Chinatown businesses look ahead as Operations Hub to promote safety comes to a close – Edmonton [Video]

A two-year pilot project to address crime and social disorder in Chinatown will be coming to an end. This comes as both the community and the city try to keep the area’s revitalization efforts moving.

The Healthy Streets Operation Centre was launched in 2022 as a collaborative project between Edmonton police, social workers, and other front-line staff.

City staff was collecting information regarding crime-related incidents in the neighbourhood. The creation of the centre is one of several actions the city promised to address a spike in violent crime downtown, in nearby Chinatown, and on the transit system.

But the pilot will be wrapping up in December.

Sandy Pon, chair of the Chinatown Transformative Collaborative, says she knew the pilot was temporary, but hoped it would have continued.

“The idea of the centre is to build more trust and confidence with the neighbourhood in dealing with the social disorder. Having more hands-on services in the area to deal with the …