent of respondents are calling for all levels of government to do more to prevent acts of violence against employees, while 85 per cent are calling for more to be done about random vandalism.
Eighty per cent think retail crime makes the products they buy more expensive.
For crime and safety, 55 per cent of respondents said "the level of criminal activity in their community has increased."
Seventy-four per cent of respondents said crime and violence "are impacting the quality of life in their community," while 50 per cent fear for their own safety in their community. Fifty-two per cent fear for the safety of their friends and 57 per cent fear for their family.
Metro Vancouver Crime Stoppers executive director Linda Annis said 88 per cent of British Columbians say "crimes are going unreported" and 68 per cent say it's because "they have lost confidence in the justice system."
"The government needs to sit up and take notice. Those two numbers together are a big red flag," Annis said. She is also a City of Surrey sitting councillor.
She added that "by not reporting, we get the impression that the crime is going down, when it really is not."
However, Statistics Canada released its annual Crime Severity Index for 2023 in July and when it came to violent crime, B.C. experienced a 4.3 per cent decrease. Non-violent crimes saw a nearly seven per cent increase.
The overall per capita crime rate, based on police reports, is down in B.C. by about three per cent since 2018. The violent crime rate cited by business leaders is up by more than 32 per cent, having spiked sharply in 2019. It has been mostly unchanged since then.
Overall in Canada, an increased reporting of child pornography was partially the result of more cases.
The survey, which sampled 1,200 British Columbians, was conducted Sept. 9 to 12, days after widely reported knife attacks in Vancouver's downtown core that injured one and left another dead.
Both municipal and provincial politicians spoke out following the attacks, with B.C. NDP Leader David Eby saying it was a disheartening moment.
“We make so much progress on driving down stranger attacks and reducing violent offences in our province and then something like this happens and it shakes people’s confidence again in a really profound way, and understandably,” Eby said in the days after.
Conservative Party of B.C. Leader John Rustad said in a news release said that the "latest assaults and killings are not isolated incidents." He said they are "part of a broader pattern of lawlessness that has taken hold in our communities."
Rustad blamed Eby's "weak stance on crime and public safety."
– With files from The Canadian Press
