The City of Kamloops is looking at possibly adopting a more proactive approach to crime and addiction recovery.

The city’s Safety and Security Committee is set to review a concept known as “situation tables.”

Councillor Kelly Hall, who chairs the committee says the concept will be up for review as part of their meeting Thursday.

“These are community tables, where you bring together agencies… when you bring together policing and health… and you sit at a table and you identify high-risk individuals in our community,” said Hall.

So-called “situation tables” were first launched in 2015 in Surrey, with the province now providing funding for them in 20 different towns and cities around the province.

“If the group determines there is a situation of elevated risk that requires multi-agency intervention, the appropriate agencies will develop and execute a rapid response intervention plan within 24-48 hours,” notes the City of Surrey’s dossier which outlines its program, known as SMART, or the Surrey Mobilization and Resiliency Table.

Councillor Kelly Hall suggests a concept like this in Kamloops may work, noting there are people in the city who already know how the programs operate.

“My understanding is Superintendent [Jeff] Pelley [head of the Kamloops RCMP detachment] has worked with situation tables before,” said Hall.  “The interesting thing is, there’s funding available.”

Hall says “situation tables” were a topic of discussion as part of meetings they held with Ministry of Public Safety officials at the Union of BC Municipalities convention in Vancouver last month.

However, there are still questions about how effective the concept is.

A 2018 review of Surrey’s SMART program did highlight some drawbacks in the “situation table” concept.

“Situation Tables are an effective practice,” the review noted.  “However, experiences have shown that participation in Situation Table meetings and interventions can generate additional work for partners who already consider their staff and resources to be operating at or beyond capacity.”

The review noted the burden on those who are tasked with participating can also have an impact on those targeted in the process.

“The effectiveness of a Situation Table intervention is limited if key services are not made available to a vulnerable person because a partner agency is not present and an alternative representative is unavailable or not sufficiently trained to share information and participate in interventions,” the review noted.  “These delays can result in a vulnerable person living with acutely elevated risk for an extended period of time, thereby increasing their risk of a crisis or trauma.”

Any adoption in Kamloops of the “situation table” concept would still require the approval of city council.