BONNYVILLE – The Bonnyville area hasn’t seen many complaints regarding the coronavirus public health orders, local law enforcement said.
According to Bonnyville RCMP Sgt. Kim Hillier, the detachment hasn’t yet been issued a case that requires their response.
“For the public to make a complaint, they go through the Alberta Health Services (AHS) website for complaints. From there, the public health inspector will review the complaint and dispatch it to the appropriate enforcement agency,” she detailed, adding residents can also call into the detachment for assistance in filing online.
Chris Garner, director of public safety for the MD of Bonnyville, noted they have had one complaint since the tip line was opened on Monday, April 6. It was regarding an alleged social gathering at a residence and has since been resolved.
On March 25, the province announced penalties for Albertans who aren’t following the public health orders put in place to slow down the spread of the coronavirus.
RCMP and peace officers have the authority to hand out fines for people not adhering to self-isolation orders after international travel, being in contact with someone with COVID-19, or for people with symptoms, businesses that aren’t following the province’s mandates, or gatherings that have 15 people or more. Violators could receive a ticket of $1,000 per occurrence, and courts could impose higher fines for more serious offences.
Hillier said the RCMP would respond to “complaints that are dangerous in nature.”
“If someone is in the middle of an altercation and the other person has threatened them with contaminating them with the COVID-19 virus or something like that, then we would respond to those,” she continued. “If it was something simple like a neighbour reporting that someone’s under quarantine but they continue to go to the grocery store or what have you, then those are considered non-violent and could be responded to by a peace officer.”
Garner added, “Most of these complaints are going all the way through to peace officers in the province, so it’s taking the load off of the public health inspectors so they can focus on things that they need to focus on instead of these public complaints as they come in.”
When responding to the complaints, Garner noted officers are stressing the importance of following the mandates.
“We’re reminding people of the orders that are in place and of the restrictions that they have to comply with. Then once that’s done, they have a choice. They can comply, or if they don’t want to comply then we would have the option of laying charges.”
The RCMP and peace officers typically only respond to situations after receiving a notification from AHS.
“It’s not we’re out driving around looking for these things,” stated Garner. “If we were to see something that’s an obvious situation, like say there was a large party or something, then it’s going to be dealt with. But, for the most part, we’re being complaint-driven.”
So far, Hillier noted “it hasn’t been a big issue here.”
“Obviously, we have very low numbers, thank goodness, of infections in this area currently. I think these enforcements are going to be much more prevalent in the cities and the areas where there’s a higher rate of infection and just a lot more people who aren’t respecting the self-isolation and social distancing.”
Even before the tip line was put in place by the province, Hillier only heard of a couple of inquiries from local residents regarding how many customers businesses can have in their store at any given time and if someone they knew wasn’t following the isolation orders.
Hillier offered her thanks to those who have been doing what they can to curb the spread of the coronavirus.
“I really like that people in the area seem to be respecting the self-isolation and the directives that have been handed down. I appreciate that because there’s so many people with underlying health issues that people just aren’t aware of, and you don’t want that to be the outcome that maybe you infect someone else that could cause a serious outcome.”
Complaints can be filed online at through the AHS website.
