'Expense of protecting this building is impossible': Business owners in Sarnia, Ont. frustrated with increasing property crime

Any dreams of re-opening The Neutral Zone (TNZ) Paintball in Sarnia, Ont. went up in flames Saturday.

Closed since the pandemic, the outdoor business has seen repeated thefts and damage to the property.

“The drug addicts that kept continually breaking into this building and using it as a shelter and a place to do their drugs apparently lit a fire to warm up and burnt out the building,” said property owner Martin Engerer.

He’s frustrated because this latest fire in the property’s office destroyed everything inside. He’s been trying to protect his land on London Line for the past couple of years.

“They cut out a 4x4 post, and this deck used have a canopy over it for the summer when it was really hot for the players,” said Engerer. “They've cut that and taken the wood for that. They started pulling up the decking itself because they're building their shelters in their tent town.”

He even had to put steel shutters on the office.

Martin Engerer, owner of TNZ Paintball in Sarnia, Ont. is frustrated with the repeated property crime to his business. (Brent Lale/CTV News London)

Business owners along the stretch of London Line all claim similar stories of break-ins, theft, and property damage.

“We've had we have break-ins, and they literally kicked and smashed their way in the back door,” said Mark Burdett, general manager of Precision Power Sports nearby. “Police showed up and they took off. Down the street, another owner had people breaking in, stealing equipment, and the guy who broke in and stole it dropped his hotel room key.”

They claim the clientele at the neighbouring Blue Water Motel are to blame.

“It's more a problem because in the winter as they move them into the hotels down the street here and pay for them to stay there,” said Burdett. “The Blue Water Motel, which is just right beside where that building burned the other day, had one of the rooms explode there just not long ago.”

Business owners on London Line in Sarnia, Ont. claim the repeated property crime and thefts are the result of the clientele at the neighbouring Blue Water Motel. (Brent Lale/CTV News London)

CTV spoke with a tenant of the motel who wished not to be identified for fear of “getting kicked out.”

She said she believed 20 out of the 26 currently occupied rooms house either troublemakers, drug addicts, or thieves.

Sarnia Police Service (SPS) Chief Derek Davis said arrests are up 16 per cent this year, and charges are up significantly.

“We have 44 people who have had tangible contacts with the police as an accused, a suspect, or someone who's been arrested and those 44 individuals have ten or more contacts with us just this year,” said Davis.

Davis is sympathetic to the business owners who are experiencing what police are dealing with and that is an increase in crime volume.

Chief Derek Davis of the Sarnia Police Service says arrests are up 16 per cent in 2024 and 44 individuals have had at least 10 interactions each with Sarnia Police Service this year. (Brent Lale/CTV News London)

“Property crimes, unfortunately, are some of the lower priorities because no one's at physical danger from those,” said Davis. “However, I will acknowledge that the property crime piece is what many of our citizens are experiencing. They are frustrated with having things stolen, things damaged, or business interrupted. What people may characterize as petty crime is not petty to those homeowners, to those businesses. And that's something that we recognize.”

Sarnia Mayor Mike Bradley has met with the business owners along London Line.

“I would suggest to them they need to come together as a group because it's not an organized, commercial area that would help to have one voice,” said Bradley.

Bradley continues to call on the province to solve the issues of affordable housing, helping close down encampments, and aiding in moving the homeless to a better place.

“There's been such a rise in small crime and larger crime,” said Bradley. “There's been such a rise in people on the streets and all that comes back to overwhelm the community.”

The big city mayors have asked Premier Doug Ford to move forward with a common approach to unify everyone.

A Sarnia Fire and Rescue Services Truck is parked at TNZ Paintball on London Line in Sarnia, Ont. on Nov. 2, 2024. (Brent Lale/CTV News London)

“We can't keep on doing the status quo because this isn't working,” said Bradley. “Business owners have a right to have their properties protected and to feel safe in their own community, as do the employees.”

Davis said as with winter around the corner, they have a multi-layered approach.

They have partnered with Lambton College to have co-op students work toward solving what one would characterize as low priority crime.

SPS encourages online reporting for residents so police can “accurately respond” and they also have their IMPACT team which is dedicated to building better relationships with the homeless community and those that are unhoused to try to get them the supports they need.

Back on London Line, Engerer said the whole city, including the downtown, is suffering.

“It's fine to want to take care of the homeless, and it's fine to be humane to people who have a drug addiction,” said Engerer. “But if you're doing it at the expense of your town, then that's not a solution.”

The damage from the fire is just one of the problems he’s encountered on the vacant property.

While it was a longshot, there was always a hope they’d come up with a solution to re-open TNZ.

“The expense of, of having to try and protect this building is just impossible,” said Engerer. “The business wasn't strong enough to support the kind of cost to create the infrastructure to protect it. Without the police department being willing to do anything, the only recourse would be to actually live on site, which I'm not prepared to do.”