Strathcona County Citizens On Patrol have been going into the local high schools and demonstrating to students what is like to drive while the influence of either alcohol or drugs. Students wear special goggles that range from 0.07 to 0.25. Their challenge is to drive a course set between pylons. Stop signs are on the course as well as stuffed animals laying on the side of the “road”. The C.O.P. volunteer walks alongside and keeps track of how many pylons and animals are hit and checks if the student stops at the indicated spots. As well, students “Walk the Line” where they wear the lowest level of goggles and have to walk with their arms down and walking heel to toes along a line with eyes watching a spot at eye level. This is proving to be a very popular event for the C.O.P.

In recognition of Volunteer Week, Strathcona County Citizens On Patrol were treated to coffee and donuts from Liaison Officer Cst Kristin Appleton at the May patrollers meeting. Commanding Officer Superintendent Barry LaRoque also attended the meeting and handed out appreciation certificates to every patroller. Superintendent LaRoque is new to the Strathcona Detachment and provided an overview of his background. He made everyone feel welcomed and looking forward to continued support from the local detachment.

When an emergency hits a small community, like it did to Candle Lake Saskatchewan when the wildfires hit, the local Citizens On Patrol Program stepped up.

Residents were concerned about looting during the voluntary evacuation and potential full evacuation. 

The Citizens On Patrol volunteers were asked to extend patrols and inform our local community safety officers and dispatch of suspicious activity. 

Over the 10 days of the emergency act that was invoked the members logged approximately 350 patrols and logged 7000 km.

As the President of our local Citizens On Patrol group in Westlock, AB – I have been mulling this idea around in my head for quite some time but the biggest problem was funding. In March of this year, our group was invited to do a presentation to a wonderful volunteer group here in our town known as “100 Women Who Care”. They meet quarterly and always ask three community groups to come and present their idea of providing some sort of project that the folks of our community would benefit from. With 95 women in attendance at that particular meeting each contributing $100 – our group was chosen to receive the funds in the amount of $9500.00. We were later notified that the donation amount had gone up to $9700.00