Kind of Like Herding Cats PAGE 4
TUESDAY March 3, 2015 • www.langleytimes.com NEWS Ellens Park Dedicated
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ARTS & LIFE Drumming Up Support
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SPORTS Gators Bronzed
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Neighbourhood ‘perfect storm’ for crime EXPERT SAYS CLUSTER OF SOCIAL SERVICES IN CITY IS CREATING ‘STREET STRESS’ MO N I Q U E TA M M I N G A Ti m e s Re po r t e r
It’s being called ‘the perfect storm.’ In a two-block radius in downtown Langley City, there is a clustering of all major social services helping the down-and-out. It is creating challenges and stresses for such a small city. With welfare, parole, probation, social service agencies of both provincial and local governments, faith-based services, drug rehabilitation, the bus loop right beside an at-risk youth centre, it has created “street stress,” said Greg Perkins of Liahona Security Consortium Inc. who took the newly-formed Community Crime Prevention Task Force on a walking tour of downtown Langley hot spots on Friday. Perkins is a former Ontario police officer who now specializes in Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design (CPTED). More than a dozen members of the Task Force, chaired by Mayor Ted Schaffer, met for the first time, to see with their own eyes the challenges Langley City faces when it comes to crime and preventing it. Perkins, who has consulted in problem areas like Whalley and Newton, said Langley City is three years into a 10-year tipping point. Once you go over that tipping point, your streets have descended into chaos and the difficulties of getting that com-
MONIQUE TA M M INGA Langley Time s
Langley City mayor Ted Schaffer shows the new crime prevention committee a binder containing six months’ worth of pictures of people who have committed crimes or have been aggressive or obnoxious inside the notorious Langley City 7-Eleven. The store has put up fencing in the back to discourage people from hanging out there. munity back are beyond challenging. He pointed to Whalley many years ago, when it had hit the tipping point. “We studied Whalley and at that point there were 10,000 calls for police service in six months. That is too overwhelming for any police agency to handle,” Perkins said. But the expert on CPTED
said social and criminal problems can’t be fixed with enforcement alone. “It has to be a community effort,” he said. That includes businesses making an effort too, in the look and design of their buildings. He said the key marker is families. “You want families shopping, visiting your down-
town. If they don’t feel safe, they just won’t come,” he said. He pointed to the large amount of fringe businesses concentrated in the downtown, from cheque cashing, pawn and sex shops, vapour and drug paraphernalia shops to the number of pharmacies. “You guys have 13 methadone dispensaries in a
one-quarter km radius. I would ask why there is so many?” Perkins said. To that end, the City is revisiting that situation soon, said Schaffer. It was pointed out that when the City put in a bylaw limiting cheque cashing businesses, they culled themselves. The City went from 13 down to just three. Perkins said the fringe
businesses in themselves are legitimate, but it is the clientele they bring in that create an ebb and flow of problems. In touring the bus loop, with its backdrop of empty storefronts, he said it appears “as an island on its own” with no connection to the businesses or environment around it. He added that he would not want to get off a bus at the Logan Avenue bus loop. The group was taken into the back parking lot behind St. Joseph’s Church where homeless people have come for years to the soup kitchen. But some have also have been known to hang around there, setting up pop-up tent cities and leaving their shopping carts behind. The front of the church had to be gated because some homeless people were defecating near the entrance. It was learned that several businesses in the downtown have gotten rid of or are considering getting rid of the awnings because homeless have been using them for shelter. Business owners continue to have to clean up feces. The City has also developed a homelessness task force to address the growing issue. City manager Francis Cheung said the City is being very careful not to push hard against those living on the streets, being mindful of what has happened in Abbotsford. Continued Page 5
Trial date set for first of four home invasion suspects MO N I Q U E TA M M I N G A Ti m e s Re po r t e r
A trial date has been set for one of the four people arrested in connection to a violent home invasion that took place in a man’s Langley City apartment on Sept. 8, 2014. Andreas Bronk, 24, was in Surrey Provincial Court on Tuesday, Feb. 24 to start a trial for another break-in he is accused of in
Langley in July 2014 . His trial for the home invasion will begin April 20. Seven days have been set aside for the trial. He is charged with break and enter and assault with a weapon. He has been in custody for some time. He is also facing charges of kidnapping in connection with the repeated sexual assaults and confinement of a woman
who was kept in a home in Brookswood last May. Clear video surveillance of the suspects entering the victim’s apartment building were distributed to the media to solicit the public’s assistance with their identification. “The response from the public in this case was outstanding,” said Insp. Murray Power, officer in charge of the Langley RCMP at the time of the arrests.
The Times posted the story on its Facebook page and there was tremendous interest in it. It was shared 202 times, with 23,824 people viewing the pictures. It was around 3:15 a.m. on Sept. 8, when the victim responded to a knock at his door and opened it to a young woman. When the door opened, three men forced themselves into the apartment. Continued Page 5