Sarnia's police chief likes the idea of resurrecting the Neighbourhood Watch program in response to the city's violent crime wave so far this year.
Chair Mayor Mike Bradley raised the issue during Thursday's police services board meeting.
Chief Norm Hansen agrees the longstanding program should be promoted and expanded.
"It seems that it starts out well and then it fades, and we can try and encourage that a little bit more going forward," said Hansen. "And you've seen that we've reached out to ask for video surveillance, a lot of people have that now, and there's a way to sign in that we have know that you have video now -- we have that program up and running. So we can expand on that, I think it's a great idea."
Chief Hansen said they won't know the exact financial burden of launching four homicide investigations in three weeks until they're complete.
"The way we do these investigations is to frontload them -- we pull officers from all kinds of divisions to assist. As the investigations wind down, we pair it down a little bit and then it's left with the detectives."
City police reported a breakthrough in the investigation of the most recent homicide Wednesday night. One unidentified suspect was arrested in the death of 62-year-old Allen Schairer and a manhunt is underway for the arrest of 28-year-old Noah Elijah Brown, of no fixed address, on a warrant for first degree murder.
-With files from Colin Gowdy
