Wildfire evacuees assured their empty homes are safe from criminals

Mounties are assuring Alberta residents forced out of their communities because of wildfires that they're working hard to keep their property safe.

"The Alberta RCMP understand that the protection of your property is second only to the protection of your loved ones," RCMP spokesperson Fraser Logan said in a news release on Friday. "We would like to assure you that we are employing a number of policing strategies to enhance the safety and security of evacuated communities during the wildfires."

Officers are maintaining tight access to evacuated communities through perimeter controls.

Police are also conducting roving patrols through the communities, looking for signs of criminal activity, as well as people who are not authorized to be in the area.

Mounties are using tools like night vision technology on drones to identify suspicious activity in evacuated communities.

Special tactical operations and emergency response teams are in place to react if any incidents are discovered, and police say experienced investigators will be deployed to examine reports of suspicious activities.

Officers are also using tactics like bait vehicles to catch criminals in the act.

Albertans can also opt into the Rave Alert mass notification system.

Users of the free system will be notified by RCMP of tips on how they can protect their properties.

Notifications will also include updates on what Mounties are doing in specific areas to deter and catch criminals.

People can choose to receive notifications about their area, or the entire province.

Notifications will be sent by text, voicemail, or email, depending on the user's preference.

Police say all user information is confidential.

“It has been active for some time and we have safely over 2,000 people signed up. We were using it for our volunteer groups that are partnering with the RCMP, groups like citizens on patrol and rural crime watch," said Supt. Mike McCauley.

"When these fires started up we thought this would be a really good platform for the Alberta RCMP to give good advice to potential evacuees before they’re in that situation and also to update the people that are evacuated on the crime prevention, crime reduction activities that are taking place to keep the communities safe while they’re not at home."

McCauley recommends keeping all doors on your property locked.

"A lot of times criminals if they’ll try a door."

"Whether it’s to a car, a residence or a shed and if it’s locked they’ll move on."

He also suggests keeping a list and photos of all your valuable items, including serial numbers.

"This will help both for likely your insurance if you need it but also it’ll help police identify property if we do catch people that are in possession of what we believe to be stolen property."

McCauley says there hasn't been a lot of criminal activity in evacuated areas, but he knows it's a concern for residents.

"So far we haven’t seen a major surge but we’ve been very proactive in trying to prevent that."

"Obviously nothing is perfect and we can’t control everything but a lot of efforts are being made to hopefully minimize any of that additional damage outside of the fire work."

For the most up-to-date information on your community, call 310-4455 or visit the Alberta Emergency website.

With files from CTV News Edmonton's Amanda Anderson