It was one line on page five of a nine-page report.
But it caught the mayor's eyes.
Vernon North Okanagan RCMP Supt. Blake MacLeod presented his second-quarter (April-June) statistics to Vernon council Monday, Aug. 11. His report included this statistic:
"During this quarter, frontline officers removed 81 impaired drivers from the roadway; 45 within Vernon/Coldstream and 36 from the surrounding areas."
Said Mayor Victor Cumming: "In one quarter, 81 impaired drivers were taken off the road. That's a sign of us not adjusting our behaviour. I'm glad they were removed. There were 45 in Vernon and Coldstream. It's a homegrown issue. I appreciate the work on that one as it carries very sad results."
Traffic safety, said MacLeod, is one of the detachment's top priorities every quarter.
"The Vernon North Okanagan frontline officers contribute to safer roads through documented contacts with motorists to enforce the Province of British Columbia Motor Vehicle Act which include disobey traffic control device, distracted driving and speed related offences," he said.
In the second quarter in Vernon/Coldstream, traffic contacts dropped over the same quarter a year ago. There were 529 contacts in Vernon, down almost 34 per cent from the 797 stops in 2024. In Coldstream, stops went from 134 a year ago to 109 this quarter, a drop of almost 19 per cent.
Traffic stops in the rural areas of Lumby, Falkland, and Enderby all increased over the same period, including a whopping 275 per cent increase in Falkland (four stops in 2024, 15 in the last quarter). Lumby contacts rose almost 60 per cent from 60 in 2024 to 95 over the past quarter. And traffic contacts in Enderby went up 69 per cent from 42 to 71.
MacLeod's stats also showed mental health calls rose slightly in the second quarter.
There were 514 files in Greater Vernon, up 5.3 per cent from 488 over the same time a year ago. In the rural surroundings, there were 94 calls for service, up from 90 (4.4 per cent) in 2024.
Overall there was a very small drop in total number of calls to the detachment in the quarter, 4,962, down 0.5 per cent from 4,988 in 2024.
The RCMP report can be read .
