The crime rate in the Kitchener-Cambridge-Waterloo area made a significant jump in 2017, continuing a three-year-trend for the tri-cities.
Figures released by Statistics Canada on Monday show that the crime severity index across Canada increased two per cent, a number dwarfed in the Kitchener-Waterloo-Cambridge area, where it rose 14 per cent. The tri-cities experienced the fourth-highest jump nationally, but was not alone, as Guelph also experienced a 15 per cent jump. Provincially, the crime severity index climbed five per cent.
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“We’re severely impacted on the crime severity under the non-violent piece with financial crimes, fraud as well as break and enters,” Waterloo police chief Bryan Larkin explained. “The financial crimes and the fraud has indicated we are living in a different world.”
It’s not an easy proposition to try to slow down these types of criminals.
“We are seeing ongoing financial schemes which are very complex, well-organized, that are defrauding a significant number of people, so that’s a significant challenge,” Larking said. “It’s resource intensive. It’s complex investigations.”
Police reported 2,382 break-and-enters in 2017, up from 1966 a year earlier.
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The chief believes that while they are doing a good job policing break and enters, other forces are still causing the number to rise.
“Our response is great. Our arrest rate is great. Our clearance rate is pretty good,” he explained. But he said the continuous growth in that area is being fuelled by an addiction problem throughout the region.
While last year’s increase may seem dramatic, it still leaves the tri-cities’ annual number (69.9) on par with London and well below Brantford (86.3), and some Canada’s worst cities, which include Saskatoon, Regina, Edmonton and Winnipeg.
The crime severity index is measured annually to record changes in crime. It takes into account both the severity of crimes and the number of the crimes.
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The actual crime rate follows a very similar variance with Kitchener being in the middle of the pack vs. the national average (15th out of all the 33 urban areas tracked by StatsCan.)
The numbers for the violent crime index were perhaps even more disturbing for the area.
In Kitchener-Cambridge-Waterloo, the number rose 23 per cent in 2017.
Waterloo police revieved reports of close to 16 violent crimes on a daily basis last year. There were 5,768 reports in 2017 as opposed to 4,695 a year earlier.
Kingston (+53 per cent) had the biggest jump with the KCW finishing second and St. Catharines-Niagara (+20 per cent) being the other Ontario region to be in the top five.
StatsCan says the number was driven most often by increases in homicide, attempted murder, or sexual offences.
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In Waterloo, the chief says the biggest factors in the increase were robberies and reports in sexual assaults.
“We’ve seen some significant (increase) in sort of the northern part of the region — Uptown Waterloo — targetting the university district,“ he said.
There were 414 reported sexual assaults in Waterloo last year, as opposed to 295 in 2012.
The chief believes the rise in sexual assault reports does not necessarily mean there was an increase in sexual assaults, but rather an increase in how many times they were being reported — a fact backed up by StatsCan, which on Monday said that just one in 20 sexual assaults is reported in Canada.
“There’s a silver lining in that particular piece of data because I think people are coming forward,” Larkin said.
This is the third consecutive year that the number has gone up and the chief says it doesn’t look as though that is going to stop in 2018.
“For 2018 we’re in a similar trajection where we are seeing similar increases in break and enters,” he said, while also noting that property crime and shoplifting also continue to be on the rise.
The chief believes that change will come when there are changes in how social service needs are met in the region.
“I firmly believe we also have to a have a social service agenda,” he said. “Addiction drives a significant amount of our crime — break and enter, theft from vehicles, shoplifting, etc.
“Those are things that we need to continue to tackle as a community more collaboratively. And looking at, how do we address poverty? How do we address affordable housing? Some of those pieces have significant impacts on the crime rate.”
He said the Waterloo police are focused in the war on drugs — and for good reason.
“Our big focus is around drug trafficking and addressing that because it fuels and has tentacles to many other crimes within our community,” he explained.
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