How a radio station helped a First Nation reserve fix a shortage of police officers

Constance Lake had a serious policing issue. A First Nation remote community home to more than 800 Cree and Ojibway in northern Ontario, the population was under the protection of a single part-time officer from the Nishnawbe-Aski Police Service.

The police force was staffed from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., Monday through Friday. Due to severe underfunding, there was no police presence on the weekends. A 911 “after hours” call went to the town of Hearst, 50 kilometres away, meaning it often took hours for help to reach Constance Lake.

Danny Kresnyak, a journalist working on behalf of Journalists for Human Rights (JHR), and Rick Allen, a community leader now in his second term as the Constance Lake chief, joined forces to fix the problem through the power of local radio.

“Many elders in the community listen to the radio, and at the time it was our main form of communication,” says Chief Allen. “The radio format really hit home, so we just extended that form of community interaction and created our own radio station.”

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "Many elders in the community listen to the radio, and at the time it was our main form of communication," says Chief Allen. "The radio format really hit home, so we just extended that form of community interaction and created our own radio station."

The Nishnawbe-Aski Police Service heard the call for a stronger presence, and with the help of the community, built a small station where officers could sleep, allowing for a 24/7 police presence.

JHR’s mission is to empower journalists to cover human rights stories objectively and effectively. Since 2002, the organization has worked in communities both at home and internationally, training citizens to think critically. Offering media training to local communities is an integral part of the JHR mandate, and the community of Constance Lake embraced the assistance.

The radio show format is simple: People called into the station and voiced their concerns about the issues facing the community. And while a variety of issues were raised, the lack of a full-time police presence came up repeatedly.

“One gentleman called in and shared a story about when he was the victim of a home invasion,” Kresnyak says. “He barricaded himself in his room and called the cops, who managed to get to Constance four hours later.”

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "One gentleman called in and shared a story about when he was the victim of a home invasion," Kresnyak says. "He barricaded himself in his room and called the cops, who managed to get to Constance four hours later."

Each project JHR takes on is tailored to the community it’s working with and the resources available. So while Kresnyak noted that Chief Allen and Constance Lake weren’t going to “start up an army of freelancers in the north,” they could certainly work with the radio equipment already available.

First up: cleaning out expired Keurig coffee pods and bags of Bugles from the local food bank to make space for a soundboard and microphones. And there was an open-door policy, literally: the studio door was always open so people passing by could hear the conversation and perhaps engage.

For Chief Allen, “policing was only one bite of the apple” plaguing Constance Lake. Other pressing issues included education and mental health support, and while the community was doing the best they could with the resources they had, those resources simply weren’t enough.

Chief Allen and Kresnyak were focused on strengthening a community that often felt neglected by their government – and helping everyone realize that with a little training, the community of Constance Lake could bring about change.

Chief Allen speaks warmly of his partnership with Kresnyak and JHR, and is proud of what they accomplished together.

“My job is to work with our people to create a better environment for everyone who lives on these lands,” Chief Allen says. “Helping strengthen our police force was a part of that work.”

All @jhrnews’ remote community training work for the Indigenous Reporters’ Program is supported by Dibaajimo, an online training platform created by Accenture and Fjord.

Devin Jones is a Toronto-based freelance writer

This post is a result of a partnership between Globalnews.ca and Journalists for Human Rights and is sponsored by: 

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