SQ Ambushes Peeve Lac Brome Drivers

The trucks roar through Brome Lake at excessive speeds. The tailgaters hang on our bumpers. The school zone and residential speed-limits are blatantly ignored. Crosswalks with elderly residents using walkers trying to cross are being ignored. School buses with flashing lights unloading children are being ignored. Vehicles doing the speed limit on Lakeside or Knowlton Road or Victoria Street are being passed and sometimes cars are passing against a solid yellow line attempting to pass two vehicles at once on a corner or risking the lives of pedestrians who have no sidewalk to walk upon.

Meanwhile the SQ sits idly...charging too much and preferring to ambush drivers instead of really helping with public security!

While these obvious highway code violations occur many residents are scratching their heads asking “Where are the SQ who we are paying to patrol our streets?”

Roads in Brome Lake are pocked with potholes and are winding twisting single lane danger zones yet the traffic on these hazardous roads seems to be faster and faster every day yet the police in charge of our streets seem to prefer to hang out in the shadows and ambush drivers who are using the nicest roads in the region!

Why would the police ignore flagrant violations in our towns and just sit on their bums waiting to catch someone going slightly over the speed limit?

The answer is being discovered by more and more residents...the SQ officers assigned to traffic ticket duty on the roads of Brome Lake seem to feel it would be helpful to ambush drivers by hiding along the best roads outside of Lac Brome instead of dealing with the dangerous driving in Town!

The cops have been camped out far outside of the reach of any dangerous traffic violations and are waiting to pounce on drivers who take the few well paved roads in Brome Lake. The best roads are between Bromont and Knowlton, a lovely paved stretch of highway that features flat straight roads with nothing but vast fields to both side. This is the road that any driver could let go of the steering wheel and close their eyes for a nap and still wake up after 5 minutes and be on the smooth and arrow straight road! The speed limit on the road is 80 kmh.

Meanwhile...the speed limits on other roads that are riddled with potholes, covered in corners, dangerous due to lack of shoulders, and laden with over-filled dump trucks, is 90kmh and even on these roads, if you dare drive the speed limit, you will have a train of tailgaters riding your bumper!

In the village of Knowlton cars ignore the crosswalks, trucks speed through the 50 kmh zone at least at 80kmh and there is not a police car to be seen! Why would the SQ feel it helps the public safety to hide in the bushes and ticket drivers? It’s called laziness...it’s called bureaucracy...and it’s called ripping us off!

According to many, the policing of Brome Lake is at an all-time low as far as quality of service goes yet the cost of having the SQ patrol our region is the highest per capita in Quebec! Are we suckers?

Maybe not complete suckers but the poor police service on our roads is leaving many residents feeling that an accident is waiting to happen! With the blatant traffic violations going on even within the tiny village of Knowlton you’d think that our tax dollars were going towards a police service, the Surete du Quebec, or SQ, that could Serve and Prtotect.

Even myself, a taxpaying, land-owning person in Brome Lake has recently been exposed to the useless Public Service the SQ is providing. Recently I had to take a rare trip to Montreal from Knowlton and like many motorists who prefer to avoid the winding stretch of Lakeside Road full of trucks and aggressive residents speeding on the tight rounding road, I took Brome Road towards Bromont which is the only nicely paved stretch of Road in all of Brome Lake! This road is so straight that a driver can let go of the steering wheel and take a nap and their car will drive for 10 minutes because the road is so wide and straight and surrounded by nothing but wide soft fields of wheat! For some reason the “engineers” of the Quebec Highway Department figured that such a straight wide and clear highway should have one of the lowest speed limits in the Eastern Townships!

So of course I am driving on a bright sunny day listening to 99.9 The Buzz on the radio of the Salsa Vibe and while I’m trying to do the speed limit....it just doesn’t make sense on this road! When anyone drives the speed limit on this road the cows in the fields will literally laugh and point at the car! I’ve been doing 100kmh on this road and had towtrucks literally flash their lights at me wanting me to go faster or move over as if it was Burt Reynolds driving! I could never understand why I was allowed to go faster up Tibbits Hill which is a pothole ridden, narrow road or why when I entered Brome Lake on Highway 104 at over the speed-limit I had cars and trucks passing me yet when I cruised alone on this road towards Bromont I was pulled over for speeding!

I wish I had been pulled over by a local police or a first responder...at least if we had local police we would likely know the officer who pulled us over and maybe a warning would have been in order. As it was I was ticketed by a SQ officer who probably didn’t live in Brome Lake and was likely assigned to traffic duty because of some sort of indiscretion due to the publication a YouTube video of some bum slapping incident at the Police Station! This guy, besides being out of shape and smelling like salt and vinegar Humpty Dumpty chips, had no sense of cool.

He said to me:” Do you know why I pulled you over”
I said to him:”I was probably going over the speed limit”

Directors note: The speed limit is 80kmh which is so slow that the cud-chewing cows in the field will literally laugh if you do that speed. The road is straighter and wider than any other road in Brome Lake and for some reason has the slowest speed limits!! This is the kind of road that even an airline pilot from Hewa Bora flight school would dream about to land a 737!

He said to me:”I know the road is good, and it’s a nice day, but do you know how fast you were going?”
I Said to him:”No....it seemed slow on such a good road on such a nice day....especially with no traffic either way! Was I going too slow?”

Directors note: There was no traffic...only cows...a speeder could have rolled their car into the ditch without harming even a fencepost!

He said to me:”Can I see your license and registration”
I said to him, thinking that he may be in a playful mood due to the sunny day and lack of traffic: ”It depends on the health of your eyesight...I find the Arial font printing on the Government issued Identification Cards is too small for most elderly people to read especially if they suffer from any sort of eye malfunction due to poor eating habits. Looking at you, sir, I’d say that perhaps you may not be able to see any sort of ID card I offered you without mechanical help of a magnifying apparatus....however your analysis of the conditions of the road today seem to display an odd appreciation that this ticket you plan to give me is a complete load of Boo-Hockey!”

Directors note: Were you expecting to get out of a ticket with such smart-ass talk? But your use of the word “boo-hockey” is good considering it is the Stanley Cup Playoffs and if the officer is a fan of the Canadiens he may let you off....good thinking!

So after this encounter I resign myself that this knuckle-dragger will be giving me a traffic ticket to meet his daily quote and can wag his tail all the way back to the station and show the boss how proud he is to have ambushed some drivers on the best roads of the territory while meanwhile residents have their life and limb being risked due to uncontrolled driving in the town! Good for you SQ dronesl!!

Actually...the worst infraction was the fact that I was wearing a Montreal Canadiens Shirt! Man...if the SQ are so lame that they don’t give a speeder a break even when they are wearing a Habs shirt then we are really in trouble!

This SQ officer, code named “Daniel”, walked back to his SUV vehicle with my papers to write up my ticket. He seemed to be unsure of which end of the pencil was the right one to make a scribble because he literally took 20 minutes to write up the ticket! I have cerebrally challenged family members so I am not going to make light of any affirmative action policy that allows the hiring of police officers even when they cannot print via pen to paper, more than 6 words per minute...but this was ridiculous! Not only did this SQ officer sit in his SUV for 20 minutes writing me up a ticket but the worst thing is he left his vehicle running the whole time!

Dude! If you pull over a driver and then proceed to try and figure out your pencil then why not shut off you motor....have you heard about the planet Earth and the collapse of our environment or has the latest episode of Tete a Clac done something to your membrane?

Man...I was driving 100kmh which is the most efficient speed to reduce emissions and consumption. I was pulled over for doing that speed yet on Highway 10 when the speed limit in construction zones is 70kmh I would be killed in a drive-by if I slipped below 90...are the SQ there? NOT! So by asking me to reduce my efficiency and then while idling his engine the whole time while figuring out the mechanics of the lead pencil the SQ and Quebec Government has increased the carbon footprint of our region by a huge percentage!

Many residents are asking why this money sucking, environmental disregarding, useless police force is allowed to drain money from Lac Brome Taxpayers like a vampire!

It seems the motto of the SQ should be “To Self-Serve and Protect our Bosses” because many residents are not feeling that the abolition of the local police force in favor of the SQ to patrol our streets has been worth it.

More Lac Brome Residents Fed Up With Poor Police Service

The Mayor’s of many Eastern Townships towns and municipalities aren’t the only ones who are fed up with the Surete du Quebec; residents are now voicing their complete dis-satisfaction with the lack-lustre service the SQ is providing to Brome Lake.

Of course, the cost of the SQ to “police” our little patch of heaven is going up faster than the price of unleaded gasoline with Brome Lake paying some of the highest price per-capita for the patrolling and service from the Quebec Police. While other municipalities have seen their policing costs go up only marginally over recent years, it seems that Brome Lake residents are being viewed as a cash-grab by the Government-run Police force who must feel that we are ready to just open our wallets and toss up whatever tax dollars they ask!

The cost of “service” from the SQ has jumped over 11% since last year forcing Brome Lake to hike taxes to try and pay the extra quarter-million dollars per year to the SQ. An 11% jump in cost is seen by many residents and local officials as nothing less than robbery! But when the cops are the ones doing the crime how can any of us do anything but try not to complain too much lest we have a boot-strapped attack by taser-wielding Police Officers sent in by the Minister of Public Security to show us that an 11% increase is a reasonable and fair augmentation!

The problem of poor public protection by the Surete du Quebec in Brome seems to be reaching a head as residents are getting “ambushed” by traffic ticketing police officers who are leaving a sour taste in the mouths of many residents who are tired of being given borderline traffic tickets in remote ares of Brome Lake while the safety of pedestrians, drivers and citizens within the town limits is being ignored.

I guess they can basically do what they want since they are, after all, the police! What are we supposed to do about crappy service that costs more than any other region in Quebec? We could maybe write to someone in Quebec City or complain to our MLA or even get on board with Mayor Wisdom who has been fed-up and battling the Minister of Public Security, Jacques Dupuis, over the pathetic police presence in Lac Brome and the continuously rising cost of such poor service.

Of course, trying to reason with Jacques Dupuis or whatever puppet is in office representing the Charest Liberal Quebec Government is a no-win fight. It would be like trying to argue with Lotto-Quebec that the suicides at the Montreal Casino are maybe a sign that gambling shouldn`t be a government sanctioned activity! Nope...the Government likes the income and since they write the rules they can decide how the game is played. If Brome Lake is being held hostage by the Police and the Minister of Security then we are literally screwed...who do the citizens, or the Mayor of Brome Lake complain to? They charge more and give worse service! That is sounding like a Monopoly or even a Government Service!! And if we’re fed up to the brim what are we supposed to do call the Police?

I wasn’t in Lac Brome in the good old days when they had their own Police Force but apparently Knowlton and Brome Lake used to have their own force and as recently as 2002 the annual budget for policing Lac Brome was only $770,000 dollars and now, only 6 years later residents are looking at paying over $1.9 million dollars. Wow! No wonder the Government wanted to take charge of policing...if they can rake taxpayers of Lac Brome over the coals with such exorbatent rate-increases every year then the Quebec Government must have been drooling in their soup thinking how they found a holy cash cow! The poor taxpayers of Brome Lake are being taken for more money than the Casino at Mount Tremblant could bring in 6 months and the Town of Brome Lake has no choice but to raising property taxes to pay for the SQ service!

Residents of Lac Brome have been fuming recently as local property taxes have gone up more than the Canadian Inflation Rate and certainly more than wages! Of course taxes have only gone up for the regular folks of Knowlton, the Industrial Tax Rate in Lac Brome has actually been reduced. Some residents say this doesn’t make a bit of sense since the Industrial taxpayers of Brome lake like Les Emballages Knowlton and Brome Lake Ducks create the most heavy truck trafffic aand residual pollution that is causing Brome Lake to turn into a toxic dump. Whoa! That may be a little left-wing as far as pointing fingers goes, after all the Industrial residents of Lac Brome provide many jobs in a time of tough economics here in Eastern Canada...let’s face it...selling duck breasts to Japan or bottling Miss Clairol for the US headsets is not as lucrative as tunnelling into the tar sands of Alberta and we are losing taxpaying residents faster than you can say “Roll up the Rim to Win!”.

So the SQ, by overcharging for a poor service, is causing more and more residents a feeling of chagrin and concern. Some feel that this is another example of the provincial Government thinking only of their own “Union” of employees instead of actually caring for the population that builds the province. Some folks are saying that it would be nice to see Brome Lake Government stand up for the residents and revert to a local police force where the money being spent was actually going to the public safety and security instead of what is happening now! If the SQ prefer to hide in the bushes and leap out at residents to meet their quota of highway traffic tickets then they are doing less than nothing to protect the residents of Brome Lake...in fact they are creating more of a hazard and perhaps leaving real delinquants and violators to run free!

Looking at it from a SQ officers point of view it is likely more enjoyable to sit on a quiet road in Brome Lake watching the latest episode of Deal or No Deal on their portable laptop but the occasional motorist they pull over on the empty highway for excessive speed will hardly make the Taxpayers who pay their salary any safer. While cars and trucks are speeding through school zones and passing over double lines at triple the speed limit on Lakeside and Knowlton Road the cops, who are costing us an arm and a leg, prefer to just sit on their cushions waiting to ambush drivers on the only nice road in Lac Brome!