Crime WID partners with Crime Stoppers to combat copper theft
By John Watson Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
The Western Irrigation District (WID) and Calgary Crime Stoppers have partnered in an effort to stop copper wire theft across the WID’s irrigation network.
The partnership serves to bring together law enforcement, community resources, and infrastructure stakeholders to tackle this type of crime.
“We felt it was prudent for the Western Irrigation District to play a part in how we could support our irrigators. We have over 600 irrigators in the WID and instead of them trying to deal with it as individuals with the RCMP directly, we felt, how could we be helpful?” said Troy Tangedal, CEO of the Western Irrigation District. “When we have a cable stolen from one of our pivots – and really our biggest concern is the pivots that rotate in the fields … obviously they are large. To go and replace a pivot cable is going to cost our irrigators in the range of $8,000 to $10,000, and not to mention the additional work it takes to go and put it back in place.”
Tangedal explained despite the impact to irrigators from replacing the cables, the greater concern stems from needing to ensure access to water at critical times during the growing season.
Some incidents have been reported to have put irrigators at risk of losing approximately $240,000 in crop production while waiting upwards of six weeks for replacement cables.
“A big concern over the last two seasons, we would notice an increase of it. We’ve got guys who are getting their cables stolen multiple times in one season which is unheard of prior,” he said. “We just want it to end, and so we are hoping that by partnering with Crime Stoppers, the signage as one is the beginning of a deterrent, and it helps with the tipping. The tips get the RCMP to help maybe catch who is doing this.”
Kurt Leiblich, president of Southern Alberta Crime Stoppers, explained the partnership is designed to take a very targeted approach to addressing the copper theft.
“The first order was 50 signs, so that’s a collaborative signage around the irrigation district related to the theft prevention campaign that is in place right now,” he said.
A portion of the Crime Stoppers website is also being dedicated to the Western Irrigation District partnership and copper theft reduction program.
Tracking measures are being added to the local P3 tip system in order for Crime Stoppers to better quantify tips that are coming in from the region respective to the copper theft reduction campaign.
“Our current engagement with the WID is slated to run for the next 12 months. The first part, we have a structured engagement with them in terms of what that three, six, nine, 12-month picture looks like,” said Leiblich. “The website addition will be taking place over the next 30 days or so and the conversations with the RCMP have already been initiated related to the updating of the P3 system to help track tips that come in related to copper theft reduction.”
The WID covers approximately 900,000 acres of land, with the first round of signage being installed over the next two months.
Any who are interested in having signs installed in their area and being a part of the program are encouraged to reach out to the WID directly.