Province to spend $265K on new police unit in Swan Valley region

Posted on November 21, 2024 by Peggy

The Manitoba government is putting up nearly $265,000 to pay for three new police officers in an effort to crack down on crime and drug trafficking in the Swan Valley region.

The money will fund the Swan Valley general investigation section pilot program, the provincial government said in a news release Thursday.

The Town of Swan River, the municipalities of Swan Valley West and Minitonas-Bowsman and the rural municipality of Mountain have signed a new five-year agreement to establish a general investigation section in Swan River to help out local RCMP, the news release said.

The general investigation section will help with “complex and multi-jurisdictional investigations,” the release said.

Statistics Canada data says in 2022, the town’s crime severity index — a measure that takes into account how much crime is reported and the seriousness of the crime — was nearly 3.5 times higher than the crime severity index of Manitoba as a whole.

Swan River’s crime severity index that year was more than 50 per cent higher than it had been five years earlier.

In response to the rising crime rate, the town and local business owners helped fund the installation of dozens of security cameras and bought a patrol vehicle to make rounds.

In late 2023, the town said it had already installed 20 cameras, and hoped to increase that to at least one camera at 84 different locations.