Small Town; Big City Drama…

Wednesday morning, I woke up to reports of gunshots, drug busts, weapons trafficking, animal torture, police brutality and doctor abuse leaving me thinking that I had, overnight, moved to Texas or some other rowdy Southern State.

Being the “Good News” newspaper, we didn’t cover any of these happenings, but I closely followed some of the stories develop on Cornwall Newswatch who was at “Cedars on Wheels” on Pitt Street, tweeting live from one of the crime scenes.

“Cedars on Wheels” was shut down by the authorities. Two schools were put on lock down as a precautionary measures as police showed up at a second location and reportedly arrested one person. The two operations were related.

More disturbing was the report of animal torture where a puppy was found with bones broken, skinned, left to die in the St-Lawrence river. What kind of sick individual would do something like this? I felt very uneasy about the whole thing. What was happening to my safe small town?

Crime has always been present in our community. I remember, in 2006, before I decided to move here, I researched the area and discovered that, compared to other small towns, it had a higher than average crime rate per capita. But it looked like things were being done to fix that and offered many other very positive draws, so we decided to make Cornwall our new home.

But crime seems to be on the rise. Over the past few months, it feels like everyday brings another despicable incident. There seem to be an arson on the loose; hasn’t there been a higher amount of fires than usual lately? Break ins, especially of motor vehicles, also seem to be on the rise.

The good news is that there are things being done about it all. Project Harden is just one of the operations that are going on.

As OPP Superintendent Paul Beesley from the Organized Crime Enforcement Bureau said at a press conference on Thursday morning: “Every illegal firearm removed from our streets and hands of criminals makes our communities safer.”

I guess the only way to eradicate crime is one criminal at a time.

Editor’s Note: Right after going to press, another scandal erupted concerning city Councillor Brock Frost, adding to the list of aforementioned  scoops.  It’s been a busy week for Cornwall’s News Outlets!  God I’m glad we’re in the Good News business.