Columns: Crime, Crime, Crime …

By Mike Archer. The difference between the community we live in and the the community we are told about in the media is seldom so obvious as it is on the issue of crime.

On Monday morning four out of the five top stories on The Abbotsford Times homepage were crime stories.

From the hang glider pilot in Agassiz to the sentencing of Jarrod Bacon, to the Stanley Cup riots, to Jarrod Bacon’s parents … if the impression you get of Abbotsford is what you saw Monday morning on the Abbotsford Times website you would be scared to even get out of your car on your way through, much less spend the night, stay a while or buy a house.

Monday morning was only one example and, though it may not be true of every page view presented on the Abbotsford Times web site, it is certainly not a rarety.

The Abbotsford Times is probably less of a crime sheet than many chain-owned community newspapers which often seem to rely on whatever low hanging fruit they can find in terms of local stories and, since the Abbotsford Police Department is one of the most efficient forces in the Lower Mainland in terms of its public relations department, there are typically more press releases from the APD in any given week that almost any other source in Abbotsford.

This is not to say that the Abbotsford Times is a slave to press releases (in Monday morning’s case the stories were court stories) but the focus on crime in the Abbotsford newspapers belies the reality on the street … namely – the APD actually does a pretty good job.

In fact, as the APD’s own stats show, Abbotsford, like most of the rest of the western world, has been experiencing a decrease in crime levels for more than 20 years.

So why the focus on crime?

While crime headlines once sold newspapers, it seems rather redundant as a strategy for Lower Mainland newspapers since they are delivered free to every home.

For comparison’s sake we took a look at The Abbotsford News’ web site at the same time Monday morning and, lo and behold, there were the same crime stories plus a few more.

Of the top news stories on the News’ web site there were six crime stories and four of five the top-read stories were crime stories. By Tuesday morning, ten of the top 12 stories on the News’ web site were about crime dropping to eight out of 12 by Wednesday.
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• Issues: Are Some Local Newspapers Becoming Crime Sheets
• Ambrose Bierce: How The Media Delivers ‘Bad News’ … And Turns It Into ‘Good News’

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This isn’t the first time the subject of the preponderance of crime stories in tabloid newspapers
and their impact on perceived rates of crime (vs. real rates of crime) has been raised.

As the demographic make up of newspaper readers continues to rise and their audience ages (fewer young people read newspapers anymore) the importance of the senior demographic may be playing a role in their coverage of issues such as crime.

Marketingcharts.com has published a study revealing that,”The current generations are growing up getting their news online for free is an indicator that print circulations are likely to decline,” the report quotes Jack Finlayson, comscore EVP, saying about the survey results.

From Marketingcharts.com

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Or is it just that crime stories are so easy and inexpensive to print due to the volume of press releases created? Hard to tell but the issue takes on an interesting twist in Abbotsford.

Back in 2005 Cascade Aerospace founder and Abbotsford Heat co-owner Barry Marsden*, who was sitting on the Economic Development Commission (EDC) at the time, complained about the economic impact of negative publicity since, in his words, “The true character of our community is not getting conveyed.”

The EDC voted to pursue a campaign promoting the City with positive stories.

While publishing ‘positive stories’ about Abbotsford is fully within the purview of the EDC, the Economic Development department, under Manager Jay Teichroeb, has traditionally done little in the way of actual publishing or marketing so where those positive stories were supposed to appear is not clear from the minutes.

What is clear is that the City of Abbotsford, under former Mayor George Peary spent hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars on surveys asking residents how they felt about crime. The majority of the 300 people surveyed in each case listed crime as their number one concern.

Abbotsford Survey Filler

Peary went on to fail in his bid for re-election and one of the main planks in his platform was his success in the war on crime. It had little influence on the voters, as did his and the City of Abbotsford’s campaign in the newspapers to have citizens support the P3 financing option for water.

Maybe the old methods of influencing citizens simply don’t work any more. Maybe people don’t respond that well to being told how to vote, told what they think (based on a poll of 300 of their fellow citizens**), or told what is going on in their city when it clashes so dramatically with what they see and hear on a daily basis.

** Pollsters do not have access to cell phone numbers so their numbers are becoming more and more skewed by their reliance on people with landlines.

Do you really feel as unsafe in your neighbourhood or on the streets of Abbotsford as the tiny expensive surveys and newspaper headlines would seem to imply?

Is the crime-ridden city the newspapers portray really the city you live in?

Whatever the reason for all of the crime coverage in Abbotsford newspapers, it really seems to fly in the face of the positive, upbeat and investor-friendly image Barry Marsden was hoping to create back in 2005.

Maybe Marsden was misunderstood.

Maybe he meant, that the true character of the City was not being revealed when so much of the local media coverage of Abbotsford was about crime. Maybe he wasn’t arguing for a ‘hear no evil – see no evil – say no evil’ approach to the way the City’s finances were being mismanaged but, in fact a more balanced and truthful approach to the issues facing the our city.

By Way Of Comparison:

We took a screenshot of the Monday morning web site for Khaama Press, an English daily in Kabul, Afghanistan – one of the unsafest cities in the world. On the entire homepage there are only three crime/war/death stories in total.

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*Minutes from the Economic Development Commission, March 2005

Abbotsford Heat Co-Owner Barry Marsden

Public Perception of Abbotsford
B. Marsden commented on the significance of the negative publicity that Abbotsford is receiving whether it is inaccurate or not, is damaging for the city for prospective businesses and deters people who may potentially move here, which has a clear economic consequence. The true character of our community is not getting conveyed.

Moved by B. Marsden, seconded by H. Braun, that the City pursue a campaign promoting the City with authentic, fact based and positive stories and seek funding opportunities to address social problems.

EDC3-2005 CARRIED