Downtown Prince George has seen a drastic increase in the number of break and enters since January, according to Prince George RCMP Supt. Warren Brown.
Brown reported the 97 per cent spike during a city council meeting Monday night.
Throughout the city, RCMP have received 261 B&E calls this year, which is up 35 per cent from the same time last year.
"There has been a huge increase in property crime and more enforcement is needed to curb this," Brown said. "We need more presence in the downtown area."
The RCMP implemented a downtown safety unit, which is currently working towards providing services that will encourage people to report crimes and also help further better relations between community members and police.
The driving force behind these crimes is primarily substance abuse, Brown acknowledges, and also new offenders coming into the community.
"We continue to monitor crime trends especially with new offenders coming into town," he said. "The last number of B&Es reported are from people new to the community who have relationships from other offenders they met in jail."
In order to curb these crimes, Brown is dedicated in bringing more of a visible police presence to the downtown core with increased street checks, on foot and on bike.
COMPSTAT has also been put in place since January. The program provides statistics and hot spot maps, identification of crime patterns and active offenders, prolific and priority offender updates and intelligence sharing and crime reduction planning.
The annual performance plan as presented to council also highlighted an increase in missing person calls, which are up 10 per cent from the previous year.
"There is a high volume of missing persons here in Prince George," Brown said.
"Especially youth. Youth in group homes under curfew are just not coming home."
According to Brown, the amount of service calls received was at its highest last year, which was the most received in the last 10 years.
In regards to community safety, focus has been applied to two major areas - the DVU (Domestic Violence Unit) and Car 60 (Mental Health Act calls).
An RCMP officer, a community-based victim services worker and an embedded child protection worker from the Ministry of Children and Family Development all work together within the DVU.
"We needed a more robust service with safety plans so people involved in these crimes are not targeted over and over again," Brown said.
The Car 60 program has seen 63 per cent more calls in 2017, as compared to two years ago.
This program has regular dressed officers responding to mental health/addictions calls in unmarked vehicles with a registered nurse.
The detachment has also been active filling vacant positions. Since November, 25 new officers have been hired with the RCMP in Prince George.
