Mike Osborne's Classification

Jamie Tripp was supposed to introduce Mike but got off on a tangent that I lost the thread of completely so - here's Mikey.

Mike was born in Powassan which is near North Bay.  He's married with a daughter working with Community Living and a son whose a Police Officer.  He started his career as an auxiliary in Listowel, moved to Kirkland Lake and came to Midland when the Chief there took over here.  He's been an instructor at Georgian College, a Training Sgt., a Det. Sgt. and the Inspector under Paul Hamelin.  He's been the Chief since 2009.  He continues to upgrade through studies at Guelph, Police Colleges and with the OPP and the RCMP.  Training is an important part of every officer's career.

Mike has been the recipient of the Meritorious Service Medal, the Queens Diamond Jubilee pin and is a Premier's Award Nominee at Georgian, among many other awards and titles.  He also belongs to all sorts of Associations and is currently the VP of OACP and Chair of OPTIC which is the infor and records management system for most Services.  He works with charities including serving on the Boards of Child Services and Minor Hockey and taste testing 32 butter tarts, working on the Torch Run, doing car washes and playing baseball with Community Living.

As Chief he is connected with and partnering with many community groups along with several of his officers so that the public gets to know the many faces of the force.  And there is an auxiliary group which makes for a great introduction to policing as a career in Midland or with other Services.  He says the Service works in partnership to help provide quality of life.

He emphasises prevention through proactive efforts like RIDE and by analysing and understanding socio economic forces that drive much crime.  He supports the victimised through efforts like Out of the Cold and the Outreach program which have, he says, contributed to a 20% drop in the crime rate.  A good community includes the police.  There will be a meeting co sponsored by the Service and the Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services on Oct. 10 at 7:00 pm at the Sports Centre and he invited everybody to come out to talk about what's good and what could be better.  They will talk about striking an advisory committee and he's open to volunteers.

Finally, he's a Bruins fan.  Don't these people get vetted before they're invited to join?

Jamie asked about graffiti and Mike said that education of the parents is important, then painting over before it becomes competitive.  Every victim wall has to be done - can't have one done and not the rest.  On making the case, the graffiti artists become victims of their own boasting as they can sometimes be tracked through their social media accounts.

Has the cost of policing gone up since Waypoint arrived?  Anecdotally it seems so but Mike says crime has been decreasing since 1991, though calls for the service are up.  It is the case that those released come here because we have the apartments so there is an impact and Midland has to be careful that the right supports are provided.  The Midland Service adopted a culture of tolerance under Paul and through training and long experience the force has only once had recourse to lethal force with someone who had a history of behaviours and, though he had been calmed before, it failed in this instance.  Mike thinks the force can claim a level of success due to this time spent on site and its familiarity with the community.

Britt thanked Mike for joining the Club and agreeing to take on a co-ordinating role with Bingo.