Winners >Corporal Brian Foote

Winner

Corporal Brian Foote
RCMP, Mission Detachment

When Corporal Brian Foote identified a gap in services for youth at-risk in Mission, British Columbia, he took it upon himself to ensure that it was filled. "There was nothing in place to deal with youth at an early age," he says.

Foote is the winner of the 2004 Minister of Justice National Youth Justice Policing Award for creating and implementing the innovative idea of the Mission Family Support Network. In September 2003, the network began as a way of providing counselling and assistance to young people who are at risk of entering into the justice system or who have already started down the criminal path.

The network is designed to give police officers another avenue to deal with criminal behaviour rather than the traditional system. In less serious cases, the police can refer youth to the network, which then works with youth to help them understand the context of their actions and explores issues in their lives that might be leading them towards criminal tendencies. The families of the youth are also involved with the process and are asked to engage in counselling as well. "Families play a huge role," Foote explains.

A case that stands out for Foote involves a 13-year-old boy who had yet to come to the attention of the police but who school authorities suspected of having some problems at home. Foote became involved and it soon came to light that the boy had recently started acting aggressively towards his mother and other family members.

The boy was referred to the network. "The idea of the network," says Foote, "is that we can share information." Youth and their families have their cases reviewed by an integrated management team composed of family counsellors, drug and alcohol counsellors, school district counsellors, mental health counsellors and Aboriginal counsellors.

This opens up the lines of communication and allows everyone to see the complete picture of what is happening in an individual case. The team is then able to determine what combination of help would most benefit the youth and their families. "This speeds up the process, big time," Foote says.

After some network members spent time with the family, says Foote, "it turned out the boy didn't see his Mom and Dad as parents. They weren't fulfilling their role as parents so he decided to step up to the plate. He didn't really know how to be a parent, so he modelled his behaviour according to what he'd seen on TV. All he really knew was that a parent had to be a strong leader, be aggressive and make sure their point got across." The network was able to offer the parents some training in parenting techniques, while counseling the boy that his behaviour was inappropriate. Foote says they haven't been heard from since.

The network is geared for youth ages eight to 18 and brings together a number of different community agencies under one service model. Foote says that this eliminates "the number of hoops someone has to go through to get counselling." By offering a "one-stop-shop" for service delivery it helps the youth and their families navigate the systems and provides the police with one point of entry into a number of different agencies.

Foote is very pleased with the work that the Mission Family Support Network has accomplished in the area so far but acknowledges that there is still work to do, "we want to go even further."

Contact person:
Corporal Brian Foote
(604) 836-7161