A Chase officer received recognition for his efforts in taking impaired drivers off the road.
The Chase RCMP detachment announced in an October news release that one of its members – Const. Camron Ganzeveld –was recently nominated to Alexa’s Team for his efforts to reduce injuries and fatalities caused by impaired motorists.
Alexa’s Team is named in honour of four-year-old Alexa Middelaer, who was killed by an impaired driver in Delta in 2008 while she was standing at the roadside feeding a horse.
The team is a provincial recognition program that pays tribute to RCMP and municipal police officers in B.C. who make an extraordinary contribution to reducing the number of drivers impaired by alcohol or drugs on B.C. roads.
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In order to be nominated for Alexa’s Team, police officers must have removed at least 12 impaired drivers from the road in the previous calendar year. Although Ganzeveld is a front-line police officer, he was able to stop and process 19 impaired motorists in 2019.
After Alexa’s death, the Middelaer family challenged the RCMP, municipal police officers, the Ministry of Justice and the Attorney General of British Columbia to reduce the number of deaths caused by alcohol and drug impaired driving. The result was the Immediate Roadside Prohibition Law, which went into effect in September 2010. Since its inception, more than 72, 000 such prohibitions have been issued in B.C.
marthawickett@saobserver.net
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