Saanich police’s Major Crime Unit had 35 investigations linked to gang activity in Saanich schools from mid-2022 through August of this year, according to statistics released by the department this week.
“More than 10 youths were identified as being involved in gang activity associated with schools over the same period,” Saanich Mayor Dean Murdock, who serves as police board chair, said in a September letter to Greater Victoria School Board chair Nicole Duncan.
The statistics in the letter, sent after a request for information by Duncan, were released this week just as the school board was making its safety plan public.
The information was released for the sake of “transparency,” given the high level of public interest in school crime and safety issues, Saanich police Insp. Damian Kowalewich said. “We thought it was good to make sure that our community was aware of how this perhaps played into decision-making from other bodies.”
He said the statistics show school- and youth-related gang activity saw a definite uptick in 2023, with incidents that were serious and violent. “There’s some stabbings, victim and witness intimidation, assaults, break-and-enters, threats and drug-related files,” Kowalewich said.
The Murdock letter noted the sharp rise in gang-related files documented in 2023 was related to the activities of one particular criminal organization that originated in the Greater Vancouver area.
The school board was ordered to create a safety plan in September by then-education minister Rachna Singh, after controversy over its ending of the school police liaison officer program in May 2023.
Last week, Education Minister Lisa Beare told the school board the plan needed to be revised by Jan. 6 with help from a special adviser.
The board — which ended the police liaison-officer program on the grounds that the presence of police in schools might cause “trauma and harm” to some Black and Indigenous students — has cast doubt on police warnings about gang recruitment in schools.
In response to Victoria Police Chief Del Manak’s call to reinstate liaison officers amid growing gang recruitment around high schools, the school board issued a statement saying that “in the absence of historical data from police it is not possible to determine whether recent reports of gang recruitment or other criminal activities represent a change in activity.”
According to the Saanich police statistics, the most calls for service from Jan. 1-June 7 of this year for Saanich high schools in the Greater Victoria School District were at Mount Douglas Secondary with 14, followed by Spectrum at 10, while Gordon Head had the most at the middle-school level with 12.
The statistics do not indicate the severity of outcome, and include calls to school property outside school hours.
A report by Rebeccah Nelems, an academic commissioned by the Victoria Family Court and Youth Justice Committee to review the Mobile Youth Services Team program, said there has been an “exponential increase” in the number of youth dealing with threats to their well-being in the region — citing the opioid crisis and surging gang activity as contributing factors.
MYST is a provincially funded unit made up of a counsellor and a police officer.
Nelems said that gangs and youth exploitation are not new in the region, but Lower Mainland gangs have become “increasingly entrenched” in the area in the past five to seven years.
Victoria and Esquimalt Police Board chair Micayla Hayes also sent a letter to Duncan, which was part of the agenda at the police board meeting this week.
The letter was sent Nov. 13 after a Greater Victoria School Board request for “insight into youth-related gang activity and police involvement in schools.”
Arrests have been made “that confirm the involvement of youth in criminal activities,” the police board letter said, noting a Victoria police investigation this year involved officers observing gang members with school-aged youth.
A gang member was later arrested within metres of a Greater Victoria School District facility.
West Shore RCMP, which was also contacted by the school board, said there are three Greater Victoria School District elementary schools and one middle school within their jurisdiction, and none has seen gang activity.
Oak Bay police have three of the district’s schools in their area, including Oak Bay High, and pointed to one file in 2015 and two in 2023 that pertained to gang recruitment or other criminal activity.
The Hayes letter said that MYST has observed that students under-report crimes “due to fear of retaliation from other youth or distrust of police involvement.”
The MYST team said that many students, especially those involved in gangs, have said that the presence of school police liaison officers could have helped them avoid gang influence, according to the letter.
Students attending presentations by the MYST team often report bullying, online threats, drug dealing and general feelings of insecurity, which “reinforces” the need for a consistent police presence, the letter said.
It said social messaging has fuelled a perception by some students that police should be feared, and a police presence in schools could counter that and build trust.
Hayes said the situation “requires a balanced approach that includes reintroducing trusted police figures in schools, fostering positive relationships and creating an environment where youth feel safe reporting criminal activity.”
