The mayor of Loon Lake is concerned vigilantism could be the last resort for residents of his community fed up with ongoing criminal activity. Recently, Brian Hirschfeld spoke with Northern Pride about the situation, stating crime has grown out of control in recent months.

“Over the past three to four months there has been a rash of break-ins, thefts and vandalism which has gone beyond normalcy anymore,” Hirschfeld said. “My neighbour across the street, who is 75 years old, got hit six times, the last time was a week ago when his back and side windows of his SUV were smashed out. Prior to that, he had his front window broken two or three times, while another neighbour had both side windows of his vehicle smashed out. There’s just been a lot of vehicles, houses and windows targeted, as well as thefts. We’ve lost probably about $5,000 worth of equipment and tools out of the village office. Other people have had their homes broken into and things stolen. I had a log splitter stolen right out of my yard.”

 Hirschfeld went on to say most of the vandalism is perpetrated by underage kids. “They don’t care and they know they won’t be punished, even if they’re caught,” he said. “They’re so blatant, they will stand on the street and throw rocks at houses. The people who own the houses come out and tell them to quit and go away, and they just tell the residents to (expletive) off, more or less. It’s out of control, and now some of the taxpayers are coming to me and talking vigilantism. It’s getting very scary.”

mayor went on to state, although the Loon Lake RCMP has been made aware of these incidents, there hasn’t been much in the way of response. “The police aren’t doing anything because they’re too busy with everything else and think this is just a minor thing,” he said. “It’s not minor anymore. It’s a huge issue, and we’ve been reaching out to the media as a last resort. The RCMP’s priorities lie in gangs, drugs and guns, and they have been running at about 50 per cent capacity most of the summer. They had to pull people away from Loon Lake to put elsewhere because they’re so short-handed throughout the province. In the meantime, we’re paying tax dollars to have one or two officers in our town, and we’re not getting that. We’re basically getting nothing.”

Hirschfeld also noted, without retribution, the young people believed responsible for these crimes have nothing to lose. “Until we start penalizing the parents of these kids or somehow penalizing these kids, it will not stop and somebody is going to get hurt,” he said. “It should have never got to the point (vigilantism), but how do you tell a person who had had his windows, vehicles or house vandalized six times in a month-and-a-half it’s going to be OK? How do you convince them not to go out, find someone and give them a good old-fashioned licking? We’ve put in a curfew now, but it’s a bylaw and the RCMP doesn’t really deal with bylaws. There’s also a local guy trying to get a Citizens on Patrol program going again, but that hasn’t come to fruition yet.”