Results from the Policing and Community Safety Survey were shared at Police Commission's monthly meeting Thursday night (photo courtesy Derek Brade)

By Teagan Rasche

MHPS gets high marks in public survey

Jan 27, 2022 | 10:15 PM

MEDICINE HAT, AB – Results from the Policing and Community Safety Survey were shared Thursday at the Medicine Hat Police Commission’s monthly meeting.

The 400-person survey was conducted by Framework Partners Inc. during December to gather input from the community and better understand public concerns.

The Medicine Hat Police Commission, the citizen oversight body of the MHPS sponsored and conducted the survey.

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“We received great feedback on our engagement with the community, our professionalism, some of the things we are doing program-wise,” police chief Mike Worden said. “The community is supportive of the things we’re doing and the trust and confidence is high, which is important to us.”

One of the top three findings strength-wise was 71 per cent of people surveyed are generally satisfied with the Medicine Hat Police Service. The satisfaction rate has risen steadily in four surveys since 2011.

One of the questions on the survey asked people to use a scale of 1 to 7, where 1 is very satisfied and 7 is very dissatisfied, to indicate how satisfied or dissatisfied they are in general with the Medicine Hat Police Service. These are the results from the last four surveys (graph courtesy Framework Analytics Inc.)

“The biggest takeaways for us are the satisfaction is strong and satisfaction has improved,” Alex Milne, principal with Framework Analytics said.

Other key findings are 89 per cent of people agree that their interaction with a police officer was professional and 77 per cent of Hatters surveyed say they feel safe in their city.

However, just under one third of people feel uncomfortable or afraid to go downtown or to the Flats area. Worden says this is an opportunity for the police to communicate what is actually occurring down there.

“Whether it be through crime trends, working with our partners and working with the City of Medicine Hat to ensure that, whether it be through environmental design, some of the security systems that are in the area, whether it be cameras, technology,” Worden said. “When people come down to the city of Medicine Hat, the downtown core, they should feel safe to do that.”

Overall, Milne calls the results a “win,” especially considering the survey was conducted after nearly two years in a pandemic.