Despite not having a physical presence in the detachment overnight, the Sicamous RCMP is always on duty and just a phone call away.
At the May 14 Committee of the Whole, Sicamous RCMP Sgt. Murray McNeil spoke to a petition council received at the April 9 meeting that expressed frustration over the “increasing number of attempted break-ins and thefts” in the night. Though it called for 24/7 policing, McNeil explained the current system and assured council the community is always covered.
“The detachment works on on-call operational readiness between the hours of 2 a.m. to 7 a.m... and that’s a common practice in small detachments in the RCMP for communities of this size.” Getting 24/7 policing typically comes when a municipality gets a population over 5,000 "where they’re paying 70 per cent of the costs.”
Anytime after hours when dispatch in Kelowna gets a 911 call warranting an officer to attend, Sicamous RCMP is contacted. Officers who are on call at home are ready to respond as needed. His report showed they typically get those calls four or five times a month, sometimes less. Those span a wide range of reasons, from suspicious persons and theft to domestics and impaired driving, and even a “prowler who turned out to be a drunk person.”
McNeil highlighted the calls that involved property crime as the petition claimed were on the rise, however, there were only five reported after hours from April 2024 to April 2025.
His report also showed that the overwhelming majority of calls were for non-criminal matters such as mental health issues and sudden deaths, when RCMP assisted the coroner. Of the 2,185 calls received over the past year, only 39 warranted a response where an officer had to attend to something that required immediate attention.
“So, I guess the message I want to say to the mayor and council and the community as well is, that property crime is not rampant in town. There’s instances where things happen in any community, but it’s not on the rise,” he said. “The numbers don’t lie. “
"And, we come out, we attend these situations as they arise. I don’t want anyone to think that between the hours of two and seven there’s no police service for the residents and community, because that’s false, that’s not the case. We take it seriously.”
He added that while one member is on-call, there always has to be another on operational readiness to respond to assist that officer, with just 10 calls over the past year requiring the response of both.
When asked about the response time for an officer to get to Sicamous, McNeil estimated about 20 minutes from the time they get the call, get out of bed and into uniform and arrive on scene.
“I think 20 minutes is pretty good,” Mayor Colleen Anderson said, pointing out that the Vernon North Okanagan detachment covers Lumby to Enderby which adds a similar commute for after-hours calls. “You can’t be sitting on everyone’s doorstep 24/7, so 20 minutes I think is reasonable.”
