The Estevan Board of Police Commissioners reviewed crime statistics and financial reports for February during its latest meeting, highlighting both positive trends and areas of concern.
“We’re in a good position all the way around with respect to all different categories and offence types,” said Chief Jamie Blunden.
Crimes against persons dropped by 41 per cent compared to February 2024, while property crimes decreased by 31 per cent over the same period. Despite the decline, police reported two cases of theft over $5,000, including a stolen vehicle. One of the cases may be reclassified as theft under $5,000.
“The inspector did some digging for me, and we did have a stolen vehicle that was taken from here," Blunden said. "It was recovered and processed through the identification unit, and it had over $5,000 worth of property. That investigation was ongoing, and we ended up catching the individual. The ident officer was looking to try and link up the prints as well as some DNA from there.”
Retail thefts and frauds continue to be an issue, with local businesses facing ongoing challenges in preventing these crimes.
“You know, shoplifting, asking for food delivery and not paying—that’s what we’re looking at there,” he said.
Criminal Code traffic violations dropped by 67 per cent, which was attributed in part to staffing shortages in traffic enforcement.
When comparing crime rates to the five-year average, property crimes remained slightly elevated.
“Everything is looking down when you look at the offence types, except the crunch against property," Blunden said. "You know, it’s up 13.3 per cent when you compare it to the five-year average. The nice thing about it is there is a downward trend because, you know, we just talked about the month to month and the year to date. We were actually at 46 year to date versus 67 back in 2024, so we’re 31 per cent down from last year.”
The report also highlighted that theft under $5,000 was up 48 per cent compared to the five-year average, increasing from 16.2 incidents to 24. However, this number was slightly lower than last year’s total of 26, showing some improvement.
Officials expressed optimism about the downward trend in most crime categories and said they are looking forward to the release of the Crime Severity Index in the coming months.
“We are in a good position, but we always knock on wood because we don’t want things to fall off the rails,” one speaker said.
Although the five-year average indicates a 13.3 per cent increase in property crime, the trend over the past two years has shown a decline. The Crime Severity Index, a key measure of overall crime levels, is expected to be updated in June or July.