By Lauren Mulholland
Public outrage over a parole office next to an elementary school has forced Corrections Canada to hold an open house at the Elgin and Gilmour street location sooner than planned.
The office opened in late September, enraging local residents who say they should have been consulted. Its location across from Elgin Street Public School and the women’s monument against violence in Minto Park is “inexcusable,” residents say.
As a result, Corrections Canada district director Ana Paquette is planning an Oct. 18 open house, where residents can ask questions about the controversial decision.
When Shelley Hartman discovered the parole office three blocks from where she lives, she and a number of residents formed Residents Against
Government Encroachment (RAGE).
“We have been so completely blindsided,” says Hartman. “We’re not going to rest until the office closes so the government never does this to us again.”
However, Paquette says the reaction from nearby residents has been unprecedented.
“We haven’t ever had this kind of response when opening a parole office,” says Paquette. “From now on we will probably inform the public beforehand.”
Government policy requires public consultation for halfway houses but not for parole offices, she says.
Centretown is home to five halfway houses.
Some residents have children attending the school and don’t understand why Corrections Canada isn’t taking their concerns more seriously. With 250 children enrolled in junior kindergarten through Grade 6, they say Corrections Canada cannot really guarantee sex offenders will not arrive at the office.
“We were aware there was a school but did not feel there was going to be increased risk either to the school or the community,” says Paquette, adding that sex offenders who are prohibited from being near schools will not be assigned to that location.
“Parole officers park their cars nearby, eat in local restaurants and go running along the canal…Offenders don’t want to hang around here,” Paquette says. “They report here because they have to, not because they want to.”
Albert Galpin has three children in the school.
“It’s so mind-boggling,” he says. “You would think that number one on their checklist is ‘A’ is it near a school, and ‘B’ what do residents think about it?”
Galpin wants Ottawa Centre MP Ed Broadbent to hold a public meeting.
Paquette says most of the meetings with offenders are done in the community, not in the office. Of the 200 active cases, 46 are from the outlying areas and never come in to the office.
Nearly 94 per cent of the offenders complete their sentence without committing a new offence, Paquette says.
Greg Davis, co-chair of the parents’ council at the school, thinks the children will still be safe.
Police, parole officers and school representatives attended a parents’ council meetingearlier this month to discuss the issues, she says.
Most parents at the meeting “were reassured,” Davis says, and she hopes the upcoming public meeting will quell the controversy.
“I don’t think there’s any cause for hysteria. These (offenders) are in the community already, it’s not like their coming in from Kingston.”
With files from William Lin