Pubdate: Wed, 15 Apr 2009
Source: Standard Freeholder (Cornwall, CN ON)
Copyright: 2009 Osprey Media Group Inc.
Contact: http://drugsense.org/url/sRKlJFsP
Website: http://www.standard-freeholder.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1169
Author: David Nesseth

DRUG SIGNS SHELVED WHILE PROVINCE INVESTIGATES

Town Hall meeting set for April 22, 7 p.m., at Nativity Hall, 301 
McConnell Ave.

The city's controversial drug search warrant sign program is on hold 
after local police recently submitted their side of the story to the 
provincial privacy commission.

Chief Dan Parkinson of the Cornwall Community Police Service said 
only "a half-dozen" of the real estate-like signs were planted in 
Cornwall before he halted the initiative not only to appease civil 
libertarians, but to get feedback from the community in the form of a 
town hall style meeting.

"It's out of an abundance of caution and sensitivity," said 
Parkinson, who launched the sign program in January to visibly 
publicize execution of drug search warrants.

The catalyst for the search warrant signs was actually town hall 
meetings held more than a year ago.

The message Parkinson got from the community was mainly a question: 
What are police doing to stop crime?

Parkinson likened the sign concept to police news releases sent to 
media, but despite the comparison, the privacy commission launched an 
investigation into the signs potential violation of residents' civil rights.

The signs included the address where the warrant was executed.

At first it was placed on the property, but it was later moved toward 
the boulevard to deter conflict, Parkinson said.

While local police wait for a ruling on the signs' legality from the 
province, they want to hear from local residents about the 
effectiveness of the signs, as well as the east-end police station 
that's been located near the heart of the city's drug activity for 
the last year.

VALID TOOL?

"We want to know if it's a valid way for us to communicate with them 
about what we're doing," the chief said of the signs.

"If they say 'yes', that's immeasurable to us. If they say 'it 
doesn't matter', then that significantly weakens the strategy."

Parkinson said police erected at least one drug search warrant sign 
in the city's west end.

The chief also said the police service didn't monitor how long each 
sign stayed up before someone took it down.

The town hall meeting is set for April 22, 7 p. m., at Nativity Hall, 
301 McConnell Ave.

"On the face of it, it strikes me that it is an extraordinary step," 
Ontario Information and Privacy Commissioner Ann Cavoukian said in 
January after the first sign was erected.

One of the primary concerns raised by the commissioner's office and 
civil liberty advocates is that the owner or occupant of the property 
may or may not be the suspect.

"The property owner could be made to look like a drug dealer when 
they've done nothing wrong," Graham Norton, a spokesperson for the 
Canadian Civil Liberties Association, told the Standard-Freeholder in January.

The police purchased 30 of the signs, about the same number of drug 
search warrants Cornwall police execute each year.

The signs have only be erected for drug search warrants, not firearms 
or stolen property.

The police strategy was backed by the Cornwall Community Police 
Services Board, the city and the mayor, said Denis Thibault, a city 
councillor and chair of the police board.
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