WATCH: Global’s Rebecca Lau spoke with Halifax Police Chief Jean-Michel Blais to see how the past year has affected his force and his officers.
HALIFAX – Having spent 25 years of his career with the RCMP, Halifax Regional Police Chief Jean-Michel Blais has a personal connection to the Moncton tragedy that claimed the lives of three Codiac RCMP members.
“It’s been a very busy year but it’s also been a very eye-opening year for law enforcement in Canada,” he told Global News ahead of the one-year anniversary of the shooting.
He refers to this as an “eye-opening year” because in the time since the Moncton incident, Canada has also seen the Parliament Hill shooting where a soldier was killed. Closer to home, there was a planned attack at the Halifax Shopping Centre that was thwarted by police.
“Somebody asked me if there is anything that keeps me up at night. That is the one thing that keeps me up at night is the safety of our officers,” Blais said.
Since Moncton — and the subsequent independent report into the shooting — the Halifax police force has taken a closer look at its protocol. That includes implementing training for outdoor active shooter scenarios, encrypting radio communications to protect officers and creating a campaign to educate the public on how to survive such an attack.
READ MORE: Halifax Regional Police Chief’s message on one-year anniversary of Moncton shooting
There’s also the need to bolster equipment and safety.
“These items were ordered and deployed before Moncton,” Blais said as he showed a display of a C8 carbine rifle and hard body armour.
“We continue with our deploying. We have a certain number and in the event there is an active shooter we have enough for all the officers who would be responding.”
In response to the Moncton incident, Halifax police have bought more hard body armour vests, which are worn over an officers’ uniform.
Blais also says the C8 carbines can be readily deployed and are especially in use now by members of the Emergency Response Team. In recent months, there has been growing criticism of the RCMP for not having carbines available during the Moncton shooting.
READ MORE: Under Fire: The carbine
All this has also prompted Halifax police to start a wellness initiative, to help personnel deal with the mental and emotional impact of these events.
“We don’t become police officers thinking that one day we’re going to die. We know that the possibility is there but we kind of put in the back of our minds.”
As for how Blais plans to mark this tragic anniversary, he says he will reflect the same way he does every day: by thinking of the sacrifices offices have made and will make.
“We have here in our hallway photos of police officers who died in the line of duty and I stop and always look at them every day,” he said.
“So tomorrow will be another day but it’ll be a day for reflection and making us realize how lucky we are to be living in a country such as Canada where these are truly the exceptions as oppose to the rule when it comes down to the way our police officers are treated.”
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