8 ~ North Shore News — sunday, May 14, 2000

Band to
chase
digital
dollars”

. From page 4

> of finance, said « on Thursday --
that the. capital cost will be.
‘handled: ° by | Squamish
Telecom Led., which is owned

and operate the cable. :5'

ae well as providiig ‘a.

ed link p
¢ cable will enable the
l Squish Nation to compete °
with other providers for

the digital economy. :

In fibre-optic cable, dats 15°

smitted : cas gh

‘ here is is currently 1 no > fibre:
tic. cable 2 to. . Whistler,

for its riem-. re

From page

Dispatch told hin that there
was nothing to report at the
time.
That didn’t ease Bell's
mind.

“My wife and 1 both spent a
. sleepless night wondering what
it was we'd heard and where it

“was going to show up and kind
_of. worried that there were

numerous occupants in the
vehicle.”

In a‘ strange twist of fate,
one hour before the crash, Bell
had driven home his daughter’s
best friend — Lauren Downs,

: » the sister of the teen who died.

“We didn’t find out it was
» Nick Downs until Sunday
night,” said Bell.

He continued through the

~ next day with thoughts of the

revious night’s crash fresh in

At 5 . that afternoon,
ae Bit in the bsck-

: ri Bell saw a helicopier fly

over hishorne.
* He! again. called ‘the West
dispatcher to

at his report was not related. *

>,

Later: that. evening,  Bell’s '

auyhter received a call from a
bour who said that police
ad lorsed a car in the ravine. .
I thers walked up to. the

“raving an and informed the P officers :
there’ thac,he had reported the ©

the night before.
“This was all going through
my mind arid I was rather tra

‘scanda

matized by what (my wife and
1) heard and the fact that I had
nobody from the West
Vancouver Police call me, visit
ine or communicate with me.”
Bell added that it was
cially surprising because after
making the initial call to 9-1-1,
he had made cwo additional

‘galls to West Vancouver Police

dispatch and still received no
fesponse.

_ The next morning Bell went
clown to West Vancouver Police
f:cadquarters to discuss the sit-
ution and the police response
to his initial report.

fell said he: met with Spt.
Wayne Giesbrecht, who admit-
ted that the police department
was having problems with its
dispatch system.

Bell had yet to discover just
how serious the problems were.
Giesbrecht told him that when
he checked, dispatch had

reported that a resident had

called in and said they had
heard a “crunching sound” on
the Upper Levels Highway and
believed it to be a car accideat.
. ‘That flew in the face of what
Bell initially told 9-1-1 when he
first called at 1:15 am. on
Sunday.

.  “L said [ was very detailed
with the 9-1-1

tor... the ©

the Cypress

car had gone of

- Creek: Bridge into ‘the ravine.
: And I described why I believed | jf

that to be the case.”
“They told me. that. there
was a. discrepancy and they

cy ;
_ would pull the tape of the 9-1-_
1 recording and find out what

was going on.’

’ says Wi

easier said than done.
~ Bell was then contacted by
another officer, Staff Sgt. Scorz
Armstrong, who told a sur-
prised Bell that a recording of
his tape didn’t exist.
“Armstrong says ‘Mr. Bell, 1
have to report to you that we
weren't able to recover the
voice tapes of your 9-1-1 call
because it seems like our 9-1-1
recording device is not work-
ing,” said Bell.

Armstrong then went on to
say thar the device which
records the 9-1-1 calls that
come into the West Vancouver
Police Department hadn't been
functioning since April 26. °

Luckily, one of the. 9-1-1
operators at ECOMM — the
9-1-1 hub that re-routes emer-
gency calls to areas in the
Greater Vancouver Regional
District > saves on the line
and eavesdropped on Be'!
after wansferring him to West
Vancouver dispatch. 7

As a result; the operator's
microphone was kept open and.
the exchange between: Bell and
the West Vancouver dispatcher
was recorded in its entirety.

Bell ‘said Armstrong ‘then
admitted that the recordin
clearly showed Bell had indeed

hat, ~ unfortunately, _was 4

Freight, ‘PD.
‘Lease’ or Fin

Mail info

@wetmorevw

reported much more than a
simple “crunching sound”
the Upper Levels Highway.

“He said, ‘Mr. Bell, in wo
instances you describe very
clearly that a car has gone over

the Cypress Creck bridge and
has crashed into the canyon
below.”

He was then told by
Armstrong that the matter was
being handed to the internal
affairs division and there would
be an investigation launched.

Bell also called West

Vancouver District and received -

a call from Mayor Ron Wood,
who is also chairman of the

~ West Vancouver Police Board.

“He said he was very con-
cemed and was goin di bring
it it up with the police ief,” said

Wood said to press time
Friday ghat he had not yet dis-
cussed the - matter | with
Churchill but that it would like-
ly. be dealt with at the next
scheduled police board meet-
ing to be held a week from this

scandal going here by any
means,” said Wood. “but obvi-

ously some investigative work
._ has to be done.” .

mayor

Churchill . confirmed . on
Friday thar there indeed was 2
failure with the West Vancouver ].
recording system. ve

“I'm not sure exactly of the
date (the malfunction: -

occurred) but yes, there was a.

failure that we were not aware
of,” said Churel

He said that the ‘problem |
has since been fixed,. :

“I am aware of the drcum-
stances jand I've ‘ozdered an: :
inquiry,” said Churchill. “Ir:
be an inquiry into the a
ateness of the action teen more
the police department.’
we effective or-not in this mat
te”

"Bell said his main concern

ensuring. that if there is a. car:

crash with: survivors® tra; pped
inside, that there is no deny ir

” rescuing them.

“I'm not here to bad

lice, work. in the future”
.. communication - and’ to

ursday. odo find “ ways. to’ simplify) th
“I don’t think there’s a - cca re

process because if there are four
peuple in a van or a bus'an
they were laying in’ the ‘ravine
for: 16 hours it wouldn’t Id