Iqaluit safety committee steps back

Iqaluit’s still-new Public Safety Committee says it can’t pull together a public safety plan for the city before its mandate runs out with the dissolving of council in early October for municipal elections.

Instead, the committee will prepare a “strategic direction” for council that will itemize:

• aspects that should be addressed in a safety plan;
• questions to be answered;
• who needs to be consulted for each aspect; and
• suggestions for how and when such consultations could proceed.

The committee has three months before it must to report to council and its mandate ends, committee member Cam McGregor said.

“That’s not enough time to do all the planning and the consultations that we all believe in, and that need to happen.

“The plan needs to be done well, and not rushed,” he added.

Shylah Elliott emphasized the committee needs to begin by doing a “safety scan” of the city. That means meeting with residents in each neighbourhood to do an inventory and priority list of problems.

The committee also sent a letter to Michèle Bertol, director of planning and lands, suggesting the city adopt the principles of “Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design” — or CEPTED — in the general plan and zoning by-laws Iqaluit is currently revising.