An Analysis of the Sustainability of British Columbia’s Crime Reduction Initiatives

In 2005, British Columbia launched an ambitious, police-led crime reduction initiative in response to rising crime and the proliferation of drug-related gang violence, at a time when Vancouver was
labelled the property crime capital of Canada and Surrey the auto theft capital of the world (Cohen et al., 2014). The initiative rested on the premise that meaningful reductions in crime required the
police to be intensely information- and intelligence-led, problem-focused, offender-focused, preemptive, performance-based, and committed to strategic partnerships, and that this work be pursued as a whole community, rather than a purely police undertaking. Early evaluations were
encouraging, as crime reduction jurisdictions experienced larger declines in property and overall
crime than the rest of the province, and the Prolific and Priority Offender Management Program was associated with a 40% reduction in recidivism among the offenders it managed (Haarhoff, 2011; Rezansoff et al., 2012). However, its effect on violent crime was less clear.

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