The Halifax police commission will work on ways to better prepare for large and violent gatherings in the wake of the Dalhousie University homecoming street party on Sunday.
An estimated 3,000 to 4,000 people converged on Larch, Preston and Jennings streets near the university. Many climbed poles and trees and set off fireworks with some directed toward houses while fights broke out within the large crowd.
One person was stabbed and taken to hospital with injuries that weren’t life-threatening.
Bottles, cans and debris from the storm were thrown at Halifax Regional Police officers who were on scene throughout the day and into the evening. Officers were punched, kicked and spat on and some required treatment for non-life-threatening injuries.
HRP Chief Dan Kinsella said his department plans “very early” for the homecoming event given similar problems in recent years.
Officers speak to students and the university community ahead of time to get a sense of what they might be facing but it’s always difficult to know specifics such as numbers, Kinsella said.
“Unbeknownst to us about 10 p.m. about 2,000 students showed up, some highly intoxicated,” on top of the thousands that had already gathered, he told police commission members at its regular meeting on Wednesday evening.
“As we assessed the scene we were able to bring the situation under control (but) we’ve got to change the way we do it,” he said at the meeting. “And it’s not just the police involved in it, we need to reach out and have connections with Dalhousie.”
Legislative changes suggested
Kinsella said he wrote to Dalhousie president Deep Saini this week to try to open a dialogue on better co-operation between the university and police on dealing with future events.
In a statement after the event, Saini said the municipality is responsible for enforcing the law but “we also intend to investigate and determine appropriate consequences for the members of our Dalhousie student community who were involved in or helped to organize these dangerous parties.”
Kinsella also raised the possibility of changing municipal legislation around what police can do in terms of controlling unruly crowds in Halifax.
“If we’re going to go down that route, we also need support from the courts, to say that yes we are going to support through this process if in fact enforcement and charges are laid,” he said.
Gavin Giles, who was sworn in as the new police commission chair Wednesday, asked Kinsella about media reports that there were too few officers on the scene.
“I’m not suggesting a militaristic response by any stretch but I am concerned about the issue of non-participant and officer safety in circumstances where there are large throngs of people acting irrationally and perhaps illegally and perhaps limited numbers of officers,” Giles said.
Kinsella confirmed HRP officers did have to be redeployed from other coverage to attend the scene and the Halifax RCMP assisted by providing back-up for possible gaps, which isn’t unusual in terms of co-operation between the two forces.
“We were out early on Saturday morning as we have been in past years and we were out with a significant contingent of officers that were called in over and above our patrol structure,” he said.
