Calls to the police are down significantly in the City of Parksville, but overall have increased slightly across the region in the first six months of 2025, according to Oceanside RCMP.
“We are up about four-and-a-half per cent total this year, over where we were this time last year,” Staff Sgt. Travis De Coene noted in a presentation to Parksville council on June 16. “For Parksville this year, it’s actually down quite substantially, so 2,300 roughly this time last year. We’re down to just over 2,000 this year, so it’s great all in all.”
Assault is down by six per cent, robbery has decreased by 67 per cent and sex offences are down by 10 per cent. Although calls for harassment were up by an alarming 433 per cent, De Coene said that is still just a total of 16 incidents.
“Our files are for the most part on the down trend, for our criminal code stuff, whether it be persons crimes or property crimes," De Coene said. "Our increase in files is generally the Mental Health Act, substance abuse stuff — general nuisance files we classify them as.”
One of the community priorities identified for 2025 is property and vandalism, which includes working with the city bylaw department and organizations like the Society of Organized Services to move along people who are unhoused and living rough in encampments.
Residents in the Regional District of Nanaimo have become increasingly concerned as bears have recently been attracted to garbage and other attractants at a homeless encampment by Chattel Road.
Coun. Joel Grenz brought up community concerns about fires and interactions with wildlife that have been connected to encampments, and asked how council can help RCMP through advocacy to senior levels of government.
“A lot of those issues are social issues," De Coene said. "The police absolutely do not want to be the people that go and take these individuals homes, so an abundance of caution is used when we’re dealing with those. Our best line of defence is to not let them establish too much, or at least keep them moving so the individuals are moving around. They’re always going to find somewhere else, they need a place to be anyways.”
Oceanside RCMP partners with other agencies, he added, and recently signed a letter with the RDN that asks the province to consider putting up some barricades to prevent people from parking RVs at the Chattel Road site.
“The tents aren’t the end of the world because they’re always movable," he said. "It’s the RVs and the stuff that costs money. Nobody wants to touch them."
De Coene added that when RCMP tow away an RV, the cost comes out of their budget.
Another community priority identified is traffic and pedestrians and De Coene said he hears about lots of issues with school zones, as well as people crossing the Island Highway to get from the beach to the downtown core.
“We’re not gonna be the bad guys out there issuing jaywalk tickets and stuff like that, but we may do warnings and just go into the schools, those type of things, to pass the word," he added.
In the past three months, Oceanside RCMP have conducted 47 impaired driving investigations, according to De Coene.
“We’ve attended 170 crashes. Unfortunately we’ve had three fatals here in the last little while, so it’s been predominately out on the highways and out on the inland highway,” he added.
Oceanside RCMP have a total of 39 regular members, with 18 in Parksville, 13 in the Regional District of Nanaimo rural areas and eight in Qualicum Beach, in addition to 11 civilian staff.
Currently there are two vacant positions, which De Coene anticipates will be filled this summer.
