With media attention currently focused on how Surrey’s streets resemble shooting galleries, it’s easy to forget that our neighbourhoods are also plagued by property crimes.
Thanks to over-development, there are now many homes in Surrey with legal or illegal secondary suites as well as empty houses awaiting redevelopment.
Often homeowners fail to vet prospective tenants adequately and thus inadvertently rent to active criminals who victimize our neighbourhoods like a spreading cancer, using their rental suites as a base of operations for burglaries, auto thefts and drug dealing.
What should be done?
First, the Residential Tenancy Branch must make it easier for landlords to evict potentially dangerous criminals, which can now take up to eight months.
Most importantly, Surrey’s crime-fighting program, which is already partially financed by secondary suite fees, should expand to include additional RCMP strike force units that target prolific criminals living in our midst. Give these miscreants a new home in prison where they belong.
Gary Cameron, Surrey
Restore funds for prevention in schools
Getting tough on crime means starting with crime prevention.
School counsellors, child care workers, youth workers, education assistants are already in our schools. Restoring funding would be a great place for Christy Clark to help youth in our communities make better choices.
Kathy Leko, Surrey