A spike in calls in Sarnia's downtown core has led to the development of a new initiative by city police.
Sarnia Police Chief Derek Davis said they have started a new foot and bike patrol project along the Christina Street corridor, which will be supported by the new cadet and auxiliary programs.
"We want to make things better for the citizens and for the business people that are downtown or using those areas and put a little more police presence downtown during those peak hours," said Davis. "It doesn't change our already response to calls for service, it doesn't change the work we're doing at Rainbow Park, it's just we're trying to bring some extra resources to address this extra problem."
Davis said in just over five weeks from June 1 to July 11, city police responded to 600 calls for service, ranging from trespassing calls to mischief and unwanted persons in the downtown core alone.
"Some of the challenges that are being felt downtown are very specific to that location," he said. "So businesses there are having to essentially police their doors. They're going to by-appointment only services and really reducing the ability of people to go downtown and be able to walk into a business and shop and enjoy the downtown core because of some of these challenges."
The new initiative is set to run for the duration of the summer and Davis said they've looked internally at what is available to fund it.
"We don't have the on-duty resources to do this, so we're having to fund it through other means, essentially through overtime, but it's important to that community and it's important that we're able to respond to that."
The new foot and bike patrol project will run in conjunction with existing patrols, IMPACT and other city police efforts already underway.