RCMP Staff Sgt. Jerry Nutbrown brings you behind the scenes with a serious of columns taking you behind police work and how it’s done in our community. If you have a question you think needs to be answered in Behind the Bison, send it to admin@borderpulse.ca and we will be sure to share it with him.
As it is the RCMP that has been contracted by the City of Lloydminster to provide policing services to the
city, I thought I’d explain a bit about our structure. Although the local detachment very much operates
specific to the city, there is a farther-reaching structure that we fall under.
Our local policing priorities were just set and these all come from local input which includes City Council
and the policing open house which was hosted by the fairly new Municipal Policing Committee. None of
these priorities are dictated by anyone outside the city so they are specific to Lloydminster. I note this as
some believe that the province or Ottawa sets these.
Our Detachment Commander, an Inspector ranked position, reports to City Council who act on the city
resident’s behalf. The next level within our organization is a district level headquarters which is called
Eastern Alberta District (EAD). This is located in St. Paul and where our Detachment Commander’s
supervisor is located. Our district goes as far south as the Consort Detachment, as far north as the NWT
border and as far west as Barrhead Detachment.
The district office oversees twenty-seven detachments coordinating the administration and some
operations. Our district headquarters has resources that we can request to assist us here within the city
and they come as part of the policing contract costs already being paid by the city. Our District Officer,
which is a Chief Superintendent ranked person, works out of this office along with two other
commissioned officers.
Within Alberta, or K Division as we call it internally, there are four districts and one divisional
headquarters which all the districts report to. The K Division headquarters is in Edmonton where they
oversee the entire province, and this is where the Commanding Officer works out of. Our K Division
Commanding Officer is a Deputy Commissioner ranked position and reports to the RCMP headquarters
in Ottawa.
As our national headquarters is based in Ottawa, this is where the RCMP Commissioner is posted. The
branch of the RCMP we all fall under is called contract policing. The other branch is called federal
policing. Federal policing includes responsibilities for domestic and international threats, border
integrity, economic and financial crimes, serious and organized crime and cybercrime.
There are many groups and units functioning at the federal level which are similar to the United States
Federal Bureau of Investigation and Central Intelligence Agency. The federal policing is a very different
branch of the RCMP however, we do work back-and-forth with them on related aspects where
investigations overlap or we may consult them on areas of their expertise. At times, investigations can
be transferred to the other depending on which branch is best suited for the particular type of
investigation.
We do get police officers and staff transferring between the branches which benefits in sharing
experience, training and expertise to better equip both branches in meeting their enforcement
mandates.
While we get benefits from the federal side, the day-to-day policing in Lloydminster is very much local.
Read more: Behind the Bison – Bail Hearings
