Quorum National and International News clippings & press releases
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9 January 2014
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YUKON ...... 4 Yukon Police Council releases first annual report ...... 4 BRITISH COLUMBIA ...... 4 Graham puts badge away for the last time ...... 4 Surrey's police shift in wake of homicide shows need for separate detachment: WR mayor .. 7 ALBERTA ...... 8 RCMP report traces ups and downs of year ...... 8 Chief Rod Knecht wants 'cheque day' done away with in inner city ...... 9 SASKATCHEWAN ...... 11 Gang violence most common in Saskatchewan in 2012, Stats Can says ...... 11 Improved relations between police, FSIN ...... 13 MANITOBA ...... 14 Would the RCMP be a more cost-effecient alternative? ...... 14 ONTARIO ...... 16 Police Services Board will hold public consultation meeting before Tasers are handed out to frontline officers ...... 16 Police board pitches 2.8% budget increase ...... 17 Halton police still seeking resident input on priorities ...... 19 Police say they need Tasers; some question the cost ...... 21 Former police chief leaving his job with the province ...... 24 Counsel can’t vet police notes: SCC ...... 25 ‘Unhappy’ over Brant OPP pay hike ...... 27 Orangeville police seek investigation of town’s police services board ...... 28 Police compensation costs rose 26 per cent over five years ...... 29 Mayor's hearing starts Monday ...... 31 Hearing over Mayor Bennett's conduct on police services board off to slow start ...... 32 Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair weighs in on recent Supreme Court rulings ...... 33 Youth in Policing grads are bright spots in Toronto's future ...... 34 Chief Bill Blair: Police carding can be illegal if done wrong ...... 36 Mayor evaded being interviewed by police commission investigator over police board conduct allegations ...... 39 QUEBEC ...... 40 10% of Montreal police senior officers under investigation since 2010: report ...... 40 Sanctions weighed for Montreal cop who threatened itinerant man ...... 41 Police unit lends homeless a helping hand ...... 43 NEW BRUNSWICK ...... 44 Saint John councillor mulls switch to RCMP for policing city ...... 44 Saint John council votes to consider move to RCMP policing ...... 46 NOVA SCOTIA ...... 47 PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND ...... 47 NEWFOUNDLAND ...... 47 Special Newfoundland police force helps nab Ontario man on child pornography charges ...... 47 NATIONAL ...... 48 Way police deal with the mentally ill at a 'turning point,' observers say ...... 48
2 Police under investigation lose right to consult lawyers on notes ...... 51 Briefing note to Public Safety Minister hints at tighter gun control ...... 54 Minister Blaney Announces Re-Appointment of Ian McPhail as Interim Chair of the Commission for Public Complaints Against the RCMP ...... 57 Special police powers = extra police responsibility ...... 58 RCMP Seek Hiring Waiver ...... 59 What happened to civilian oversight of the RCMP ...... 60 INTERNATIONAL NEWS ...... 71 Report criticizes Pittsburgh police side-jobs policy ...... 71 Californians outraged after police acquire military armored vehicle to patrol city ...... 74 Editorial: Washington high court ruling on police records emphasizes public interest ..... 75 Specially trained Milwaukee officers work to help homeless ...... 76 Chicago murders drop in 2013. Good police work, or something else? ...... 78 Bratton Takes Helm of Police Force He Pledged to Change ...... 80 Tracking technology promises more efficient officer deployment ...... 82 2013: The year policing changed ...... 83 Mental health nurses to be posted in police stations ...... 86 Dallas police overhaul use-of-force training after criticism from recent shootings ...... 87 Training to aid mentally ill a priority for Maine police ...... 88 33 cops killed by gunfire in 2013, the lowest number since 1887 ...... 91 Judge tosses police unions’ suit over Breathalyzer tests ...... 92 Utah’s largest police forces use Tasers more than any other weapon ...... 93 New demands changing the face of police hiring pools ...... 97 Mental health support gets cash boost ...... 101 More cuts on the way for Humberside Police on top of budget reduction ...... 101 Police Salaries and Pensions Push California City to Brink ...... 103
3 YUKON Yukon Police Council releases first annual report
January 6, 2014 The Yukon Police Council's first annual report, tabled in the Yukon Legislative Assembly this week, shows that the council is building partnerships and listening to Yukoners.
'Collaboration and ongoing dialogue have been key aspects of the council's work since it was established in 2012,' Attorney General and Minister of Justice Mike Nixon said. 'The council has been listening to what Yukoners have to say about policing issues and priorities in the territory.'
Set up to provide a formal way for community members to have input into policing services, the Yukon Police Council has worked to create partnerships and meets regularly with community organizations. In 2012 and 2013 the council met with many organizations to gather their input, including Kaushee's Place, the Yukon Anti-Poverty Coalition, the First Nation Justice Network, the Canadian Mental Health Association-Yukon and the Second Opinion Society.
The 2012/13 annual report provides an overview of the council's activities and a synopsis of conversations the council has had with Yukon citizens. Yukon's policing priorities are also outlined and were communicated by the minister to the Yukon RCMP in early 2013 following public input including the council's work and recommendations.
'I am pleased to be a member of the Yukon Police Council, as I feel we are making a difference,' First Nation Yukon Police Council member from Dawson City Lisa Anderson said. 'We've met with more than 100 different service providers and Yukon citizens since we started and I feel that we are putting forward recommendations to Minister Nixon that reflect what we have heard.'
Learn more Download the report yukonpolicecouncil.gov.yk.ca
BRITISH COLUMBIA Graham puts badge away for the last time
4 by Daniel Palmer - Victoria News posted Dec 26, 2013 at 9:00 AM
Jamie Graham thumbs through emails on a Blackberry from across the table, his brow furrowing as he scans the screen.
"There is no retirement anymore," said Graham, just days before stepping down as chief constable of the Victoria Police Department.
On Dec. 19, Graham quietly left VicPD after five years at the helm to make way for incoming Chief Const. Frank Elsner. It marks his third retirement from policing in a 43-year career (he also served as head of the RCMP's Surrey detachment – the biggest in Canada – and then as chief constable of the Vancouver Police Department).
He leaves VicPD as it struggles with increased budget constraints, the continued turbulence of a forced policing merger with Esquimalt and the high crime burden of core-city syndrome. And while he's had some success curtailing those issues, Graham admits he's created his own controversy on occasion with his verbal shoot-from-the-hip style of communication.
"If I don't agree with something, I'm quite vocal about disagreeing," he said.
Graham left the Vancouver Police Department in 2007 under much less auspicious circumstances, being investigated by the Office of the Police Complaint Commissioner for his lack of co-operation with a 2003 investigation into police brutality in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside.
He also made headlines for leaving a bullet-riddled shooting range target on the desk of Vancouver's city manager in 2006; and for openly supporting the creation of Insite, a supervised injection facility and needle exchange on the Downtown Eastside.
"I don't necessarily agree with what goes on on the main floor (of Insite), but upstairs, the treatment level is absolutely remarkable. They're really making a difference," he said.
Graham's had low points in Victoria as well – leaving his gun inside his unmarked police car, and suggesting that a group of anti-Olympic protesters had been infiltrated by an undercover police officer in 2009.
"Whether or not there was any outing of an officer, who knows. I never was briefed, didn't know, still don't to this day. But you never talk about (undercover) operations, even in jest. So that was the mistake," he said.
Yet his aggressive defence of police officers and direct leadership style have won Graham accolades among the rank-and-file, most recently in his advocacy for expanded uses of automated licence plate-scanning technology. Last December, he publicly clashed with B.C.'s privacy commissioner on how mass information is collected, stored and flagged using the cruiser-mounted system.
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"There's no way the police can do any nefarious activity. Everything is scrutinized by every level," he said. "ALPR is great technology. Eventually, you'll see it in every officer's handheld device."
Victoria Mayor Dean Fortin said working with Graham has been a privilege over their five-year tenure together, and he commended Graham for making needed improvements to VicPD jail cells, as well as strides made in restorative justice.
"I think this is the one piece that says the most to me: under Chief Graham’s leadership, Victoria’s crime-severity index dropped 26 per cent," Fortin said. "Efforts like Late Night Great Night and crime-reduction strategies like the current focus on prolific offenders have helped make that happen."
Esquimalt Mayor Barb Desjardins called Graham a "strong leader" who entered a challenging environment at VicPD.
"(Graham) never backed away from a challenge and certainly sometimes we wished he wasn’t walking into them," Desjardins said. "He has brought many up and coming police leaders forward through the promotion process, and he sold the need for more officers to the communities he was in charge of. Not an easy feat."
Graham wouldn't comment on his legacy at VicPD, but said he's most proud of the promotions made to the executive, which include all fresh faces from when he arrived in 2009. He's also glad to leave a police department with stronger morale than when he began, when former Chief Const. Paul Battershill left the department after an affair with a police board lawyer.
"When I started, the organization was going through some challenging times, that's now behind us," Graham said. "We don't have the problems of a bigger organization, the communication gaps. I've got seven inspectors, and VPD has about 35. … The people in our command roles are battle-tested, they know the issues on the street and they're highly educated, so they get it."
Graham's frequent criticism of the Capital Region's patchwork policing model is likely to continue in incoming Chief Elsner, the Twitter-savvy, community-minded chief from Sudbury, Ont.
In the meantime, Graham plans to focus on his passion for antique cars, travel with his wife and possibly find a second career in the civilian world.
"Everybody is coming to Victoria, this is where people want to live. So this will be a base no matter what we do."
6 Surrey's police shift in wake of homicide shows need for separate detachment: WR mayor by Tracy Holmes - Peace Arch News posted Jan 7, 2014 at 10:00 AM— updated Jan 7, 2014 at 4:30 PM White Rock’s mayor says a mass redeployment of Surrey police officers to Whalley and Newton only strengthens his resolve to retain his city’s police detachment.
The 49-officer shift was announced by Surrey Mayor Dianne Watts Friday, in an update on her newly formed Mayor’s Task Force on Causal Factors, which is looking into that city’s 2013 murders.
The announcement followed the Dec. 31 death of 53-year-old Julie Paskall, who died two days after she was brutally beaten during a robbery outside Newton Arena.
Wayne Baldwin told Peace Arch News he emailed his White Rock council members and city manager Saturday after learning of the officer redeployment, to remind them of what the city stands to lose in an amalgamation. “If we had been merged with Surrey, you know where a lot of those 49 would have been redeployed from,” he writes.
Baldwin reiterated to PAN that he has no doubt amalgamation would result in reduced police coverage for the seaside city.
“They would go to where the trouble areas are. That’s what you do: you take your forces and you concentrate them in the trouble areas and try and deal with that,” he said.
In his email, Baldwin predicts South Surrey residents will pay for the increased focus on Newton and Whalley, through a reduced police presence “for the next couple of months, or more.”
White Rock’s policing costs, particularly those for integrated teams, were cited last month as argument in favour of amalgamating the two forces, but Baldwin said he’s “not convinced” there would be financial advantages to such a merger.
Not only would residents lose the “no-call-too-small” service they currently enjoy, but they would likely pay more for the service than their Surrey neighbours.
“Since our assessed value is relatively high compared to most of Surrey, we’re going to be paying a way higher cost than anyone else in Surrey, for the same coverage,” he said. “I just don’t see it being a really viable alternative.”
In his email, Baldwin describes maintaining White Rock’s detachment as “our best defence against the crime migrating from Newton into White Rock.”
“There is a price to be paid for controlling your own resources, and within reason it is necessary to pay that price in order to maintain your standards – particularly when it comes to something as important to people as personal safety.”
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ALBERTA RCMP report traces ups and downs of year By April Hudson, Spruce Grove Examiner/Stony Plain Reporter Friday, December 20, 2013 10:56:08 MST AM
Parkland County’s Governance and Priorities Committee (GPC) members received a presentation from the Spruce Grove / Stony Plain RCMP, who delivered an Enhanced Policing update on Tuesday, Dec. 17.
The report was delivered by a number of RCMP staff: Insp. Gary Graham, Staff Sgt. Steve Bergerman, Sgt. Dave Knibbs, Cpl. Bryce Long and analyst Richard Walsh.
During the presentation, council heard that the RCMP detachment has been coordinating with the Edmonton Police Service (EPS) to make arrests —a partnership that has so far seen success.
Long, from the RCMP’s Drug Unit, noted there have been a number of high- profile arrests this year, including two arrests involving residents bringing large quantities of methamphetamine into the area — a drug that is currently high on the RCMP’s radar.
Div. 6 Coun. Tracey Melnyk asked a question regarding legalized marijuana growing operations, noting one has approached the County to inquire about opening up within the municipality.
Graham noted that legislation that would legalize such grow-ops has not yet passed, adding the RCMP would look at impacts if it does pass.
“I’ve had three different people write me general letters asking for support (for grow-ops),” Graham said, taking council by surprise.
Council had only been made aware of one.
Bergerman gave a report on the gravel truck enforcement initiative, noting they saw some surprises during this year.
After targeting Highways 770 and 627, a notoriously bad intersection within the county, Bergerman said statistics showed that more offences were being committed by passenger vehicles than by gravel trucks.
8 Mayor Rod Shaigec said the report provided some impressive statistics, with the exception of sexual offences, which jumped 85 per cent for sexual assaults and 50 per cent for other types of sexual offences from 2012.
Graham said no one factor can be attributed to that increase; repeat offenders would bring up the number, but so would the fact that more individuals may be reporting sexual assaults.
Domestic violence statistics were also discussed as Div. 1 Coun. AnnLisa Jensen asked where Parkland County stands compared to provincial or national statistics.
Graham noted that domestic violence has been a priority for him for many years, and under his direction the Spruce Grove / Stony Plain detachment created a full- time position for a domestic violence co-ordinator, whose primary role is to provide expertise and to provide support to victims.
“(Domestic violence) is an extremely high priority, hot-button issue right from Ottawa down,” Graham said, adding that many other detachments are also now moving towards creating domestic violence co-ordinators.
Council accepted the presentation for information.
Chief Rod Knecht wants 'cheque day' done away with in inner city Edmonton police chief wants changes to how social assistance cheques are distributed The Canadian Press Posted: Jan 06, 2014 2:25 PM MT Last Updated: Jan 06, 2014 2:49 PM MT Edmonton police chief Rod Knecht wants changes to the distribution of social assistance cheques. (CBC)
Edmonton's police chief wants the provincial government to consider changing the way it distributes social assistance cheques to help reduce crime against the poor and the handicapped, especially in the inner city.
The government distributes more than 80,000 cheques on one specific day each month to people across the province who are on income support programs.
About three-quarters of those cheques are directly deposited to bank accounts, but others are mailed out and must be cashed.
Chief Rod Knecht said this leads to criminals gathering on "cheque day" to prey on the weak and vulnerable such as those with mental health and addictions problems.
9 "We are talking with the government right now around: 'Could we split those up, so we are issuing them to different people twice a month as opposed to once a month, or sporadically, so the predators won't converge ... and victimize these people over and over again?"' Knecht said.
'Bad guys' out to cheat vulnerable
"Some people who are mentally challenged, the bad guys take them to one of these quick cheque-cashing places, getting them to cash the cheque and then taking the money away from them."
Knecht said some people are so frightened of being robbed that they spend their entire social assistance cheques in just a few days.
Jennifer Dagsvik, a spokeswoman for Alberta Human Services, said staff "strongly advise" people to have their cheques directly deposited to a bank account, but she acknowledges that option doesn't work for everyone.
Dale Beesley, executive director of the Assured Income for the Severely Handicapped program, said the chief's proposal wouldn't work in the short term due to limitations of computers used to manage cheque distribution.
Province to consider idea
Beesley said the idea will be considered when the computer program is upgraded in the future.
In the meantime, he said, the government will continuing working with some clients with mental health and addictions problems to help ensure that monthly cheques cover basic needs. In some cases, a portion can be directly diverted to cover rent and utility bills.
"It would be something that could help. But I think the better strategy is to have better information protocols and use those other safeguards up front with clients to provide them with options to make sure that they are spending the money on what it is intended for."
Knecht said changing the way cheques are distributed would not only help reduce crime, it would have the added benefit of freeing up officers to investigate other cases.
The chief said Edmonton police responded to 6,752 more service calls in 2013 than the previous year and he expects the trend to continue in 2014 as the city's population grows and more transients drift into and out of the community.
The police service is already hard-pressed to meet its goal of quickly responding to priority calls involving death or serious injury in the city within seven minutes, he said.
10 Effective policing goes hand in hand with the prudent use of limited resources, he said.
"We have to find efficiencies. The status quo won't do it anymore."
SASKATCHEWAN Gang violence most common in Saskatchewan in 2012, Stats Can says
BY BRADEN DUPUIS, LEADER-POST DECEMBER 20, 2013
REGINA — For the second year in a row, Regina finds itself in the top five in Canada in terms of homicides committed per 100,000 people.
Numbers released by Statistics Canada on Thursday show Regina had seven homicides in 2012 for a homicide rate of 3.06 — good enough for third in the country.
Thunder Bay and Winnipeg were first and second, respectively.
Regina also had a higher-than-average rate of gang-related homicides when compared to the rest of the country, ranked at No. 3 behind Saskatoon and Thunder Bay.
Regina Police Service spokesperson Elizabeth Popowich said it’s “tough to gauge” if gang activity is increasing in the city.
“We have a number of investigators in our service that are involved in the business of investigating anything that is suspected to be gang related,” Popowich said.
“But of course, these things also don’t come with labels on them, nor do gang members declare themselves as gang members to us.”
Nationally, the rate of gang killings remained stable for the third year in a row at 0.27 victims for every 100,000 population.
Prior to this, gang-related homicides had generally been increasing since the early 1990s, until peaking in 2008.
Gang-related homicides nationwide were unchanged in 2012 from the previous two years, with 95 deaths.
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Overall, the number of Saskatchewan homicides dropped by nine.
But according to Popowich, the local numbers alone don’t paint the complete picture.
“It would be misleading for someone to assume that it’s three times more dangerous to live in Regina,” Popowich said.
“There are so many other things that are factors in public and personal safety.”
The majority of homicides in Saskatchewan and Canada occur between people who are known to each other, Popowich said.
“So these are not random acts that could simply happen to anyone on the street.”
In most cases, homicides occur where there are drugs, alcohol or personal conflict, Popowich said.
“Those kinds of things become individual decisions, and neither a police agency or the government can be in anyone’s home or anyone’s life at that level,” she said.
The RPS can monitor trends and statistics, but at the end of the day it can’t be everywhere at once to prevent violent crime from occurring, Popowich said.
“Unfortunately, when we are called, often it’s after the tragic event has occurred,” she said.
“Then it’s our duty and responsibility to do everything that we can to hold whoever is responsible accountable in the courts.”
Nationally, police recorded 543 homicides in 2012, down 55 from the previous year; that’s the lowest homicide rate since 1966.
The agency said the 2012 homicide rate was 1.56 victims for every 100,000 population, down 10 per cent from 2011 and the lowest in four decades.
Despite the overall decrease in homicide in 2012, fatal shootings increased to 172 from 158 in 2011.
Although the number of shootings increased in 2012, the rate of firearm-related homicides remained among the lowest in almost 50 years.
About 65 per cent of firearm homicides involved handguns.
Shootings accounted for a third of all killings, while 31 per cent involved stabbing.
But the most important thing to remember, Popowich said, is that these statistics are more than just numbers.
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“It represents the loss of the life of a person, and so each and every one of them is tragic,” she said.
“We have to make sure that we never lose sight of that as well.
— with files from the Star Phoenix’s Charles Hamilton
Improved relations between police, FSIN
BY TERRENCE MCEACHERN, THE LEADER-POST JANUARY 6, 2014
Months after a public forum between police and First Nations leaders in Regina to discuss violence in the community, both sides are feeling optimistic about improved relations and changes that have taken place. "There have been linkages made that weren't there before," said Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations (FSIN) Vice-Chief Kimberly Jonathan. "There has been a clear communication gap that's been resolved."
On Nov. 6, Jonathan and Regina Police Chief Troy Hagen were part of a public forum at Regina Treaty Status Indian Services Inc. to discuss three recent homicides as well as violence against aboriginal women.
Weeks later, Hagen participated in a public march in downtown Regina with First Nations leaders to raise awareness about the issues.
"The people needed to see that his heart is obviously with this file," said Jonathan.
"The important part is (Hagen) is not coming in and saying 'I know everything and I know what's best for you families (and) First Nations communities.' He has his ears open (and) he has the best interests at heart."
Jonathan saw the positive results of improved relations when she received a phone call on Dec. 31 from police informing her that an arrest had been made in the Sept. 25 homicide of Kelly Goforth. The call helped Jonathan prepare support and have resources in place to help Goforth's family.
Jonathan also noted improved relations with the Prince Albert Police Service and the Saskatchewan RC MP.
"They're so enthusiastic. They want to listen, they want to learn (and) they want to help. They want to ensure we create safe communities in "F" Division through Saskatchewan," she said.
Jonathan said that educating young women about how to stay safe needs to continue.
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"Staying together when they are going to be out and about, whether it's to a bar or to the park, wherever - that they keep together and that they watch their beverages (and) that they make smart decisions to be able to keep themselves safe," said Jonathan.
"And if they are going to be gone away, that they ensure there is communication to family members and friends."
Despite the improved relations with police, Jonathan is still calling for a national public inquiry into missing and murdered aboriginal women to give families a voice and find answers. She said it is upsetting to hear arguments relating all missing aboriginal women to prostitution or abuse of drugs or alcohol.
On Friday, Bob Morin, deputy police chief, noted that there are too many longterm missing persons cases in Canada and, although he doesn't oppose a public inquiry, the decision to invoke one is not in his control.
He added that cases involving unsolved missing and murdered aboriginal women can be a source of frustration for investigators and families.
"I mean, people disappear off the face of the earth. And we continue to look at those investigations but I think more importantly it's frustrating for the families and loved ones of those folks who are really left to wonder where their loved ones are," said Morin.
Since 2005, there have been three missing and two unsolved murdered aboriginal women cases in Regina. "We have put a lot of time and effort in those files and we continue to investigate them, and it's frustrating when we continue to see long-term missing people knowing the impact it may have on those families."
MANITOBA Would the RCMP be a more cost-effecient alternative? DECEMBER 19, 2013 Westman JOurnal BY DEVERYN ROSS It is an annual budget problem that leaves Brandon’s mayor and council with two choices -- one bad, the other worse. They can impose large property tax increases in order to offset the rapidly rising cost of providing police services, or they can lessen the blow by limiting spending in other priority areas such as infrastructure renewal, economic development, downtown revitalization and affordable housing.
The first option harms Brandon’s competitiveness, while exacerbating the tax burden borne by those living on low and fixed incomes. The second option defers
14 necessary expenditures into the future, when they will inevitably come with a higher price tag.
Neither choice addresses the source of the problem, which is the escalating cost of operating a police department. It is a challenge facing many of Canada’s municipal governments, and Brandon has been among the hardest-hit communities in the nation.
In the past 8 years, salaries for the city’s police officers have risen by almost 46 per cent. Base pay for a first class constable in the Brandon Police Service now stands at $84,427.03 -- very close to what first class constables are paid in Vancouver ($85,716.00) and Toronto ($86,365.94) -- and despite the fact that Brandon has neither the intensity of criminal activity nor the cost of living of either of those cities.
The explosion in police salaries has had a predictable impact on Brandon’s operating budget. From 2011 to 2013 alone, budgeted policing costs have increased from $11,596,212 to $13,899,068. That’s a 19.9 per cent increase in just two years, and the city’s draft 2014 budget calls for yet another hike. While numerous communities throughout the nation are struggling with the same issue, it appears that the struggle is far more onerous for some than others. With a population of 46,061 (according to the 2011 census), Brandon paid approximately $302 per citizen for its policing costs this year. That is far higher than Red Deer (population: 97,109), which paid $21,111,388, or $217.40 per citizen. Kelowna (population: 117,312) paid $20,094.000, or just $171.29 per citizen. Grande Prairie, Kamloops and the Greater Moncton Area also paid substantially less per citizen than Brandon.
How have those communities avoided the costly increases Brandon is experiencing? How can Kelowna, with a population almost three times that of Brandon, have a policing budget that is just $6 million higher?
The answers to both questions lie in the fact that none of those communities have municipal police forces. In each case, local policing is provided by the RCMP, at a substantially lower cost to taxpayers.
The RCMP provides police services under contract to municipalities in each of the provinces other than Ontario and Quebec (which have their own provincial police forces). Under those contracts, the federal government shares the cost of the service provided by the RCMP. For municipalities with a population over 15,000, contract jurisdictions pay 90% and the federal government pays 10%. Communities do not have to meet special criteria for RCMP policing. Indeed, “the federal government is willing to consider requests for new municipal policing agreements” says Josée Picard, a spokesperson for the federal department of Public Safety.
In other words, Brandon’s city council has the option of switching to the RCMP for policing. If they could negotiate the same “per citizen” cost as Kelowna, it would reduce policing costs by more than $6 million -- enough money for targeted expenditures in other areas and a small tax cut.
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The union representing Brandon’s police officers has already signalled that it would fight such a move. “The RCMP is currently an agency with its difficulties”, says Brandon Police Association president Kevin Loewen. “In fact, there are often times where the low staffing levels create response times that would shock a Brandon resident calling during an emergency.”
“The Brandon Police Service provides a Cadillac service to the City both in response times and specialized sections available at a moment’s notice.” That may or may not be true, but the issue is whether Brandonites can afford to continue paying Cadillac costs when a substantially more affordable option may be available.
That is a question for Brandon’s mayor and council to decide. Whether they have the courage to do so remains to be seen.
ONTARIO
Police Services Board will hold public consultation meeting before Tasers are handed out to frontline officers
In August, the Province approved expanding the deployment of conducted energy weapons (CEWs) to frontline officers; decision will be up to local police services
Kawartha Lakes This Week By Barbara-Ann MacEachern Dec 19, 2013 | (LINDSAY) The public will get the chance to have their say as the Kawartha Lakes Police Service moves to provide all frontline officers with Tasers.
At the Police Services Board meeting on Monday (Nov. 18), members discussed a report from Chief John Hagarty which recapped the Province’s authorization for the “expanded deployment of conducted energy weapons (CEWs) in Ontario.”
(Chief Hagary told the board he prefers to use the generic term of CEWs rather than the brand name ‘Tasers.’)
The units have been used by Ontario police forces since 2002, but, until now, only frontline supervisors and tactical unit officers, hostage rescue and containment teams have been permitted to carry them.
The Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services initiated a review to explore expanding the use of CEWs, including examinining “current medical
16 literature” and consultation with stakeholders, including the Canadian Civil Liberties Association. Following that review, the restrictions were lifted to allow frontline officers to carry the devices. Police services will make that decision based on their needs.
Chief Hagarty told the board police chiefs have different opinions on the issue, noting Toroto Police Chief Bill Blair is dealing with 7,000 officers, while he oversees 45 on the Lindsay force.
“My preference is that all officers [carry] them,” the chief said, noting that while the CEWs “are another item on the duty belt” for officers to carry, it is easier to address an officer’s use of the unit rather than the current sitation of keeping track of who used the two units the force now has. (Funding has been allocated in the 2014 police budget to purchase 45 units; council has not formally passed that budget to date.)
At Monday’s meeting, board members were primarily concerned with ensuring the public had a chance to discuss concerns before the decision is made to allow frontline officers to carry the units.
The board welcomes public comments, but wants them to be received according to protocol, either by written submission or deputation. They decided there could be enough response to warrant holding a special meeting for that purpose.
Max Radiff said the board should assume there will be enough public interest to hold a meeting in the evening, when more could attend. When the date is selected, the board approved a motion to advertise it.
In the interim, Chief Hagarty’s report will be posted on the website at klps.ca and hard copies are available at the police station on Victoria Avenue North. Police board pitches 2.8% budget increase
By Benjamin Aubé Thursday, December 19, 2013 3:52:09 EST PM TimminsPress.com
TIMMINS - With a lot of talk about being in the red, budget talks shifted to the thin blue line at city council.
A preliminary budget presented by representatives of the Timmins Police Services (TPS) Board included a 2.8% increase from last year’s budget, for a net request of $13,413,207.
Darlene Lafontaine, vice-chair for TPS Board, said challenges for 2014 include advances in technology, court security costs, prisoner transportation and costs of training.
17 However, upcoming collective agreement renewals for TPS uniformed and civilian staff put the focus on wage and benefit increases, which in 2014 make up 89.1% of the force’s budget. This year, salaries and benefits alone will go up about $423,000 from 2013.
“I’ll put it out there on the table. Our biggest part of the budget of course is (wages and benefits),” said Lafontaine. “There was arbitration to bring us to that $423,000 increase.
“The cost of policing is increasing due a lot of the salary, and this is not just happening in the City of Timmins, it’s happening with a lot of municipalities. That is the reality and that’s the realistic picture I bring tonight.”
As opposed to other department budgets, municipal police budgets can only be established by local police boards according to Ontario law. Council can either reject or accept a given budget, but changes can only be made by the board.
"We don’t mind paying what the community can afford," said Coun. Mike Doody, who sits on the five-member board along with Mayor Tom Laughren. "That’s not necessarily the way the arbitrator sees it."
Coun. Todd Lever agreed with Doody that the arbitration system to resolve collective bargaining agreement disputes for essential services like policing “has to be changed."
“The police services board really has no control over this,” said Lever. “It goes to an arbitration system which, I think people are starting to recognize, has to be thrown out the window.
“The simple answer would be to toss out the arbitration system. It’s political kryptonite, but you establish a baseline across the province: This is what we pay an officer with this much experience. If various municipalities want to pay more, they can do that, for recruiting purposes or whatever, but here’s the minimum. That’s the only we we’ll be able to fix the policing costs issue. I’d like to see the party willing to take this issue on.”
Police Chief John Gauthier responded to a question from Coun. Gary Scripnick about how the city can keep policing costs low.
"That’s a question every police chief in Ontario is asking themselves," said Gauthier. "It’s going to take a lot of brainstorming and it’s going to be very difficult."
Other than the chief and deputy chief, the Timmins police force contains 85 sworn officers and 44 full-time civilian members. Among the civilian members are 24 emergency dispatchers and 10 records clerks.
Deputy Chief Des Walsh said reducing the number of employees on the service would also reduce the amount and quality of services the TPS provides for the
18 community. He said the 85 TPS officers is comparable to other police forces in the province, considering what is provided.
Mayor Tom Laughren said policing costs, both municipal and OPP, are the talks of many councils.
“This is going to become, in my mind, an election issue,” said Laughren. “There are police forces out there that are (costing) well over $1,000 per household, and there’s areas being policed for well under $100 per household. There’s no rhyme or reason to it.”
In Timmins it is around $680 per household.
Laughren said the Ontario Association of Police Services Board (OAPSB) is taking a hard look at adopting a form of co-ordinated bargaining.
“There are pros and cons to it,” said Laughren, who added he expects to hear news come from the OAPSB in the coming months. “But obviously, the direction we’re going in, we can’t sustain it.” Halton police still seeking resident input on priorities
Oakville Beaver By David Lea Jan 03, 2014
The Halton Regional Police Service unveiled a draft plan of the goals and objectives they intend to pursue over the next three years.
The service priorities, which were divided into four themes, were discussed during a meeting of the Halton Regional Police Service Board late last month.
These goals are important, said the board, as they will guide police in the delivery of services vital in maintaining the safety of Halton residents.
Under the theme ‘Community Safety’ the plan listed six goals including one to ensure Halton maintains the lowest overall crime rate and Crime Severity Index of any comparable-sized community in Canada.
Another goal was to deter criminal activity through the strengthening of crime prevention, community policing and safety initiatives and by “relentlessly pursuing criminals.”
Other goals stated the need for improved crime clearance rates and called on police to focus on key areas of concern for the community including: traffic safety and enforcement, growth in illegal drug activity, gangs and organized crime, assaults and sexual assaults, domestic violence, youth and young adult crime,
19 victimization of seniors/youth/children, technology-based crime, monitoring and tracking offenders, hate crimes and human trafficking.
Engaging the community to collaboratively share responsibility for keeping the region safe was among the stated goals.
“In this last round of public consultation we heard a lot of people talking about how the police can’t do it all and you know the police can’t do it all,” said Keith Moore, planning and research, Halton police.
“We need the public and others helping us by being the eyes and ears out there in the community, looking for issues they need to bring to police’s attention, helping us find criminals once crimes have been committed.”
The final Community Safety goal called for the establishment of leading edge emergency preparedness measures that would ensure the police service continued to operate effectively during emergencies or large-scale special events where police resources would be stretched thin.
Under the theme of ‘Outreach and Collaboration’, the No. 1 goal was listed as building public awareness of and trust/confidence in the Halton Regional Police Service and policing in general.
Educating the public about safety and security issues, as well as reducing fear of crime were also among the goals under the heading.
In addition, defining and clearly communicating Halton police responsibilities, strengthening communication and community dialogue, collaborating with Halton communities to prevent and solve crime, strengthening relationships with youth and diverse communities and other law enforcement agencies were among the list.
“There has been some sense of people wanting some clarity about the things you do, don’t do, should be contacted about and shouldn’t be contacted about,” said Moore.
“They were saying to us, ‘If I see someone dumping some soil on the side of the road do I call the police or do I call a conservation officer or a municipal bylaw officer? If somebody’s barbecue is sending smoke into my backyard do I call 911 or do I call a municipal bylaw officer or a councillor?’”
Under theme of ‘Organizational Capacity’, the goal of ensuring police resources and funding responsibly address operational requirements and changing demographics was first on the list.
Enhancing the use of police analytics to improve effectiveness and efficiency, while ensuring Halton police be leaders in the use of new technologies were also listed.
20 Other goals in this area included: ensuring all employees are well-trained and well-equipped; strengthening police ability to effectively deal with situations of elevated risk (such as, mental-health-related incidents); enhancing human resources best practices to support employee recruitment, retention, diversity, career development, succession planning, performance management and positive labour relations; strengthening employee understanding of the Halton Regional Police Service and its initiatives; and ensuring police facilities adequately meet current and future needs.
Under the final theme of ‘Organizational Excellence’, the main goal called for Halton police to demonstrate the highest levels of ethical and professional standards.
Strengthening service delivery and positive interactions with the community were also listed, as well as ensuring the police service is an employer of choice for both uniform and civilian positions.
Strengthening employee engagement and motivation; ensuring the police service culture emphasizes respect, responsibility, accountability, relationships and results; ensuring the police service meets or exceeds all current and future provincially mandated requirements; and becoming a leader in identifying and implementing innovative policing practices were some of the other goals.
Members of the public can see the draft plan on the Halton police website at www.haltonpolice.ca, under the ‘In the Spotlight’ icon where it is listed under 2014-2016 Business Plan.
The public is invited to comment on the plan until Thursday, Jan. 9.
At the Jan. 23 police board meeting, the final draft of the business plan will be submitted for adoption.
Police say they need Tasers; some question the cost
By Bill Sawchuk, St. Catharines Standard Monday, December 30, 2013 4:38:02 EST PM
Beyond dollars and cents, Tasers — or what police refer to as conducted energy weapons — are a matter of life and death, Niagara Police Chief Jeff McGuire says.
“In our opinion, it is really quite simple, a conducted energy weapon in the hands of a properly trained police officer, with proper steps of accountability in place and good supervision, is going to save lives,” McGuire said.
21 “If hand-to-hand combat didn’t work, and pepper spray didn’t work, and you are fighting for your life, it gives the officer an opportunity to de-escalate a situation without having to elevate to the level of having to shoot someone.”
After a bruising battle, Niagara Region council agreed to add $670,000 back into the police budget recently, the exact estimated cost to buy stun guns for all front- line NRP officers.
A final plan to buy stun guns will be presented in January to the police board, which can approve or reject it.
In Hamilton, the police service asked for $992,462 to equip all front-line officers with conducted energy weapons.
However, a report to the police services board recommended a plan to purchase fewer devices, which will be in a pool and signed out.
The report said this will help minimize costs and help ensure that as technology changes, the devices are more easily upgraded.
West Lincoln Mayor Doug Joyner said there are still questions that need to be answered in Niagara about the cost and the need for a Taser in the hand of every front-line NRP officer.
The NRP deployed Tasers 19 times in 2012 and 27 times in 2011.
“In my mind, the chief needs to justify if every front-line officer needs one,” Joyner said. “What they are saying is when they go out on a shift, they are going to grab their pepper spray, grab a flashlight. They are going to grab some handcuffs. They are going to grab a Taser. I don’t know that it is necessary that each front-line officer have one. Certain people on that platoon have them and I think that’s good enough.”
The NRP has 60 conducted energy weapons for its specialized units and uniformed supervisors.
The Taser incapacitates a victim using an electric shock, which disrupts the brain’s signals causing pain and muscle contractions. Most victims fall down, which is why officers use them in altercations.
Tasers have an “on-board” computer chip that records the date and time whenever the trigger is pulled. Some models record how long the trigger was depressed.
On Aug. 27, the province announced it would allow the use of Tasers by front- line officers. The province didn’t, however, provide any funding.
McGuire said since provincial policy now allows police forces to deploy stun guns, he believes they should be purchased. The plan would be to equip 300 additional officers with the stun guns.
22
“The more coverage we have, the better,” McGuire said. “If you look at the stats, there isn’t a large number of uses. In a perfect world, we would have them at every call.”
Because of the change in provincial policy, McGuire said there could be liability issues if an officer used a firearm when no Taser was available.
“I think it is reasonable to expect the board may be in a position to defend itself ... if a situation escalated to lethal force.
“Particularly in this jurisdiction, which is a large geographic area. Having a couple on the road, say for instance, up in 3 District (Welland), in my opinion, is not that reasonable. They can be miles and miles apart. These things happen very quickly. It might be different in some of the larger cities if you have people right around the corner quickly.
“None of our officers want to elevate to lethal force. They would very much like to have more steps before they get to that point. They don’t want to go home at night having discharged their firearm thinking, ‘I wish I had a CEW, I could have handled that differently.’ ”
Henry D’Angela, chair of the police services board, didn’t return calls.
Regional Coun. Bruce Timms understands the chief’s point of view.
“I think all of the officers need to be better trained on de-escalating circumstances, but, as the chief said, the presentation of a stun gun is often a significant deterrent. If they actually go that extra step and use it, it is a lot better than a bullet.”
Timms said councillors want to know what putting $600,000 worth of the Tasers in the capital budget would do to property taxes if the money doesn’t come from the NRP’s operating budget.
“(The chief) is putting forward a good case to equip his people, but the board has to decide what we can afford,” Timms said.
“It is a significant cost.”
Timms said the Taser deployment was one of the services threatened by an arbitrators decision to give the police a 3% raise in 2012.
“We need to demonstrate to the arbitrators that significant services are at risk because of these exorbitant labour awards.”
McGuire said police could attempt to find the money within the NRP operating budget and perhaps not roll the weapons out to every officer at once, but stagger the deployment over a few years.
23 “But I think the potential liability of not using these weapons should be weighed against their expense,” he said. “We are still working on our deployment model as to what’s best for the people and what’s best for the service. We will be reporting to the board at the January meeting.”
Conducted Energy Weapons
The following are Conducted Energy Weapons deployments and uses reported by NRP over the past five years.
2008: 54 total; 23 dart probes; 20 drive stun; 11 demonstrated force.
2009: 41 total; 15 dart probes; 18 drive stun; 8 demonstrated force.
2010: 19 total; nine dart probes; 3 drive stun; 7 demonstrated force.
2011: 27 total; 12 dart probes; 6 drive stun; 9 demonstrated force.
2012: 18 total; 8 dart probes; 3 drive stun; 8 demonstrated force.
Four-year totals: 160 total; 93 dart probes; 50 drive stun; 43 demonstrated force.
Dart probes: Stun gun is fired at a subject; drive stun: stun gun is applied directly to a subject; demonstrated force: any instance in which the stun gun is removed from its holster in front of a member of the public.
Former police chief leaving his job with the province By: Sudbury Northern Life Staff | Dec 30, 2013 - 2:00 PM Ian Davidson resigns post as deputy minister of Community Safety and Correctional Services
Ian Davidson, a former chief of Greater Sudbury's police force, has retired from his job as with the Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services.
A spokesperson with the ministry confirmed Monday that Davidson was stepping down in February, but said he wouldn't be available for an interview until after the holidays.
Davidson left his job in Sudbury in 2009, to take on his first role with the ministry, Ontario’s Commissioner of Community Safety, with oversight of the Office of the Fire Marshal, Public Safety Division and Emergency Management Ontario. He was appointed deputy minister in September 2010, a month after Sudbury MPP Rick Bartolucci was named minister by former Liberal Premier Dalton McGuinty. As deputy minister, he was also Ontario’s deputy solicitor general.
24 According to a biography on the ministry's website, Davidson began his career as a police officer in Ottawa in 1978. He became a superintendent with Greater Sudbury Police in 1998, before being named chief in 2002. He was elected president of the Ontario Association of Chiefs of Police in 2008.
Davidson has a bachelor’s degree from Carleton University, where he majored in law. He is a graduate of the Ontario Police College, the Canadian Police College, the FBI National Academy, and the Rotman Police Leadership Program. He is also a certified municipal manager.
The man who replaced Davidson in Sudbury, Frank Elsner, is now chief of the police force in Victoria, B.C. A search is on to find a replacement, which should happen by the spring.
Counsel can’t vet police notes: SCC Written by David Dias Thursday, 19 December 2013 Canadian Lawyer Magazine
Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit scored a huge victory in today’s ruling by the Supreme Court of Canada.
Former Ontario SIU chief André Marin says this ruling plugs a big hole. In Wood v. Schaeffer, the SCC sided 6-3 with the SIU and families of civilians killed in police shootings. The ruling means police officers under investigation will not be able to consult a lawyer prior to preparing notes on the incident.
The case stems from two shootings where civilians were killed by police. On both occasions, police officers were instructed by their superior officers to wait until they had spoken to counsel before taking notes (which could be admissible in court).
The families of the deceased challenged the officers’ right to counsel, applying to the Superior Court of Ontario for interpretation of the Police Services Act regarding access to counsel.
That application was originally dismissed, but then dealt with at the Ontario Court of Appeal. The appeal court issued a decision that would prevent lawyers from providing strategic counsel, but would allow for more basic legal advice.
Lawyers for the police appealed to the Supreme Court, arguing the limits on legal advice were too restrictive. Lawyers for the SIU then executed a bold counter: they cross-appealed, arguing that any legal counsel during note-taking — basic or otherwise — was inconsistent with the purpose of the police regulations.
The Supreme Court agreed, dismissing the police officers’ appeal and allowing the SIU’s appeal—prohibiting police officers under investigation from meeting with a lawyer prior to submitting notes.
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Justice Michael Moldaver, writing for the majority, was strident in his reasoning: “Permitting police officers to consult with counsel before their notes are prepared is an anathema to the very transparency that the legislative scheme aims to promote.
“ . . . a reasonable member of the public would naturally question whether counsel’s assistance at the note-making stage is sought by officers to help them fulfill their duties as police officers, or if it is instead sought, in their self-interest, to protect themselves and their colleagues from the potential liability of an adverse SIU investigation.”
Justices Louis Lebel, Thomas Cromwell, and Morris Fish dissented on the SIU’s cross-appeal. They suggest that a “plain wording” interpretation of s. 7(1) of the Police Services Act entitles police officers under questioning to basic legal advice.
“This brief, informative conversation might . . . help to remind an officer of his or her duties in the circumstances and put the officer at ease after having experienced a potentially traumatic incident.”
The ruling, however, denies even this general level of advice: “. . . even the perfunctory consultation contemplated by the Court of Appeal is liable to cause the same threat to public confidence. . . . A loss of public trust would seem a high price to pay for an initial consultation. . . .”
André Marin, Ombudsman of Ontario, served as the director of Ontario’s SIU from 1996 to 1998. Marin is ecstatic about the decision, saying it plugs a giant hole that has plagued the SIU since its formation 23 years ago.
“We had an absurd situation where a lawyer could ghost-write the notes. They would take statements around the witness officer and then give advice to the subject officer. . . . And then you would have the lawyer redacting, deciding what would go in the notes and what wouldn’t go in the notes. It corrupted the evidence from the get-go.”
Marin says police unions have fought hard to keep their members’ right to counsel during questioning, but they overreached this time. Instead of just accepting what the appeal court had granted, the police unions took a huge risk and appealed, and lost big time.
“They challenged it and the SIU said, ‘Fine, we have nothing to lose. We’ll cross- appeal.”
Marin is particularly thrilled for the families involved.
“Nobody was prepared to go on a limb for this family. So that’s why I’m happy today.”
Brian Greenspan, counsel for the appellants, declined comment, noting his client would be issuing a statement shortly. Julian Falconer, counsel for the
26 respondents, was unavailable for comment.
‘Unhappy’ over Brant OPP pay hike
By Michael-Allan Marion, Brantford Expositor Monday, December 30, 2013 8:12:05 EST PM
PARIS – County council is looking at a proposed 2014 budget for the Brant County OPP contract that carries a 6.3% increase.
The budget, forwarded to the committee of the whole from the police services board, calls for $7.7 million to satisfy the contract. That's a 7.6% hike from nearly $7.2 million for 2013.
However, a series of alterations, including a rebate from the province for keeping overtime costs at a minimum during 2013, reduce the increase to 6.5%
Still, most of the increase is due to an 8.55% salary hike for uniformed officers negotiated by the provincial government with the Ontario Provincial Police Association and dictated to all municipalities with OPP contracts.
“It's unfortunate that the municipalities and their taxpayers that pay their bills weren't consulted, and don't have a say,” said Coun. Joan Gatward, also a police board member.
“We aren't happy either. But sometimes government isn't easy. There are decisions that are made that we just have to swallow.
“I believe we still get good value for our policing dollar. Our people in our county were surveyed about how they felt about the policing they get. They find it reassuring to have the OPP as a safety net.”
Most of the 2014 budget is eaten up by salaries, premiums and benefits for uniformed officers. They include an inspector, a staff sergeant, four sergeants and 44 constables. That comes to a little less than $6.5 million.
OPP Supt R.A. Philbin, commander of the municipal policing bureau, explained in a letter attached to the budget that an 8.55% increase in salaries is expected in 2014.
He referred to a compensation framework agreement reached between the Ministry of Government Services and the Ontario Provincial Police Association, which states that following a two-year across-the-board salary freeze that ends Dec. 31, 2013, the general salary increase in 2014 “will be determined by the salary of the highest paid police service in Ontario.”
27 Municipalities using OPP contracts were informed of the 8.55% figure in May. The increase was plugged into the budgets for all municipal contracts for 2014.
“A good thing coming out of this is that the OPP has gotten the message,” Gatward said.
“People aren't happy with the big increase and they are looking at a new billing model. I'm comfortable they will find some efficiencies.”
Civilian staff account for another $869,547. That covers the salaries and benefits for a court officer, three detachment administrative clerks, and prison guard, communications, telephone support, office automation and operational support personnel.
Other operating expenses, including vehicles and equipment, come to $826,984.
Brant will receive a “provincial services usage” credit of $340,502. It compensates the municipality for the deployment of officers to other areas for investigations or other occurrences deemed to be provincial responsibilities.
Orangeville police seek investigation of town’s police services board Police association has requested, for reasons not made public, an independent review of the force’s bosses by the Ontario Civilian Police Commission.
By: Peter Edwards The Star Published on Thu Dec 19 2013 Orangeville police officers want the province to investigate their bosses. The Orangeville Police Association unanimously has requested that the Ontario Civilian Police Commission investigate “the adequacy and effectiveness of the Orangeville Police Services Board” in its Nov. 13 meeting.
The OCPC is a provincial oversight agency meant to ensure police forces follow the Police Services Act.
Police services boards are responsible for hiring and monitoring local police chiefs, establishing police policies and making sure those policies are followed. Orangeville Police Association meeting notes obtained by the Star don’t explain why the investigation was requested, but do note the decision was made after consultation with a lawyer.
The Star has also obtained a letter sent by Orangeville Police Association President James Giovannetti in which he tells members of the request for an outside review of the force, without giving reasons.
“As a result of ongoing concerns regarding the operation of the Orangeville Police Services Board, the OPA Executive unanimously decided to request that
28 the OCPC conduct a review in to the adequacy and effectiveness of the OPSB,” Giovannetti wrote to members.
“This request is specifically in regards to the OPSB, and does not involve senior management of the Orangeville Police Service,” Giovannetti continued. Neither the police board chair Cynthia Rayburn nor Orangeville Mayor Rob Adams, who sits on the board, could not be reached for comment Thursday.
This isn’t the first time Orangeville officers have urged the province to investigate those at the top of the police structure.
In 2010, former Orangeville police sergeant Curtis Rutt also requested a province investigation into what he deemed widespread lack of training for officers.
Rutt called for an independent review by the OCPC and for Chief Joseph Tomei to be suspended. He accused Tomei of supplying inadequate training, which Rutt believed resulted in substandard investigations.
Rutt was subsequently charged under the Police Services Act with discreditable conduct, deceit and breach of confidence for allegedly leaking material to the media.
Rutt resigned last August, saying his continued employment with the force was “intolerable.” The charges died with his resignation. Police compensation costs rose 26 per cent over five years Dec 26, 2013 THE RECORD By Paige Desmond WATERLOO REGION — Waterloo Regional Police compensation costs have increased 26 per cent in five years, according to an analysis by The Record.
Salaries, pensions and other benefits cost about $93 million in 2008 and rose to $117 million in 2012.
The cost per full-time equivalent increased 14 per cent to about $109,000.
Waterloo Region Police Services board chair Tom Galloway said the trend is not sustainable. He blames an arbitration system that decides police pay hikes based on what other services have been awarded.
"The arbitration system has to be changed so that ability to pay, the economy, cost of living — all those factors need to become paramount as opposed to, well what did the other guy get whose the highest out there," he said.
When police disagree with the contract they're offered, they can take it to a provincial arbitrator. Arbitrators generally make decisions based on what other police services have secured.
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"There's two ways of paying for these increases," Galloway said. "One is to raise taxes, the other is to reduce costs. And when 85 per cent of your costs are salaries, that's where you look to save costs."
In 2013 police were awarded an 8.6 per cent pay raise over three years by arbitrators.
Under the Police Services Act, Region of Waterloo councillors approve the budget the police services board signs off on.
Police Chief Matt Torigian said it's difficult to grade police pay because duties and requirements can vary, even in the space of a single shift.
For example, Torigian said, an officer could be required to handle a low-risk neighbour dispute, and then attend a life-threatening call.
"It's very difficult to compartmentalize the tasks and the roles and responsibilities and then try to look at a salary grade that's commensurate," he said. "That's one of the reasons why … our governments have decided the best way to go about it is through binding arbitration if your community can't come to a decision point on its own."
He said more needs to be taken into consideration than just dollars and cents.
"Putting a really wide lens on this is critically important in determining whether or not we are getting a return on investment for our policing dollars that is satisfactory to our community," he said.
Policing is one of the most significant costs in the regional budget. In 2013, a $135-million police budget was approved — 7.3 per cent more than in 2012.
Torigian was asked to cut the equivalent of eight first-class constables from salary costs at the time.
It's anticipated the 2014 police budget will be about $140 million, meeting a target set by the region of a 0.9 per cent tax hike.
North Dumfries Mayor Rob Deutschmann said he also takes issue with the arbitration system, but he'd like to see the community weigh in on its expectations for police.
"We've got a police services board who seem to be promoting a certain direction that is not necessarily in tune with what the police chief is recommending and I'm wondering, then, shouldn't we go to the public and say what do you want to see in policing," he said.
Deutschmann said he will bring a motion to regional council in January seeking a public input process on policing here.
30 Galloway agreed there are community needs to balance.
"The community grows, the calls for service grow," he said. "That's basically the indicator of police work is the calls for service."
Between 2008 and 2012, calls for service increased from 176,000 to 300,000. Here is what the Commission accuses
The regional population grew from 533,000 • He sent a letter to the Minister of people in 2008 to 559,000 in 2012, Community Safety and Correctional according to regional documents. Services advocating that Board chair Nancy Martin's term not be extended after the Board had voted down his The equivalent of 95 full-time staff were motion not to support her term being hired by police during that time. extended.
Galloway said one way to address • He authored and sent a letter to the community needs while keeping costs down Minister alleging that Board chair Nancy Martin had committed misconduct while would be changes to legislation allowing not bringing the allegation to the Board different types of police staff to be hired. for action
"The legislation has to change so special • He authored and sent a letter to the constables and other types of officers can Minister alleging unsupported allegations of misconduct against Board do lower-level work," he said. "We're paying chair Nancy Martin first-class constables to stand at the side of the road doing radar — they should be • On receiving a confidential complaint doing major investigations — homicide, about the conduct of Chief Murray drugs, fraud." Rodd, he did not keep the matter confidential among members of the Board but shared the complaint with Torigian said investigative units have been members of Peterborough City Council shaved to put more officers on front lines. and a member of Peterborough City staff. He is also accused of sharing an Galloway said he has no plans for drastic email pertaining a confidential board meeting with City Council members. cuts to police, but there needs to be a shift on compensation. • On receiving a confidential complaint about the conduct of Chief Murray "I'm certainly hearing many more people Rodd, he did not immediately bring the express concern about the cost of policing complaint to the Board for action. and the need to slow it down," he said. "If • While negotiating the budget for the they don't make dome concessions, it's Peterborough Lakefield Police Service going to get to a point where it's not for 2012, he attempted to negotiate with sustainable, it's not affordable." Chief Murray Rodd rather than, as a member of Council, with the Board
Mayor's hearing starts • He publicly expressed disagreement with a decision by Chief Murray Rodd to Monday hire a civilian in the position of Police EXAMINER STAFF Services Communications Co-ordinator Friday, January 3, 2014 8:27:59 EST PM which the decision was supported by the Board Mayor Daryl Bennett’s hearing before the Ontario Civilian Police Commission is • He publicly condemned the Commission's investigative process, describing it as a "farce" and "anti- democratic," and he compared the Commission's investigative powers to 31 those which existed in "pre-war Germany" scheduled to begin Monday at the Holiday inn in Peterborough.
The OCPC is a quasi-judicial agency that conducts investigations into the conduct of police officers or of members of police services boards.
In this case the OCPC alleges that Bennett violated the code of conduct for police services board members. A panel of two commission members is hearing the case. The commission is seeking to remove Bennett from the Peterborough Lakefield Police Services Board.
Bennett has been effectively suspended from the board since September 2012 when the commission launched its investigation.
The hearing is scheduled to run Monday to Friday and Feb. 3, 6, 7, 10 and 14 at the Holiday Inn on George St. Hearing over Mayor Bennett's conduct on police services board off to slow start
First witness called by police commission faces a barage of questions from Mayor Bennett's lawyer January 6, 2014 Peterborough This Week By Sarah Frank PETERBOROUGH -- Debates over procedural issues tied up most of Monday afternoon (Jan. 6) during a hearing over Mayor Daryl Bennett's alleged misconduct on the local police services board.
Counsel for the Ontario Civilian Police Commission (OCPC) argued Mayor Bennett's lawyer Richard Taylor was out of bounds while questioning their first witness -- OCPC investigator Warren Korol, who worked on the Mayor's file. The OCPC laywers objected as Mr. Taylor pushed the investigator to talk about evidence that hadn't yet been presented and answer questions about specific interviews he conducted in Peterborough. Although he was cautioned by OCPC Chair David Gavsie for getting ahead of himself, Mr. Taylor says the questions were fair.
The hearings into the Mayor Bennett's conduct on the board will continue throughout the week, with a total of nine allegations against him, including accusations of sharing confidential information with City councilliors and attempting to negotiate budget issues directly with police chief. Ultimately, the OCPC wants the mayor booted from the local police services board. He's been suspended from participating in his role on the board member since the commission announced its investigation last September.
Commission Chair David Gavsie became noticeably frustrated with Mr. Taylor's line of questioning during the hearing and blocked questions over whether the evidence provided by the OCPC's counsel could have included more documentation.
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"It's not up to Mr. Korol to decide what information they rely upon," says Prabhu Rajan, prosecutor for the commission. "Mr. Korol's opinion doesn't matter -- we haven't qualified him as an expert…In some ways, (Mr. Taylor) is essentially trying to put me on the witness stand."
Mr. Gavsie agreed there might be some confusion over who Mr. Taylor should be directing his questions at, since Mr. Korol was only involved in collecting evidence and conducting interviews -- not issuing the allegations against the mayor.
"You're really asking him to make a case against himself, aren't you?" he asked Mr. Taylor.
Throughout the meeting the OCPC's counsel reviewed a number of video clips of local media coverage, including interviews with Mayor Bennett where he calls the Police Services Act "the worst piece of legislation to work under" and likens the investigation process to living in "pre-war" germany.
Mr. Taylor plans to continue questioning Mr. Korol on Tuesday (Jan. 7), when the hearing continues at 9 a.m. at the Holiday Inn.
The hearings are scheduled to continue until Friday afternoon (Jan. 10). Later hearings are scheduled for Feb. 3, 6, 7, 10 and 14, beginning at 10 a.m. at the Holiday Inn.
Mayor Bennett isn't required to put forward his evidence against the allegations until Feb. 3. Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair weighs in on recent Supreme Court rulings RENATA D’ALIESIO The Globe and Mail Published Friday, Dec. 27 2013, 12:16 PM EST Last updated Friday, Dec. 27 2013, 4:21 PM EST Toronto police Chief Bill Blair says his officers will turn to other laws to deal with the harmful effects of the sex trade after the Supreme Court of Canada struck down the country’s major prostitution laws.
In a year-end interview with The Globe and Mail on Friday, Chief Blair declined to reveal whether he agrees with the top court’s unanimous ruling. He noted police officers can use other laws, such as those targeting human trafficking, assault and exploitation, to deal with pimps and people who and sell women, men and children for the sex trade.
“The Supreme Court has issued a ruling and it’s a very strong ruling and we accept the direction that they give,” the Chief Blair said. “We will use every tool available to us to keep people safe.”
33 In a 9-0 ruling last week, the Supreme Court declared that the laws that increase dangers to vulnerable prostitutes, including bans on street soliciting, brothels and living off the avails of prostitution, violate Canada’s basic values.
“Parliament has the power to regulate against nuisances, but not at the cost of the health, safety and lives of prostitutes,” Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin wrote on behalf of the country’s most influential court.
The Supreme Court has given Parliament one year to respond. Justice Minister Peter MacKay must decide whether to adopt new prohibitions in connection with prostitution. If so, the minister must ensure those rules fall in line with the ruling.
Chief Blair weighed in Friday on another Supreme Court decision that affects police officers. The court ruled last week that officers being investigated in a shooting should not be allowed to talk to a lawyer before preparing their notes and turning them over to investigators, such as Ontario’s civilian Special Investigations Unit.
The ruling was a strong rebuke of a common practice in Ontario.
For example, Douglas Minty, a 59-year-old developmentally disabled man, and Levi Schaeffer, a 32-year-old with psychiatric problems, were shot dead by Ontario Provincial Police officers in separate incidents in 2009. Both men were armed with a knife. In each case, supervising officers told the police officers under investigation to consult with lawyers before preparing their notes. Those same lawyers represented other police officers who witnessed the incidents.
This will no longer be allowed because of the Supreme Court’s ruling. The court determined that protecting public confidence in the police is so important that government can limit police officers’ rights to basic legal advice.
Officers will now be allowed to consult lawyers after turning over their notes to investigators.
“In my opinion, it was never appropriate for lawyers to vet notes,” Chief Blair said. “The officers’ notes are to be a reflection of their independent recollection of events – today’s memoir – and to assist them. It was never appropriate for a lawyer to … vet the notes.”
Youth in Policing grads are bright spots in Toronto's future
BY JENNY YUEN,TORONTO SUN FIRST POSTED: SATURDAY, DECEMBER 21, 2013 04:00 PM EST | TORONTO - Kulthum Noor got her first taste in policing at Scarborough temples plagued by a string of gold-necklace thefts.
34 The 17-year-old participant in a police youth program was thrust into action to hand out pamphlets and translate for South Asian community members attending the targeted temples.
“Mostly women of South Asian descent were targeted because they wear a lot of gold,” Noor said. “It beat the language barrier and it felt like I was really helping people.
The Lester B. Pearson student was among 60 teens who graduated Friday from the Youth in Policing Initiative (YIPI) program.
The program – funded by the province – employs kids aged 15 to 18, from priority neighbourhoods in 17 divisions across the city, to create a link between youth and police through work assignments.
“I want to pursue this as a career option,” she said. “I wanted to see what it looked like behind the scenes. This enhanced my desire, maybe in the Emergency Task Force or the K-9 Unit because I love dogs.”
Noor was stationed at 42 Division at Milner Ave. and Markham Rd. for 17 weeks. Each teen is paid $10-12 an hour
“(YIPI) taught me structure, because it taught me that I had to be there right there after school and more organized,” she added.
Toronto Police run a similar full-time employment program for youth during the summer.
Prior to Friday’s group, 1,200 students had graduated the YIPI program, with another class ready to start in January.
Dressed in black uniforms with the program’s name inscribed on them, one by one, Friday’s ceremony saw them receive a certificate handshakes with Toronto Police Services Board Chair Alok Mukherjee, Deputy Chief Mark Saunders and Deputy Chief Peter Sloly at police headquarters on College St.
“These are high-potential kids,” Sloly said. “They will help build this city and this society.”
Francis Malcolm, 17, became involved with YIPI through his guidance office. He was placed at 51 Division in the Parliament St.-Eastern Ave. area, and said it allowed him to see first-hand “what police do.
“I like hearing about the different sides of police – that they’re not all scary as they seem to be or if people see police, they associate them with something bad,” said Malcolm. “Now, I can say I’ve gotten to know them and associate them with some good stuff.”
35 Malcolm’s father, Fitzbert, said he panicked a bit when he came home one night to see a police cruiser parked in his driveway. He then saw a nicely dressed young man step out of the car and realized it was his son.
“I was stunned,” he said. “He started laughing and said, ‘It was the first day on the job and they decided to give us a ride home.’
“Francis acted on his own impulse,” his dad recalled. “This program makes the community safer. And in doing so, it will help (youth) build their self-esteem.”
R.H. King Academy student Deandre Smith, 17, was also stationed at 51 Division. Though he doesn’t want to join the police force after graduating, what he’s learned on the job will help when he becomes an early childhood education worker.
“It was really amazing to see the smiles on their faces when we play basketball with these kids, seven to 10 years old,” Smith said. “It was the best thing in the world.”
ELIGIBILITY FOR THE PROGRAM
Must be a student between the ages of 15 and 18 years Must not have any criminal charges pending before the court Must be a Canadian citizen or permanent resident Must be legally eligible to work in Canada Must be attending school Must not have previously participated in any YIPI program
Chief Bill Blair: Police carding can be illegal if done wrong By Staff Torstar News Service December 28, 2013
Torstar News Service In a year-end interview Friday, Toronto police Chief Bill Blair speaks about carding, Mayor Rob Ford, the use of Tasers and controversy surrounding the G20 meeting in Toronto. Toronto police Chief Bill Blair says carding is legal — but that “if done improperly, it can cross the threshold into illegality.”
The police services board has retained Frank Addario, a prominent criminal lawyer, to offer an opinion on the legality of the force’s controversial practice of stopping, questioning and documenting residents on the street. The people who are carded are disproportionately black and brown, and some legal experts contend that the practice violates the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
Blair argues that carding is a valuable crime-fighting tool. In a year-end interview in his office on Friday, he said, as he has in the past, that he has privately
36 obtained three legal opinions from “very senior counsel” that “do not suggest that it’s illegal.” But he added this time that he believes carding can become illegal under certain circumstances.
Asked when it crosses the “threshold,” he said: “I think there is a point at which, if a person is detained without justification, then it can be illegal. And so the manner in which the approach is made, the questions are asked, the information is obtained, even the type of information that’s gathered, there’s a point at which everything the police do must be justified in law.”
Civil rights lawyer Peter Rosenthal, who seeks the abolition of carding, said he is not aware of Blair saying anything similar in the past.
“If he acknowledges the danger, that’s another reason to desist from the practice,” Rosenthal said.
“I don’t understand why the police are trying to find out how much they can get away with legally,” he said. “By this overpolicing of the black community, they’ve caused tremendous antagonism, and it ends up with them getting much less co- operation from the community than they would otherwise get.”
Blair addressed several other topics.
Mayor Rob Ford
Blair said officers might have had a chance to “intercept something” while watching Mayor Rob Ford — but that jumping to action could have jeopardized their investigations.
City councillors called earlier this month for Blair to explain in detail why Ford had not been arrested. Police surveillance captured Ford conducting clandestine package exchanges with an accused drug dealer, and alleged gang members were caught on Project Traveller wiretaps suggesting that Ford was smoking crack cocaine at a crack house as late as April.
Blair said investigators have to maintain a “broader focus” on “the whole truth, and all of the evidence.”
There “may have been an opportunity where they might have been able to intercept something,” he said, but they needed to “look at the investigation in its totality.” Project Traveller, which targeted the Dixon City Bloods gang, was concerned with murder, gun trafficking and drug trafficking, he noted.
“When you do larger, complex investigations, like when we do wiretap investigations — over the course of Project Traveller, for example — you see a lot of other, low level, criminal activity that takes place. And if you just stop and deal only with the first infraction you see, that can end the larger investigation,” Blair said.
37 “I understand the public may want a different outcome, but we’re not there to create the outcome somebody may want,” he said. “We’re out there to gather all of the evidence, and, where appropriate, to put that evidence before the courts.”
The investigation into Ford’s activities adds significant uncertainty to the 2014 mayoral election campaign, which formally begins on Wednesday. Blair said the looming campaign does not make the investigation any more urgent.
“Those investigations have to be done, as I have said before, without fear and without favour. Certainly without any political consideration. We follow the evidence. We go where the evidence takes us. And if there is evidence that warrants the laying of a charge, and a prosecution, then that will take place. And if not, that decision will be based entirely on the evidence,” he said.
Blair would not commit to informing the public when the Ford investigation is complete. And he would not say whether he is confident residents will still get to see the video that appears to show Ford using crack if there is a guilty plea from Sandro Lisi, who is charged with extortion for allegedly using threats to try to obtain the video. The courts, Blair said, will make the call.
Tasers
Blair said he will return to the board early in 2014 to discuss the “very measured, careful expansion” of Taser use.
The board voted in November against immediately approving Blair’s request to spend more than $300,000 to acquire 184 Tasers for front-line officers.
The force already had more than 500 Tasers, but provincial restrictions limited them to use by supervisors and the tactical squad. Though the province announced in August that it would ease the restrictions, Alok Mukherjee, chair of the police services board, said he wanted to wait until the ministry of community safety issued its new set of guidelines.
“The board decided to wait until the ministry published its regulations. The ministry has now published its regulations. So, as quickly possible, I’ll go back before the board to give them an opportunity now to see the regulations, and my recommendation,” Blair said.
Blair’s proposal was met with public resistance from civil libertarians and advocates for the mentally ill, who argue that Tasers are frequently used improperly. The provincial announcement came a month after the killing of Sammy Yatim, an 18-year-old who was armed with a small knife on an empty streetcar when he was shot repeatedly with bullets and then hit with a Taser.
Blair pointed immediately to the Yatim incident when asked about the year’s greatest challenges.
“We had a number of events, and in particular the Yatim shooting this summer — the use of force, and in particular deadly force, involving persons who are
38 suffering from emotional disturbance and mental illness, remains a huge challenge for the profession of policing, and for the community at large,” he said.
G20 bandanas
Police Const. Vincent Wong last week became the first officer to be found guilty of a Police Services Act charge related to the G20 summit in 2010. He was charged with unlawfully arresting a man who was wearing a bandana around his neck.
Officers who testified at the tribunal wrote in their notebooks during the G20 that they were told anyone wearing a bandana was “arrestable.” On Friday, Blair said it is not true that there was an order to arrest bandana wearers.
“I’m not aware of any order that was given to arrest people who were wearing bandanas. I believe there were instructions given to investigate persons, but not to arrest. There’s a difference, by the way, a very significant difference, between investigating someone who might be wearing a mask and arresting someone,” he said.
He argued that it was reasonable to instruct officers to investigate people wearing bandanas.
“We’d experienced a significant amount of rioting in the city, and there was a great deal of intelligence information that rioting was going to continue. And I think we have a responsibility to do everything we can to prevent those acts of violence and vandalism. And so persons who, for whatever reason, were determined to be worthy of further inquiry, I think it is appropriate — police have to make those inquiries,” he said.
Mayor evaded being interviewed by police commission investigator over police board conduct allegations
By Joelle Kovach Monday, January 6, 2014 10:38:33 EST PM
The ex-cop who conducted an inquiry into Mayor Daryl Bennett’s conduct on the police board never did get an interview with Bennett, he said - even though he asked persistently for almost three months.
Warren Korol, who spent 33 years on the Hamilton police force, is the investigator for the Ontario Civilian Police Commission, the body that looked into complaints against Bennett’s conduct as a police board member.
39 Korol was the first witness at a hearing Monday in Peterborough at the Holiday Inn. Over nearly three months of 2012 he repeatedly requested an interview with Bennett, he said.
The OCPC alleges that Bennett violated the code of conduct for police services board members.
The commission is seeking to remove Bennett from the Peterborough Lakefield Police Services Board.
Korol told the board about a series of 22 e-mails between him, Bennett and Bennett’s lawyer, Richard Taylor, in late 2012.
In the e-mails, Taylor asked Korol for the “parameters of the investigation” and for the questions Korol would be asking in an interview.
Korol said he refused because investigators don’t get “the ring of truth” when they allow people time to formulate their answers with help from their lawyer.
At the hearing on Monday, Taylor did not address this. But he wasn’t done his cross-investigation of Korol; he is expected to finish Tuesday, starting at 9 a.m.
Taylor instead focused on the allegation that the mayor failed to keep confidential a complaint e-mailed to him about a comment city police Chief Murray Rodd made to CHEX-TV.
Taylor asked Korol whether he had any documentation to support the idea that the complaint was meant to remain confidential.
The OCPC’s lawyer, Prabhu Rajan, objected; more than an hour was then spent arguing about whether Taylor’s questioning could be allowed.
The hearing is scheduled to resume Tuesday at 9 a.m. and continue all week.
QUEBEC 10% of Montreal police senior officers under investigation since 2010: report Posted on 12/19/2013 3:28:00 PM by Richard Deschamps CJAD
An unprecedented number of senior officers within the Montreal police force found themselves under internal investigation over the past three years.
40 A La Presse report suggests 15 of the 150 senior officers on the force had undergone questioning, at one time or another, in the three years since Marc Parent became police chief in 2010.
The report suggests the rank and file at the police department are split as to whether they believe there's a necessary cleanup taking place in the upper echelons of the force — or whether it's all a witchhunt.
In any case, a climate of suspicion is said to exist to the point where some of the 150 have purchased a second cellphone — just in case the one furnished by their employer becomes subject to wiretapping.
Two of the concerns were determined to be unfounded. Of the others, one officer is in the crosshairs because he is involved in a family construction business which did work for Mascouche, where the mayor is accused of corruption.
The rest of the cases are either serious disciplinary issues or criminal investigations including a drunk driving case, an officer who made false statements when crossing the border and an inspector who bought police equipment with a fund dedicated to the fight against contraband tobacco.
Parent's spouse is also being reassigned, to avoid any appearance of conflict of interest.
Genevieve Beauregard is director of human resources for the police force — she'll be assigned other HR work when the entire department is transferred to city hall in the New Year.
Sanctions weighed for Montreal cop who threatened itinerant man
‘I will tie you to a pole for an hour,’ he is heard saying
BY AARON DERFEL AND CHRISTOPHER CURTIS, THE GAZETTE JANUARY 3, 2014 The police officer who threatened to tie an itinerant man to a pole in the frigid cold met with his superiors for one hour Friday morning.
A police spokesperson confirmed the cop had a one-hour meeting with his supervising officers who will decide what disciplinary sanctions to impose on him.
In video footage that surfaced online Thursday, the officer is heard telling a homeless man “I’ve told you that if I receive another 911 call about you, I will tie you to a pole for an hour.”
The itinerant was wearing only shorts and a t-shirt and had reportedly been acting aggresively with police and bystanders. Police say he was the subject of four 911 calls before the officer uttered the threat and repeated it.
41
“I swear — look into my eyes — I swear,” the officer said, pointing his finger at the man, “I’ll tie you to a pole for an hour.”
The man, who is seen holding a Styrofoam cup containing loose change in his right hand, cowered in front of the officer outside the Jean-Talon métro station.
With his left hand, the man grabbed the pompom of a red Santa Claus hat strung over his right shoulder. A police cruiser was parked next to the man and another officer is seen sitting inside, observing his colleague without making any comments.
The bystander who took the video on a smartphone uploaded it to YouTube, where it quickly went viral, eliciting many outraged comments, including from Coderre.
“The words of the police officer were unacceptable,” Montreal Mayor Denis Coderre said in a tweet at 9 p.m. Thursday, adding that he’s “concerned about the current conditions of the homeless” during this week’s cold snap.
Commander Ian Lafrenière, head of public affairs for the Montreal Police Department, said disciplinary action will be taken against the officer.
“It could be a reprimand, it could be many things,” Lafrenière told The Gazette after 10 p.m.
“What you heard on that video is unacceptable and unexplainable. The commanding officer will be meeting with him (Friday morning), and I can tell you he’s not happy at all.”
Lafrenière explained that the officers on the scene had received a number of 911 calls about the man, whom he described as aggressive, mentally unstable and well-known to police.
“The man was not wearing appropriate clothing for the weather and the officer offered to put him in the police car to take him to a shelter, but he refused,” he said. “A passerby then promised to follow him to a warmer place” and the man left.
The passerby who took the video is heard at one point addressing the police officer, asking, “You know that you are making threats and you have no right to do so?”
“Back up, sir,” the officer is heard replying in the wind. “We’re in the process of dealing with this man.”
“It’s sad,” Lafrenière said, noting that some police officers have been volunteering to work past their shifts to help the homeless find shelter in the minus-30 degree cold.
42 “For all the police officers in Montreal, this is a shock.” Police unit lends homeless a helping hand Unique unit brings together police officers and health care professionals CBC News Posted: Jan 04, 2014 5:28 PM ET Last Updated: Jan 05, 2014 8:08 AM ET Two recent events have put relations between Montreal police and the city’s homeless population in the spotlight: the freezing weather and a video showing one officer’s altercation with a panhandler wearing only shorts and a t-shirt on the coldest day of the year so far.
In response to the controversy around the video, Montreal police Cmdr. Ian Lafrenière expressed frustration that it took away from what he says are the many valuable contributions made during the recent cold spell by his department. At the top of that list is the ongoing work of its small but dedicated homeless assistance unit.
Known by its French initials EMRII, the roving unit consists of five specially- trained police officers and four health care workers. Rather than an emergency response team, its job is to provide long-term assistance to some members of Montreal's homeless population.
No easy task
With the entire island of Montreal as their beat, the unit does what it can to keep tabs on some of the city’s most vulnerable citizens.
The unit’s caseload currently numbers close to 80 people, about 20 of whom are currently living on the streets. Clients followed by the EMRII team are those who resist using shelters or local resources, and they frequently generate 911 calls.
Team members spend a good deal of their time driving around Montreal in a police van trying to locate clients in order to make sure they’re okay and provide them with basic necessities like extra clothing, water and snacks like granola bars.
“They’re mobile but they usually have a routine, so we basically know where to find them,” says unit nurse Nathalie Gallant.
The units’ goal, says Gallant, is to develop a connection with their clients in order to build the trust and confidence required to help them with their day-to-day needs. The unit also helps clients access health care, legal aid and even find an apartment.
“The more frequently we can interact with them, the stronger that link will be,” she says.
43 Such links have taken a lot of work to build since the unit was created in 2009. Sometimes it can take months. And convincing clients to trust the police is not an easy task.
Laurent Dyke, one of the unit's police officers, said the decision to keep their uniforms and drive a clearly-marked police van was taken to avoid deceiving clients, a first step in building that all-essential trust.
This is also furthered by the officers' obvious concern for their clients.
"They're human beings that we get attached to because we see them all the time," says Dyke.
It's hard, often slow-going work that brings big rewards. Only one client from those originally referred to the unit in 2009 remains on its current case list.
Gallant attributes this record to the unit’s policy of rigorous follow-ups with its clients and its efforts to unite the various service providers assisting them around common goals.
Success, she says, is measured in baby steps.
“But even those are big steps,” says Gallant. “They do it for themselves and that’s a big reward.”
“I feel like we’re changing the world one person at a time.”
NEW BRUNSWICK Saint John councillor mulls switch to RCMP for policing city Coun. David Merrithew wants city to get estimate from Mounties as possible cost-saving measure CBC News Posted: Jan 03, 2014 1:06 PM AT Last Updated: Jan 03, 2014 4:27 PM AT
A Saint John city councillor wants council to study the cost of bringing in the RCMP to police the city, in hopes it may be a way to save money.
Ward 4 Coun. David Merrithew will put forward a motion Monday night, asking city staff about getting a quote from the national police force.
"This past budget saw costs for policing increase by approximately $1 million," Merrithew states in his written submission to council.
"Such increases in a single year, especially given the small growth in our overall tax base, are not sustainable," he said.
44
"It is the financial responsibility of this council to explore alternative cost for policing services for the city of Saint John."
But Chris Waldschutz, chair of the Saint John Board of Police Commissioners, contends Merrithew's figures are misleading.
The Saint John Police Force's core operating budget is unchanged this year, he said.
Council recently approved a 2014 policing services budget of $23.7 million. Last year, the budget was $22.7 million.
The $1 million increase covers two years of anticipated pay increases — 2013 and 2014 — as well as long-term disability commitments, said Waldschutz.
In addition, the force represents 13 per cent of the city's overall budget, which is comparatively low, he said.
"My fear is we're not going to compare apples and apples," Waldschutz said, with respect to any study.
Meanwhile, the New Brunswick Police Association says it conducted a 15-year comparison that shows the RCMP is consistently more expensive in New Brunswick than municipal policing.
The cost of Mounties range between 10.4 per cent and 26 per cent higher than the average cost of a municipal police force, based on data provided by the provincial government, said executive director Bob Davidson.
"A federal service cannot be less expensive than a local service, it's just not going to happen," he said.
'Disheartening' tactic
Davidson worries about the impact of Merrithew's motion on morale among the Saint John Police Force's 166 officers.
He contends it's an anti-union move in the midst of contract negotiations that are at an impasse.
"This tactic is very disheartening and very suspicious at this time when you have your contract going to binding arbitration to settle," he said.
In June, Saint John council voted unanimously to promote the idea of creating a regional police force.
But the proposal was quickly shot down by the Fundy Regional Service Commission.
45 Council subsequently voted unanimously on a motion to declare its support for city officers.
The Saint John Police Force is one of the oldest police services in Canada.
The RCMP provide policing services in 190 municipalities in Canada.
Moncton started outsourcing its policing services to the Codiac Regional RCMP in 1997, when the city disbanded its municipal police force.
The city had considered switching back to a local police department in 2010 during a financial dispute with its neighbouring communities of Dieppe and Riverview, as well as the federal government.
But council voted to keep the RCMP after it reached a new-cost sharing deal with the other two municipalities.
In 2012, the federal government also agreed to contribute 10 per cent of the policing costs in Greater Moncton.
Saint John council votes to consider move to RCMP policing Decision prompts complaint to labour board from police union negotiating new contract CBC News Posted: Jan 07, 2014 7:59 AM AT Last Updated: Jan 07, 2014 7:59 AM AT
The City of Saint John has voted to take a serious look at switching to the RCMP for police protection.
The move comes as the city is locked in contract negotiations with the union representing the Saint John Police Force.
The union alleges city council is trying to interfere in contract negotiations between the union and the city's police commission.
"This guy's got no mandate to do what he just did there. None!" said police union representative Bob Davidson.
"We're wasting time, money, effort," said Davidson, who was surrounded by dozens of off-duty police officers who attended the council meeting.
Police commission chairperson Christopher Waldschutz appeared to agree with Davidson's assessment.
"We're in the middle of negotiations. How can you foster trust and goodwill?" said Waldschutz.
46 City council voted Monday to examine the process and the costs involved of switching to the RCMP.
Mayor Mel Norton said the exercise is only about gathering information and allowing council to make some comparisons after having to add $1-million to its budget for policing costs in 2014.
"Any time we can be more informed that's a positive opportunity and this is one of those opportunities," said Norton.
However, the vote was not unanimous. Coun. Shirley McAlary was one of five councillors who voted against the move.
"I have a concern about the legal aspect of it because we are not the commission of the police," said McAlary.
Norton and Coun. Greg Norton both sit on the city's police commission as well as on city council. McAlary said council should get a legal opinion on whether they should have been allowed to participate in Monday's vote.
Police association president Jamie Hachey said the council's move will not go unchallenged. He says he'll file a complaint with the New Brunswick Labour and Employment Board on Tuesday.
"We're in active collective bargaining and they've threatened to contract out our jobs as an extortion tactic."
NOVA SCOTIA
PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND
NEWFOUNDLAND Special Newfoundland police force helps nab Ontario man on child pornography charges Published on December 27, 2013 The Telegraph A special RCMP/RNC unit in this province initiated a month-long, online cover operation that resulted in the arrest of an Ontario man on child pornography- related charges.
47 A news release today states an investigation started by the Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit (CFSEU – NL) resulted earlier this month in the arrest of Troy Aaron Paul Charron.
The 40-year-old was arrested Dec. 13 by members of the Ontario Provincial Police Child Sexual Exploitation Unit, the Chatham-Kent Police Service, the London Police Service and the Canadian Border Services Agency (CBSA) as he was returning to Canada from the United States.
He faces two counts of possession of child pornography, one count of making available child pornography, one count of accessing child pornography, one count of unsafe storage of firearms and one count of possession of a prohibited weapon.
Two days earlier, on Dec. 11, police in Ontario searched a home in Chatham, Ont. as a result of the CFSEU-NL investigation.
During that search two computers were seized which are alleged to contain images of child sexual abuse. An arrest warrant was then issued Charron, the home owner.
A subsequent search of Charron’s vehicle Dec. 13 revealed a computer and external storage device containing images of child sexual abuse.
The accused is facing additional charges of possession and the importation of prohibited material.
Charron was released on bail and will make his next court appearance on Jan. 7 in Chatham at the Ontario Court of Justice.
NATIONAL Way police deal with the mentally ill at a 'turning point,' observers say By By Diana Mehta The Canadian Press Dec 20, 2013 |
Whether the victim was a scissors-wielding mentally ill man, a soldier with post traumatic stress disorder or a teen with a knife on an empty street car, police shootings of those in crisis appear to have sparked a polarizing debate.
At a time when statistics suggest one in five Canadians experiences a mental health illness in any given year, there's growing concern about how police deal with some of society's most vulnerable.
48 While public outcry following some high-profile shootings has at times led to street protests and accusations of excessive police brutality, senior police officials say they've made the issue a priority.
Those in the upper echelons of law enforcement also say, however, that officers are only human.
"I'm not going to tell you that we're perfect," says Vancouver police chief Jim Chu, who is president of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police.
"What I will say is that the vast majority of police officers in Canada try very hard to act within the law, but also to handle those difficult, chaotic, dynamic situations. The vast majority of times they resolve peacefully."
The association issued a call this year to shift from dealing with a crisis to preventing it in the first place through more health-care funding and government support for the mentally ill.
Police appear to lack national measuring tools, however, to see if training on de- escalation techniques is succeeding on the street, and there aren't any easily available national statistics on police interactions with the mentally ill, said Chu, partly because of the patchwork of forces across the country.
He added that police come under a great deal of scrutiny when an encounter ends with an injury or death — including watchdog investigations, civil suits and coroner's inquests.
"Unfortunately those things happen and we don't have the luxury of saying, 'oh that client or that situation we're not going to deal with,'" he said. "If we want more accountability than that, then I say bring it on."
The heightened focus on the issue has some saying Canada could be at a critical juncture, with 2014 poised to be a year in which key changes could be wrought in how authorities deal with the mentally ill.
Many are working towards a conference planned for the spring of next year — a joint initiative between the police chiefs association and the Mental Health Commission — which will take an in-depth look at the issue. Simultaneously, a number of police departments have emphasized training which focuses on de- escalation.
"I think we're at a turning point, I think what these situations this year have really demonstrated is that the public demands that we do better," said Camille Quenneville, CEO of the Canadian Mental Health Association's Ontario division.
There are worries, however, that having such a spotlight on interactions between police and the mentally ill risks reinforcing the misconception that a mentally ill person is a violent one.
49 "There's nothing to suggest there's a link there," said Quenneville, adding that statistics show those with a mental illness are far more likely to be the victims of crime rather than the perpetrators.
"These situations, although they've had a lot of attention, are very rare," she said. "There are many family members who rely heavily on police to help them in crisis situations."
But some families whose loved ones have died in police shootings say there are crucial times when officers failed to help.
One example is the case of Reyal Jardine-Douglas, whose sister called 911 when her mentally ill brother boarded a transit bus. The 25-year-old was shot after he pulled a knife from a backpack and advanced on police who approached him.
His family has said they were devastated at how the situation was handled and demanded changes in how officers confront people they know to be mentally unstable.
Another case — which appeared to galvanize public outcry against police use of force — was that of Sammy Yatim, who was shot multiple times while apparently wielding a knife on an empty streetcar.
The incident, captured on cellphone and surveillance video, prompted hundreds to take to the streets of Toronto demanding justice, while Yatim's family asked why no one among the multiple officers at the scene stepped forward to offer mediation that might have prevented the tragedy.
In some cases, police can call in teams which involve a psychiatric nurse or someone with expertise in dealing with a person experiencing a crisis. But often there aren't enough of those teams available and they don't get to places in time.
To head off a crisis before it gets to a point where guns are drawn, some suggest officers work more closely with third party non-medical facilities which offer police referral and crisis intervention services.
To certain critics, however, long-entrenched "policing culture" is to blame for crisis incidents that end badly.
"The current culture is command and control," said John Sewell, spokesman for the Toronto Police Accountability Coalition who is also a former city mayor. "We need a different response."
Sewell would like to see those in crisis dealt with primarily by specialized teams, as a hostage situation might be.
"You can't have a general police officer responding because their culture is the wrong culture," he said.
50 The Mental Health Commission of Canada, however, expresses a bit more hope in police.
"I sense a willingness and an openness," said commission president Louise Bradley. "But it's highly emotionally charged issue."
Bradley pointed out that a number of factors lead to police having to confront a person in crisis.
"We're looking at an issue that involves everything from poverty and homelessness, to the training of how to deal with people with mental illnesses," she said. "Another issue is the whole issue of mental health of police officers themselves — that's a very important matter."
The commission is currently in the process of reviewing training provided to forces across the country with plans to make recommendations. Trying to create some sort of national training standards which take cues from "pockets of excellence" across the country, is another goal it's working towards.
"Mental health issues have largely been misunderstood," said Bradley. "There's now more attention being paid by police forces to dealing with stigma that I have never seen before."
Police under investigation lose right to consult lawyers on notes SEAN FINE - JUSTICE WRITER The Globe and Mail Published Thursday, Dec. 19 2013, 10:08 AM EST Last updated Thursday, Dec. 19 2013, 4:17 PM EST Police being investigated after a shooting should not be allowed to talk to a lawyer before preparing their notes, the Supreme Court of Canada has ruled, in a strong rebuke to a common practice of Ontario officers.
The ruling on Thursday has wide implications because the court said protecting public confidence in the police is so vital that government can limit police rights, even to basic legal advice.
“So long as police officers choose to wear the badge, they must comply with their duties and responsibilities . . . even if this means at times having to forego liberties they would otherwise enjoy as ordinary citizens,” Justice Michael Moldaver wrote.
Douglas Minty, a 59-year-old developmentally disabled man, and Levi Schaeffer, a 32-year-old with psychiatric problems, were shot dead by Ontario Provincial Police officers in separate incidents in 2009. Both were armed with a knife. In both cases, supervising officers told the officers under investigation to consult with lawyers before preparing their notes. Those same lawyers represented other
51 police officers who witnessed the incidents, and the lawyers had a legal duty to share the notes with all of their clients.
The court said unanimously that lawyers could not approve a draft of police notes because to do so would undermine public confidence in the investigations. Ontario created the country’s first civilian body, the Special Investigations Unit, to move away from the biased appearance of “police investigating police.”
Justice Moldaver deplored the process that police followed after the shooting of Mr. Schaeffer.
“Both officers completed their notes only after their lawyer had reviewed their draft notes. Neither officer ever provided their original draft notes.” As a result of the lawyer’s involvement, the SIU concluded it did not know what happened in the shooting, Justice Moldaver wrote. “Surely this is not the stuff out of which public confidence is built.”
Police expressed disappointment but said they would comply with the ruling. “An SIU investigation is a criminal investigation, and anyone else who is faced with a criminal investigation has that right to seek guidance from counsel. That’s why we’re disappointed,” Dan Axford, interim president of the Police Association of Ontario, said.
Justice Moldaver, an Ontario judge appointed to the court by Stephen Harper, is often viewed as helping move the court to a more pro-police position on crime.
Three judges, including Justice Morris Fish, who heard the case before his retirement in the summer, would have allowed police to consult with a lawyer before the notes were prepared, but only in a limited way. Justice Fish was considered the court’s strongest voice for accused rights.
Videos of police shootings can never capture emotional pain or mental illness:
Christie Blatchford | January 2, 2014 7:40 PM ET National Post I didn’t know Staff-Sergeant Ian Matthews, the exceptionally well-regarded Hamilton Police officer who killed himself just before Christmas. The 47-year-old former homicide detective, called Blarney for his Irish roots (he still had traces of a lovely accent), shot himself in a locker room at force headquarters.
As complicated a business as suicide always is, policing, says one who knows, is unique in that those who care about what they do “lose a piece of their souls every day they come to work.” How big a piece depends upon who you are, what the day brings, what other burdens you carry and the type of call, but it’s not unreasonable to assume that some of this wear-and-tear on the heart over St.- Sgt. Matthews’ 25-plus years on the job may have caught up with him.
52 Policing has changed dramatically over my lifetime, and if some of that is for the better — police forces are certainly more diverse — it also has made doing the job tougher, and here I refer to the various oversight and accountability mechanisms, both official and unofficial.
Consider, for instance, the case of Paul Boyd, a 39-year-old film animator who was fatally shot eight times Aug. 13, 2007, by Vancouver Police Constable Lee Chipperfield.
Mr. Boyd suffered from bipolar disorder, and while he usually managed the disease successfully and built an admirable career despite it, periodically he suffered periods of mania and depression, sometimes with paranoid delusions. He was in the midst of such an episode on the night of his death.
That was more than six years ago, but the case was finally resolved only this fall, when special prosecutor Mark Jette, a senior Vancouver lawyer, concluded Const. Chipperfield shouldn’t be criminally charged.
Mr. Jette had been appointed to review an earlier report in May of 2012 by the Alberta Serious Incident Response Team, which had been asked by the British Columbia justice minister to re-investigate Mr. Boyd’s death after a previously undisclosed video, which showed 49 seconds of the last part of his confrontation with police, had surfaced.
The video captured the final three of the nine shots Const. Chipperfield fired, and shows Mr. Boyd crawling, unarmed, on his hands and knees.
While the video didn’t show what position Mr. Boyd was in or what he was doing when Const. Chipperfield fired the last and ultimately fatal shot, the sight of him crawling and vulnerable fueled public outrage.
As the North Shore Schizophrenic Society, a local advocacy group for the mentally ill, said in its November 2013 bulletin, “Nobody who has seen the video of Paul Boyd crawling on the ground just before the final shot can have any reasonable doubt that Boyd was not a threat in the few seconds that followed, whether he still had the chain and padlock or not and whether there was a video recording of those last few seconds or not.”
But the special prosecutor, Mr. Jette, disagreed, and so do I. Mr. Jette’s reasons first.
His job required him to determine if there was a substantial likelihood of conviction — a variation of this test is used in all cases across the country, before charges are laid — which meant he had to consider possible defences open to Const. Chipperfield.
Mr. Jette concluded there was nothing to contradict the officer’s claim he was acting to preserve life, his own and others.
53 Mr. Boyd may have been defenceless in those last seconds, but he was a big, strong man, armed at one point with a hammer and at another with a bike chain and lock, and in a struggle with another officer who’d tried to subdue him with his baton, Mr. Boyd “had gained the upper hand,” Mr. Jette said.
Police and civilian witnesses alike described “a high level aggression” from Mr. Boyd, and said he seemed so immune to the first shots Const. Chipperfield fired that the officer wondered if he’d missed or if Mr. Boyd was wearing body armour and civilians thought police might be using rubber bullets.
Policing has changed dramatically, and if some of that is for the better, it also has made doing the job tougher Herschel Hardin, vice-president of the North Shore group, sent me the bulletin, which raises the spectre that if police doctrine is officer safety first and last, it may be “sometimes taken as licence to eliminate, with the use of a firearm” against “any real or imagined risk at all in dealing with the mentally ill in crisis.”
Or, as the bulletin sharply concluded, “It’s all right to be trigger-happy.”
This appears to be a departure for the group, which works closely with the police and values them. The NSSS has been around for three decades, unusually for an advocacy group also does front-line peer support for the seriously ill in crisis, and has fought a long battle against overly restrictive criteria for involuntary hospital admission. (B.C. doesn’t require that the mentally ill be pronounced dangerous before they are hospitalized involuntarily, as is the case in Ontario and Quebec, but the message hasn’t yet reached even all mental health professionals.)
But, as I wrote Mr. Hardin, if Mr. Boyd wasn’t a threat in those last few seconds, expecting an officer to recognize that, in the midst of all that stress and adrenalin and fear, may be asking too much.
Mr. Hardin and I may disagree on this particular decision, but where we agree, I think, is that too often, police are left to deal with terribly troubled people who have been abandoned by the health care system.
I’ve yet to see a video which captures emotional pain, whether anguish and sorrow, or mental illness, whether depression or delusion. And that goes for Paul Boyd, the officer who shot him, and Ian Matthews.
Briefing note to Public Safety Minister hints at tighter gun control By Patrick Cain Global News December 19, 2013 12:19 pm
Senior RCMP officials invited Public Safety Minister Steven Blaney to a briefing on gun control at a police range in Ottawa in late September, at which they seemed to be nudging him toward stricter rules on some types of firearms.
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Blaney’s office wouldn’t comment on the meeting. But the notes suggest his department’s pushing an issue – updates to decades-old gun laws – that failed to gain traction with his predecessor.
Canada hasn’t singled out any firearm by name for prohibition since the mid- 1990s.
“It was envisioned that the classification framework would be updated as more firearms came on to the Canadian market, but it has not been updated since its inception in 1995,” a briefing note for the meeting says.
“Firearms … not mentioned in the regulations are, by default, categorized as non-restricted (e.g. many .50-calibre sniper rifles and other military and paramilitary type firearms are currently non-restricted.)”
Blaney replaced Vic Toews as Public Safety Minister in a cabinet shuffle in mid- July.In 2012, Public Safety officials warned Toews that the outdated list posed ‘a risk to public safety.’
In the list drawn up in 1995, dozens of specific firearms were singled out for prohibition or restriction. Gun rights advocates criticize it as based on cultural and aesthetic criteria, while gun control advocates say it should have been updated and expanded since then.
“Any changes to the classification framework would be controversial,” the note says. “Firearm advocates would view reclassification as an attempt to deprive them of their property, while gun control advocates would support the reclassification of some firearms to the restricted or prohibited classes.”
The note, released as part of an access-to-information request, ends by quoting Prime Minister Stephen Harper as saying that “prohibited weapons exist as a category under the law for essential reasons of public security.”
A number of senior officials from Public Safety and the RCMP were to attend the briefing, including Commissioner Bob Paulson.
In the briefing note, Blaney was invited to “shoot a variety of these firearms at a range located on site as a practical, hands-on means of better understanding the different types … business casual dress is recommended.”
A tightening of firearm rules would come as welcome news to gun-control advocates, and would likely be slammed by opponents as being based more on fear than sound methodology.
“I see that as a step in the wrong direction,” argues Ottawa-based firearms lawyer Solomon Friedman. “There isn’t a list of features that lead to prohibition – nowhere does it say what the basis of prohibiting these firearms by appearance was.
55 “Semi-automatic firearms are all quite similar, functionally. You have what amounts to an arbitrary classification based on the appearance of the firearm, or on its heritage.”
Some provinces may also be pleased: Quebec and Ontario announced last month they’ve formed a working group to study firearm classification (Ontario’s Attorney General says it’s still preliminary and wouldn’t comment).
So what might new gun laws look like?
The note mentions .50-calibre rifles, now mostly classed as non-restricted in Canada. They were originally designed for military use against aircraft and lightly armoured vehicles. In November, Quebec Minister of Public Security Stéphane Bergeron called for their reclassification. “They should be banned,” says gun control advocate and Montreal massacre survivor Heidi Rathjen. “There are no deer with bulletproof vests in our forests. There is no reason for civilians to have access to weapons that can pierce light armoured military vehicles. It’s absurd that this weapon is available for ordinary civilians.”
Last August, the Canadian Association of Police Boards called for restrictions on ‘bullpup’ rifles, also non-restricted, which shorten a rifle’s length by placing the bolt and magazine and the rear of the barrel at the firer’s shoulder, much farther back than on a traditional rifle.
In May 2010, an RCMP briefing note for then-Public Safety Minister Vic Toews said “a case could be made” for prohibiting the ‘family of VZ58 rifles,’ which externally resemble the banned AK-47.
Rumours circulated this summer about a reclassification of the Swiss Arms Classic Green rifle.
Relaxing other aspects of the gun licence system might allow the government to present a balanced gun-control package – for example by allowing people with a “possession-only” licence, grandfathered when rules were tightened in the early 1990s, the right to buy guns. In April, Public Safety’s Firearms Advisory Committee, largely made up of people on the gun-rights side of the debate, discussed giving the remaining 633,000 POL-holders acquisition-grade licences. “(POLs) were left over as a sort of transitional thing when we switched over to the new system,” Abbotsford, B.C. police chief Bob Rich, a member of the committee, told Global News in July. “At some point you want to get over to one licence.”
At its 2012 and 2013 meetings, the committee discussed doubling the term of a gun licence from five to 10 years. (The RCMP opposed the move this year, saying it would “limit their ability to monitor, on a timely basis, any changes to an individual’s mental health status.”)
But even if Ottawa wanted to restrict or ban a gun that’s now non-restricted, it’s not clear how it would do it it: Thanks to the abolishment of the long-gun registry,the federal government no longer knows where the owners are.
56 “[The Canadian Firearms Program] would inform provincial Chief Firearms Officers, post a notice to its website, inform callers when they call the CFP toll- free information line and issue special bulletins to firearms businesses and police,” if a non-restricted firearm was made restricted or prohibited, RCMP spokesperson Sgt. Julie Gagnon said in an email.
“It’s expensive, and it’s impractical, and it’s even more impractical now that we don’t have registration anymore,” Rathjen said. “The police will have the hardest possible time finding these weapons, or their owners, in order to make sure they’re classified properly.”
Friedman, for his part, remains dubious about reviving the practice of banning firearms by name.
“I think the best way to look as this is to advocate for a principled approach to classification, which at the moment does not exist. Are any firearms more or less likely to cause harm? If you don’t begin your prohibition discussion from there, you’re not doing it on a principled basis.”
Blaney’s office had little to say.
“We do not comment on [the] ministerial schedule,” said spokesperson Jean- Christophe de Le Rue in response to a list of questions from Global News about the Sept. 30 briefing. “We are always looking at common sense measures to ensure public safety without placing needless burdens on law-abiding hunters, farmers and sport shooters.”
Minister Blaney Announces Re-Appointment of Ian McPhail as Interim Chair of the Commission for Public Complaints Against the RCMP OTTAWA, ONTARIO--(Marketwired - Dec. 19, 2013) - The Honourable Steven Blaney, Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness, today announced the re-appointment of Mr. Ian McPhail as Vice Chair and Interim Chair of the Commission for Public Complaints Against the RCMP (CPC).
"I am pleased that Mr. McPhail has agreed to continue in his roles as Vice Chair and Interim Chair of the Commission for Public Complaints Against the RCMP," said Minister Blaney. "Mr. McPhail's experience and dedication will be invaluable as we transition to the new Civilian Review and Complaints Commission for the RCMP in the coming year."
In June 2013, Bill C-42: Enhancing Royal Canadian Mounted Police Accountability Act received Royal Assent. This legislation will enhance RCMP accountability and transparency by, amongst other things, creating a new Civilian Review and Complaints Commission for the RCMP (CRCC) to replace the
57 existing CPC and providing it with enhanced powers. The CRCC, and related provisions of Bill C-42, will be brought into force in 2014.
"Since first being appointed in January 2010, Mr. McPhail has strongly contributed towards our Government's efforts to make Canada's national police force a stronger, more modern organization," said Minister Blaney.
The Commission for Public Complaints Against the RCMP (CPC) is an independent agency created by Parliament that ensures complaints made by the public about the conduct of RCMP members are examined fairly and impartially. For more information on the Commission, including Mr. McPhail's biography, please visit: www.cpc-cpp.gc.ca.
Special police powers = extra police responsibility GLOBE EDITORIAL The Globe and Mail Published Sunday, Dec. 29 2013, 11:00 PM EST Last updated Sunday, Dec. 29 2013, 11:00 PM EST
Police officers are not ordinary citizens. That may sound obvious, but a decision of the Supreme Court of Canada earlier this month strikingly illustrates two of the differences: Police are authorized to use deadly force, but when they do kill people, they do not enjoy all of the same rights as ordinary citizens under investigation. With their special powers must come special obligations.
The court rightly placed limits on the right of police officers to not incriminate themselves, and on their right to consult a lawyer at their earliest convenience.
The cases involved two police shootings, after which police sought the help of lawyers in preparing or revising their notes. The court avoided any suggestion that police officers would necessarily skew their notes as a result of meeting with a lawyer. Instead, Justice Michael Moldaver, who wrote the majority opinion, said that a lawyer’s advice might shift the “focus” of the notes, and he emphasized the point that “appearances matter.” They do.
Both of the cases came from Ontario, where an independent Special Investigations Unit, made up of civilians, investigates all deaths or serious injuries at the hands of police. The question of who investigates police, and how, is of national importance: two weeks ago, a Quebec coroner found that investigators failed to ask a key question after the police shooting of a teenager called Fredy Villanueva – an example of police investigations of police being undesirable.
In both the cases before the Supreme Court, a man refused to drop a knife and was shot. In both cases, officers were instructed by their superiors not to write any notes about the incident, until they had spoken to a lawyer. And in one of the cases, the notes were not finished until a lawyer reviewed a draft.
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Ian Scott, then the director of the SIU, concluded that he could not adequately assess the cases because the resulting notes were not independent enough or close enough in time to the events. Police officers have a duty to make notes promptly, in order to take advantage of fresh memory – and thus, greater accuracy.
The families of the dead men sued for a declaration clarifying the rights and duties of police officers, which the court granted. But this will hardly be the last case in which these issues arise.
“Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?” said the Roman poet Juvenal. Who will guard the guardians? The Supreme Court’s decision helps to clarify that it cannot be the police themselves.
RCMP Seek Hiring Waiver Blacklock’s Reporter January 7, 2014 The RCMP are seeking more leeway in hiring outside experts as “temporary civilian employees” in crime investigations.
The Public Service Commission said Mounties sought an exemption from federal law that limits the hiring of temporary staff. Under the Public Service Employment Act short-term hires are restricted to 90 days a year.
The Mounted Police Professional Association of Canada, a group attempting to overturn a federal ban on unionizing RCMP members, said temporary employees are typically assigned to specialized work.
“People I knew within that field worked on long-term projects where the end-date was not known,” said Robert Creassar, association spokesperson. “They are used as monitors in terms of gathering wiretap evidence, and many times those projects go on a lot longer than the 90-day period.”
The Public Service Commission did not comment.
In a regulatory notice, the commission said the change in labour regulations anticipated unforeseen circumstances related to major investigations.
“The proposed regulations would provide the RCMP the required flexibility and ability to adjust to operational demands in real time so it may respond to emerging situations in a timely fashion,” the commission wrote.
Assignments for temporary civilian employees may include any order to “photograph, catalogue, pick up and appropriately store bricks from a building that had exploded as a result of a bomb,” the commission explained. While such a need for temporary hires may not be skill-specific, it could be a case where there was a need to immediately contract a professional with expertise.
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The proposed changes would also give the Public Service Commission authority to conduct an annual review of police hiring. And it would also establish a new monitoring requirement for the RCMP on its use of temporary civilian employees.
Creassar noted that civilian employees may include highly specialised professionals in crime labs such as toxicologists or firearms experts.
By Dale Smith
What happened to civilian oversight of the RCMP BY MICHAEL KEMPA The Walrus From the January/February 2014 magazine
ON THE MORNING OF Saturday, June 26, 2010, the chair of the Toronto Police Services Board, Alok Mukherjee, was on the phone in his office at headquarters, chasing information about local G20 demonstrations for his members. Leaders of the world’s economic powerhouses, accompanied by massive entourages, had come together to hammer out deals that could shore up the teetering economy. Meanwhile, spotting a global platform, over 10,000 protesters, belligerent and peaceful alike, took to the streets. A deputy chief overheard Mukherjee, a human rights expert, and asked if he would like to see the demonstrations in action.
After watching about a half-hour of live streaming video in a neighbouring room, the deputy invited Mukherjee to visit the city’s command centre, at a police building that cannot be identified for security reasons. Inside, they found a conference hall jammed full of people—standing room only—but despite the crowd, it was quiet and disciplined. Dozens of security officers, some kitted out in headsets, manned a central bank of computers. At the back, a giant monitor played closed-circuit television feeds of Toronto from every imaginable angle. “It looked like a military operation,” recalls Mukherjee. He recognized many civilian and sworn TPS staff in attendance, along with many more he did not know, whom he took to be members of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. But where was his chief, Bill Blair? He finally spotted a half-open door leading into a side office. There was Blair, sitting alone at an empty desk, watching the G20 unfold on a small TV tuned to CP24, a local news station.
That was the moment when Mukherjee began to get nervous. Blair had assured him that all police agencies acting on Toronto turf would follow the Toronto model, which guarantees citizens the right to peaceful assembly, but seeing its advocate marginalized he suddenly doubted it. Who was really in charge of Toronto that weekend, and what were their priorities?
While the G20 passed without a major terrorist incident, storefronts outside the fenced-in summit zone were smashed, and police cruisers were abandoned and torched on Saturday afternoon, all while the Toronto police appeared to be
60 hemmed in along the security fence, safeguarding visiting dignitaries and G20 business. With the damage done, the TPS suddenly sprang into action that evening, kettling masses of protesters in the streets, and ultimately arresting and holding 1,105 of them in processing centres that were little better than makeshift cages, for hours and in some cases days. It was the largest mass arrest in Canadian peacetime, and most detainees had no idea what they were being charged with.
As Mukherjee watched it all unfold on TV at home, like so many other Canadians, his anxiety gave way to anger. This was not the work of the chief he knew. While Alphonse MacNeil, the RCMP commander who headed up the G20 security operation, maintains that operational matters fell to the most local command levels possible (which explains why Blair was watching on TV), Mukherjee believes the federal government “simply took over Toronto” that weekend. He is not alone. The widespread perception that the RCMP had strong-armed local police and democratic institutions helped to prompt inquiries and reviews into the role of each security agency and level of government. Mukherjee, who in addition to his near-decade of work on the TPS board served as president of the Canadian Association of Police Governance last year, maintains that the G20 security debacle could have been avoided if the RCMP had had some sort of civilian oversight body. Then the two boards could have collaborated, checking up on the division of responsibilities and making the rules in play clear to the public before the summit. Crucially, the Toronto board could have pushed its RCMP counterpart on the interests of civilians, in line with the Toronto model, as well as vetting the budget and equipment procurement processes, and saving taxpayers some portion of the summit’s nearly $1-billion cost.
Ironically, just such a body almost came into existence in the period leading up to the G20. Proposed in 2007 by the task force into much-needed organizational reform, which was headed by former Ontario Securities Commission chair David Brown, the idea for a civilian board of management to remake the RCMP would come to dominate the minds of the force’s leadership over the next three years.
However, by the summer of 2010, a few short weeks before the G20, in its first crack at reform legislation after Brown the Harper government appeared to reject the board of management. When subsequent legislation introduced in the House (after the Conservatives landed their strong, stable majority) became law this past summer, Vic Toews, then minister of public safety, pronounced the concept dead.
Today’s RCMP sits in the eye of a vicious storm, the result of more than a decade of public relations disasters, including the G20. Without an aggressive program for governance renewal, it will likely pitch from one crisis to another until the public eventually demands that the government pull the plug. Based on the weight of opinion behind the proposed board, the scuppering will hinder efforts to raise the force above its tarnished reputation, while unravelling the mystery of what happened to civilian oversight helps explain how it got that reputation in the first place.
61 THE ROYAL CANADIAN MOUNTED POLICE, formerly the North West Mounted Police, began its institutional life in 1873 as a political instrument. Sir John A. Macdonald had in mind a federally loyal armed cavalry that would spread across the West to “civilize” the population, and pave the way to fully bring the territories into a peaceful, productive confederation. The only face of government across vast swaths of western territory, officers routinely made calls that went beyond mere law enforcement. As the RCMP approaches a century and a half of history, Maintiens le droit (“uphold the right”) remains its official motto.
Its dual legal-political mission is typical of colonial police forces. However, many of those institutions considered successful today heeded an important lesson: while upholding the right (beyond the strict letter of the law) is a blessing under robust public accountability, it becomes a curse under political interference. For example, when the Royal Ulster Constabulary, the RCMP’s closest relative, was remodelled through a lengthy peace process to become the Police Service of Northern Ireland in 2001, it prioritized a system for civilian governance that would assure the divided British unionist and Irish nationalist populations that the police were not in the pocket of one political faction or another.
On the other hand, the RCMP has always answered directly to the government. This relationship was formalized in the early 1980s, when the commissioner was designated a deputy minister, first within the department of the Solicitor General and now under Public Safety. As an appointee approved by the prime minister, whoever occupies the big chair serves at the pleasure of the government.
The arrangement is a classic reflection of what Donald Savoie, Canada Research Chair in public administration and governance at the Université de Moncton, calls “court government.” Within this system, the power of the PMO grows through a strategic network of deputy ministers and other key bureaucrats, while sidestepping cabinet and parliamentary oversight. Through his studies of the Canadian and British systems, Savoie has shown that the opacity of court government leads to poor departmental management, while the lure of power promotes opportunism.
Starting around 2000, the system’s pitfalls were revealed in a well-known series of scandals: the mismanagement of pension funds; the sharing of Maher Arar’s intelligence file with US agencies, which led to his torture in Syria as well as inconsistencies in the public account of what the RCMP leadership knew and when; the taser-induced death of Robert Dziekanski and suggestions of another apparent cover-up; and a litany of bullying, sexual harassment, and assault cases.
Surprisingly, it was not the most salacious scandals that led to sweeping recommendations for reform. Rather, in the spring of 2007, after a group of senior officers and civilian employees stood before a parliamentary committee, alleging that the brass tried to cover up serious irregularities in the management of the force’s pension and insurance plan, then public safety minister Stockwell Day struck an independent investigation under Brown. What was ultimately reported shook the RCMP to its core.
62 DAVID BROWN is an unlikely revolutionary. The soft-spoken corporate lawyer, who is based in Toronto, has built a track record of dogged but measured regulation. His work with the OSC, as well as the council of governors for the Canadian Public Accountability Board, which oversees audits of publicly traded companies in Canada, has been active and innovative but has not stirred major public controversy. However, after his initial investigation into the pension scandal, he publicly declared the RCMP’s culture “horribly broken” and “completely at odds with the reality of managing a $3-billion enterprise.” He further recommended that the government strike a task force to explore solutions to a problem “far more deep rooted than we had thought going in,” he says during a phone interview.
It was not a case of bad apples, as the RCMP often claimed through the scandal years, but a rotten culture. More specifically, an autocratic Mountie brass bred in the image of Commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli had cultivated a culture of fear and deference; managers simply refused to accept any bad news, and therefore made uninformed, sometimes self-serving decisions, playing to the authorities above them. In this context, Brown described a disillusioned rank and file, suffering under “impossible demands” that compromised health and safety. In addition to under-resourcing, exacerbated by the lack of coherent organizational priorities, inconsistency and mystery hung over the evaluation, promotion, discipline, and grievance processes, sapping officer morale.
To break the cycle, Brown proposed a three-pillared program, beginning with a more independent public complaints process coupled with vigorous internal discipline. The second pillar, separate employer status, as well as the third, an independent board of management, were considerably more controversial; they would essentially render the RCMP responsible for its own decisions, in consultation with a body of civilian experts. The pillars could not be “cherry picked,” Brown points out, as they supported one another in a seamless architecture of complete institutional reinvention.
Indeed, Bill Sweeney, a deputy commissioner of the RCMP at the time, calls the proposed system of checks and balances wedged between the brass and the government a sea change. Initially, the Conservatives, perhaps not yet familiar with the benefits of court government, seemed ready to take up the bold challenge. Day, says Brown, was “very complimentary to the report.” Mukherjee adds that representatives from Public Safety told him that the minister was keen to proceed with Brown’s plan in its entirety, implementing pieces of it as they were ready to roll out.
On Brown’s recommendation, the government appointed the external Reform Implementation Council, headed by prominent Montreal attorney David McAusland, to provide guidance and give the occasional public push to police leaders, who would understandably have found it difficult to make the about-face. By the spring of 2008, however, as McAusland and Sweeney both confirm, senior staff’s thinking began to align. Brown felt optimistic that the Conservatives would implement his recommendations within two years, but his optimism may not have accounted adequately for the pivotal role of certain individuals in the courtier system. As it
63 turned out, nobody would be more important in this case than the commissioner. Not only would his job change the most if the RCMP were weaned from the government, but the government likely would not relinquish court power without his inducement.
ON JULY 16, 2007, the same day Brown’s task force was announced, Prime Minister Stephen Harper introduced his permanent replacement for the embattled Zaccardelli. William J. S. (Bill) Elliott had enjoyed a long career in the public service, with heady appointments in Public Safety, with the Canadian Coast Guard, and within the Privy Council Office. He had even acted as national security adviser to Prime Minister Paul Martin. To that list, he could now add first civilian commissioner of the RCMP. If Elliott said little about the Brown recommendations, beyond an initial amorphous endorsement, his command-level officers had little cause to worry. “What Brown was proposing with a board of management and separate employer status was a machinery-of-government-issue,” says Sweeney, now assistant deputy minister of Alberta’s public security division. “We looked at it like we needed a strong statement from our commissioner to indicate to the government that we were behind these radical reforms; but once the legislative process had started, I would see it as proper that our commissioner would not continue to comment publicly on these issues.”
Besides, Elliott had the independent Reform Implementation Council, which seemed to be doing the heavy lifting for him. McAusland’s tone became ever more urgent over a series of five reports published between September 2008 and December 2010, culminating with a warning: appoint an interim board in the event of any further legislative delay, or risk losing all reform momentum. “That council had to be invented to say the things the RCMP could not—and should not—say,” Sweeney explains.
Meanwhile, any enthusiasm the Conservatives might once have had for fundamental police governance reform appeared to evaporate. When Peter Van Loan replaced Day as minister of public safety in late 2008, Mukherjee says that “the consultative work just stopped.” He recalls, for example, rushing from his home in Toronto to Ottawa early one morning to discuss the most radical pillars of reform with the minister, only to spend hours waiting for an appointment that never materialized. And relations did not warm with the appointment of Vic Toews in January 2010. “His message was very guarded,” Mukherjee says. “It certainly seemed to us that the feds had no interest in stakeholders’ opinions.”
This was confirmed that June when the government presented a pair of bills that attempted to beef up the public complaints process and improve the labour relations regime for serving Mounties, while making no mention of the all- important separate employer status and board of management. Both bills would die on the table when Harper called a federal election the following spring, but the damage had been done.
It is easy to imagine why the prime minister, who had now been around the block a time or two, would be reluctant to cede control of the RCMP, but proof is much harder to come by. Journalists cannot pry open the inner workings of the PMO or
64 cabinet meetings through access to information requests, and neither Day nor Toews responded to invitations to comment for this article. Investigation into RCMP decision making proved nearly as difficult. Interviews I conducted with several former high-ranking members of the force were cloak-and-dagger affairs, intended, I was told, to elude an informal sanctioning process that operates through networks of nods and winks, personally and professionally undermining those who breach the Mountie family trust. Only their strong desire for reform compelled them to speak.
A source I’ll call White, who ultimately left the RCMP, feeling disillusioned about the pace of reform, says he assumed from the start that Elliott had a handle on the process. “He was a bureaucrat,” he explains. “He knew the Town, and he knew the Centre, as we call it.” The Town is an Ottawa term for all of the stakeholders on a given issue who have the capacity to influence change. As it relates to the RCMP, this might include members of the government’s caucus, higher-profile Opposition MPs, senators, lobbyists, police governance associations across Canada, and, at the periphery, a handful of academics. Conversely, all of the executive power is concentrated in the small, dense Centre: the PMO and its courtiers. Any commissioner who wants to steer an institution in a particular direction must rally the former to exert pressure on the latter, a sort of politicking that requires savvy and connections across the landscape, which Elliott had in spades. It also requires a certain amount of grace.
I HAVE A LOT OF RESPECT for Bill Elliott’s intellect,” says Sweeney, who worked directly under the commissioner, “but he was a ‘ready, fire, aim’ kind of guy.” In the public record, Elliott has been painted rather more negatively as yet another bully who took little advice from his senior executive. When pressed for details of this dynamic, White describes a detail-oriented bureaucrat afraid to address the big picture, who shut down debates by nitpicking over grammar. “ ‘It is for whom, not for who,’ he would say during high-level meetings on reform,” he recalls angrily. “ ‘It is with respect to, not in respect of.’ I mean, is correcting my grammar going to help me get my message across to the room that day? To interrupt me and make me look stupid? ” While Elliott was dismissive of his subordinates, another dissatisfied high-ranking former officer, whom I’ll call Jones, also perceived him as timid and fawning with his political bosses. “The government footprint was all over Bill Elliott,” he says. When the Conservatives revealed their hand in those two reform bills in June, Elliott was a target of blame among some senior staff. It now looked as if the commissioner was a much bigger part of the problem than of the solution. In Jones’s definitive opinion, “We don’t have a board of management because Bill Elliott was a puppet of the government.”
Heading into the G20, Elliott was in an unenviable position: caught between a senior command growing impatient with the reform process, and an unsympathetic government that also happened to have a great deal riding on the largest security operation in Canadian history. In the immediate aftermath, then deputy commissioner Raf Souccar, along with assistant commissioner Mike McDonell, went over Elliott’s head and complained directly to the government about their boss’s behaviour. They reported that his management style was a drain on morale and engagement throughout the force. McDonell spoke of
65 “interference in operations,” noting that the commissioner’s decision to visit the G20 nerve centre was disruptive. Elaborating in parliamentary standing committee meetings held in February of the following year, he went so far as to say that senior officers suffered from something akin to “battered wife syndrome writ large” as a result of Elliott’s “browbeating.”
“People got to the point where they cumulatively lost faith and felt they had to do something,” Sweeney explains. He maintains that he did not reach that point, but he retired that summer, while another deputy commissioner who had been publicly loyal announced his own retirement. McDonell also retired and initially moved down in rank to join the Ontario Provincial Police; Souccar would be removed as head of federal policing in the fall, after the government executed a workplace assessment, investigating assertions that “the commissioner and his management style were a brake rather than an accelerator of change,” according to a Public Safety document accessed by the Globe and Mail. The results have been sealed, but Elliott publicly commented that they were not entirely flattering.
In the meantime, White says the leadership shakeup sent the wrong message within the force about reform, while the media seized on the story of infighting at the top. Many sources, including Sweeney and McAusland, point out that a board of management could have helped avert this public shaming, by addressing HR grievances, holding the involved individuals to account, and establishing clear management protocols. Without it, the force sustained another black mark. But how Elliott would come out of it was yet to be determined.
AS THE SUMMER OF 2010 turned to fall, photographers were called to the bucolic setting of the RCMP’s new headquarters in southern Ottawa. Elliott and his team were putting together a glossy magazine-style publication on the reform process for a general audience. In a brief passage buried midway through the document, which was released almost three full years after the Brown report, Elliott finally extolled the “prominent role played by external advisors,” singling out the Reform Implementation Council for pushing the force to improve its capacity to manage its people and resources. It seemed like a clear and direct endorsement of Brown’s two final pillars, separate employer status and a board of management.
Elliott spent the next several months championing the cause. In late November, he spoke about the importance of governance reform to an audience at the Canadian Club of Ottawa; afterwards, he told reporters, “Frankly, I’m not at all of the view that the government will come to the conclusion that it should give us more authority and more flexibility without some increased accountability to go along with it, and I think a board of management can provide that accountability.”
Actually, there were signs that the Conservatives were less keen than ever. Mukherjee says that as 2010 wound down, “Public Safety told us in private meetings that there was no political appetite for civilian oversight of the RCMP. They told us not to waste any more of our time pushing the minister or any parliamentary committees on it.”
66 Two senior government officials close to the issue, who wish to remain anonymous, suggest that if Elliott did support Brown’s recommendations, he had done too little behind the scenes to bring the Town and Centre with him. “His announcement in support of a board of management came out of nowhere for us,” one source says. “I was astounded. Elliott used to work with Public Safety, and he knew how this works.” Another potentially messy leadership melodrama seemed to be brewing on the main stage. Then something curious happened: on February 4, 2011, Elliott announced that he was stepping aside as commissioner; several months later, it was confirmed that he would take a post at Interpol. Within the RCMP, it is widely understood that “Interpol, the UN, all these appointments are useful for moving old staff along,” explains Jones. “It allows them to save face, and it keeps people’s mouths shut who had troubles before.” However, unlike Zaccardelli, who had resigned from the force before moving to Interpol, Elliott was being seconded, meaning he would remain on the RCMP payroll.
And just as suddenly as Elliott had picked up the board cause, he appeared to drop it. In his last ten months as commissioner, virtually nothing from him on governance reform made it into the public record. White says he was hardly surprised: “Why would he fall on his sword if there was no government support for this issue? It was just easier for him to go quietly into the sunset.”
BILL ELLIOTT sounds wary at the outset of our telephone conversation— understandable, perhaps, given the media’s response to the bullying allegations. In a November 2010 Globe and Mail profile, he took the opportunity to defend himself at length—“I’m a loud guy. I’m big, loud, direct, plain-speaking. At times, I’m blunt to a fault. The fact that I’m the Commissioner of the RCMP exacerbates a challenge that I had long before I came to this job”—so I begin by asking him about reform instead.
Was Interpol some kind of quid pro quo for dropping the cause to implement Brown in full, for instance? He denies anything of the sort (Interpol, of which he was already a member, approached him, he explains). He maintains that he pushed for a board of management and separate employer status after the move to Interpol had been decided, just as he had done for a good part of his tenure as commissioner.
“At the outset, I was unconvinced,” he acknowledges in his firm baritone. He was concerned that a group of civilians might not know how to distinguish between appropriate police oversight and operational meddling. He also had doubts that the government would agree to go forward with these recommendations, and if it did he was not sure the RCMP had the internal skills and capacities necessary to “get there, and then carry on with it.”
However, he says he overcame his reservations and began to develop the case for a board of management from early 2010 onward: “As we ticked off the boxes with David McAusland, I began to do the consultations and background work I needed to do on the big governance questions.” As for his public overtures in the fall of 2010—the glossy brochure, his speech to the Canadian Club—he says they were necessary to build popular as well as rank-and-file understanding and
67 support for Brown’s recommendations, which might in turn bring the government around. “I thought it would be helpful,” he says with a dry chuckle, “but history has proven me wrong.”
Choosing his words carefully, he adds that he finds it “surprising, and you can add disappointing,” that anonymous government officials would say they felt broadsided by his public position on reform. He maintains that he consulted widely, even on the question of whether to go public. Unfortunately, I would not have access to any documents that might prove it.
“What I told you is factually correct,” he says, his voice rising and his diction becoming more precise. “I met with people, and I consulted. Now I have no inclination, nor obligation, to prove that.” He pauses briefly, seeming to collect himself. “Even if it were in my own interests to break these confidences, to show you that I had been having all of these meetings, I still won’t do it. I feel very strongly about this, but I am not getting angry. I want to be clear about that. My passions have been taken for other emotions in the past, which has gotten me in trouble.…It would have made absolutely no sense for me not to have consulted,” he says finally. “I have been accused of many things, but never of being stupid. And that would have been stupid.”
He suggests instead that certain key officials were worried that devolving authority to the RCMP would open the floodgates for similar demands by other public agencies. Even while they allowed that separate employer status and a board of management might be good for the force, the general mood favoured centralization. “Opposition to devolving governance of the RCMP has a lot to do with wanting to not just maintain but expand authority over the RCMP,” he says.
When I contact Elliott several weeks later on his request, he wishes to address the charges of bullying. “I did not have my day in court, nor anything resembling an opportunity to tell my side of the story,” he explains. And his story is this: conceding some basis for the complaints, other “fabrications and gross exaggerations were motivated by a desire to further a plot to have me removed” for a preferred candidate. Who wanted him gone? Opportunists playing politics on the force who, he says, may have felt passed over for promotion, a problem made worse by a culture of entitlement that he claims his team had been fighting all along.
“The RCMP is not politically controlled,” he now says rather diplomatically, “but that does not mean vigilance is not required to keep the politics out of daily interactions with government.”
WHO, then, is ultimately responsible for thwarting the RCMP’s move toward independence? So far, I have discovered that some senior RCMP staffers blame Elliott for being unduly influenced by the government; the government blames Elliott for not developing his case; and Elliott says he was stonewalled by the government and sidelined by opportunists. To find out if some treasure trove of official records exists that might help resolve the matter, I filed access to information requests. Within a month, I received a letter acknowledging my
68 submissions; the access to information officer with whom I followed up at sixty days assured me that I would have the documents—in another ten months.
What we do know is that by the time Commanding Officer Kevin Brosseau was assigned to lead the force’s input into another legislative effort, at the beginning of 2012, none of the brass was talking about a board of management. His job, he explains over the phone, was to determine how best to modernize the force’s internal discipline, and “hard-wire a culture of individual responsibility and accountability” for operational and managerial decisions from the bottom up. “If you want to know what happened with the board of management,” he adds, “I think you would have to ask Commissioner Paulson.”
Bob Paulson was appointed to replace Elliott in November 2011. A former air force pilot with over a quarter century of RCMP service, he is by all accounts an operational star who has taken a tough but smart line through his career. When we meet in his office at the force’s southern Ottawa headquarters, he has a shade under two years’ experience as commissioner, during which time, he says proudly, the RCMP has finally moved from endless reform debate to action.
Bill C-42, which passed into law last June, instituted a more powerful public complaints body, which is not only able to compel evidence from officers in nearly all cases, but can make suggestions for policy and procedural reform directly to the commissioner and the minister. Under the legislation, his team has also streamlined the RCMP’s disciplinary process in co-operation with local commanders, and has pushed forward a corrective, rather than punitive, professional ethics agenda.
Paulson adds that the force is working closely with the departmental audit committee, an expenditure review mechanism adopted from other areas of the public service while Elliott served as commissioner, and there is now a greater emphasis on municipal and provincial input into tailoring contract policing services, a move he hopes will enhance RCMP interactions with all levels of government.
Note that this version of reform does not include separate employer status and a board of management, structures Paulson admits were not a part of his original pitch for the commissioner position. Echoing the logic espoused by the government throughout the latest legislative process, he argues that it realizes Brown’s objectives in a more efficient format, even while he concedes that it is “a complex soup” that may be difficult to understand. This is no small problem, as complexity tends to diminish public visibility, a fundamental principle of Brown’s reforms. As McAusland puts it, “The public perception that the RCMP is under political control has always been an important part of the problem.”
A handful of incidents since Paulson took office have perpetuated that notion, perhaps most disturbingly when the PMO issued a statement last summer that the RCMP should return guns seized in safety searches of abandoned homes in the wake of Calgary’s floods. But the commissioner, while acknowledging that he “serves at the pleasure” of the government, remains adamant that he has never
69 felt inappropriately pressured by his political bosses; and that any time he has made a case to them for a power or an authority he needs, it has been granted.
Donald Savoie points out that court government can run smoothly when the right personalities are in place, or when there is an alignment of views from the top down. Even if that is now the case, history suggests that it is unlikely to last. The best chance to mitigate the failures of court government that played out during Elliott’s tenure remains a board of management, a third party to hold all decision makers accountable.
I say it is our best chance because, as Paulson notes, local police boards have been far from an unqualified success across Canada, running the gamut from toothless rubber stampers to meddlesome micromanagers. Mukherjee’s Police Services Board in Toronto, for example, was heavily criticized by one independent review for not pushing Chief Blair harder to ensure adequate operational planning for the G20. A well-equipped board of management would boost public confidence in the RCMP, while greater transparency would deter any would-be bullies or opportunists.
I scan Paulson’s office, which is decorated with sterling swords, pewter crests, and various insignia, along with a framed print of a plane that nods to his air force days—the usual trappings of high police rank. Then, on top of his giant desk, facing the visitors’ chairs, I spot a cheap wooden sign with painted lettering, the kind you see at roadside souvenir shops. It reads, “I’m from Missouri.”
It makes no sense—Paulson is from Lachute, Quebec—and at the end of the interview I finally ask about it. “That is the Show-Me State, man,” he responds, grinning broadly. I later learn that Missouri’s nickname is popularly attributed to late-nineteenth-century congressman Willard Vandiver, who reportedly declared that he hails “from a state that raises corn and cotton, cockleburs and Democrats, and frothy eloquence neither convinces nor satisfies me. I’m from Missouri, and you have got to show me.”
I take it as a sign (however flimsy) of hope for a board of management. My government insiders did hint at some internal support for reconsidering the idea, once existing reforms “take hold and settle a bit.” At one point during our interview, Paulson says that if gaps were to emerge in the current model, and “if it could be staffed properly—you probably do have a point—a board of management could add some value.” Maybe there will yet be an alignment of views from the top down that will finally cleave the Mounties from the government’s court, saving them in the process. Just don’t think it will be easy. “People want to come in here and peddle their ideas, they had better show me that it is going to work,” Paulson says, rising to shake my hand.
70 INTERNATIONAL NEWS Report criticizes Pittsburgh police side-jobs policy January 3, 2014 11:56 PM
By Jonathan D. Silver / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette When former Pittsburgh police Chief Nate Harper helped organize a private security firm with his subordinates, he did so in a "largely unregulated" environment governed by a handful of outdated and "unclear" policies, according to a consultant's report released Friday.
The lack of clear, modern and coherent policies -- particularly as they pertain to police officers working simultaneously in the private security sector -- helped foster an atmosphere that allowed questionable business ventures to flourish at every level of the department, according to consultant Steven M. Toprani.
While Mr. Toprani did not allege that any of the businesses themselves were crooked, he cited the potential for trouble because of an inherent conflict of interest caused by officers owning private security businesses.
"Because certain off-duty officers own private security businesses, this category of employment poses a direct and significant threat to proper functioning of the [police] bureau and is the proper subject for reform," according to the 25-page report.
Mr. Toprani, the former Washington County district attorney, called on Pittsburgh to implement lucid policies that would limit the ability of police officers to be involved in private security and detective businesses.
Among his suggestions: requiring police officers to be approved for outside employment and barring officers from having a financial or ownership stake in a private detective business.
Mr. Toprani's report was made public nearly a year after it was announced that he would be hired to perform a top-to-bottom review of existing Pittsburgh police outside employment policies and best practices nationally. The city paid him $10,000.
"There was a gap in our policies when it came to outside employment," said city public safety director Michael Huss, who said he reviewed a draft of the report more than a month ago and received the final copy Friday.
Mr. Huss directed acting police Chief Regina McDonald last year to review a draft of Mr. Toprani's report, policies from other bureaus and applicable laws, then draft a new outside employment policy for the Pittsburgh police bureau.
71 Chief McDonald said through a spokeswoman that she expects her draft to be ready to submit to the public safety director within a month.
Kevin Acklin, incoming chief of staff for Mayor-elect Bill Peduto, said in an email that they had not received the report as of 1 p.m. Friday "but we will review [it] upon receipt and take any recommendations into consideration in connection with our plans to improve ethics in city hall and restore faith in local government."
The new outside employment policy, Chief McDonald said, will include a provision that requires officers to inform the city of their outside employment.
"At this time we do not know how many officers are involved in outside employment," she said via spokeswoman Diane Richard.
Mr. Toprani said Friday he did not have a specific number of officers involved in outside employment, particularly for companies dabbling in private security, investigations or consulting. He said citizens called him for several months after he was hired to pass along information about officers' companies and he referred them to the U.S. attorney's office or the Allegheny County district attorney's office.
He said those companies were neither "rampant" in the bureau nor were they examples of an "isolated incident."
Mayor Luke Ravenstahl selected Mr. Toprani after reports last year by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette that ex-police Chief Nate Harper created a private security consulting firm with his subordinates, and that Cmdr. Eric Holmes, while a sergeant, was also employed full time as the head of Slippery Rock University's police force with Mr. Harper's approval. The company in which Mr. Harper was involved, Diverse Public Safety Consultants, has since been dissolved.
When the role of Mr. Harper, Cmdr. Holmes and others in outside employment became public, it opened a Pandora's box of problems and concerns for the police bureau.
"Often these outside positions at a minimum blur the lines of demarcation between public duty and private pecuniary interest and may ultimately directly conflict with the city's legitimate business," according to the report.
"More startling," the report continued, "is the fact that this activity operated in a vacuum, with apparent marginal oversight from some supervisors and misguided encouragement from others. Compounding matters are the city's weak and vague policies."
Mr. Harper resigned amid a federal investigation in which he was ultimately charged. He pleaded guilty to four counts of not filing tax returns and one count of criminal conspiracy in connection with diverting more than $70,000 in municipal funds. He is awaiting sentencing.
Although federal prosecutors have not connected Mr. Harper's role in Diverse Public Safety Consultants to their criminal investigation into city affairs, the mayor
72 said he was disappointed by Mr. Harper's involvement with the enterprise and by his doing business with subordinates.
Mr. Toprani took time to address what he saw as Mr. Harper's shortcomings as chief, writing that he "willfully concealed" his business relationship from the city and that he "callously disregarded his duties for financial gain and served as an example to his subordinates to do the same."
Attorneys for Mr. Harper Friday strongly disputed those allegations, saying their client joined the company while making plans for retirement but did not consult for or profit from it.
Attorney Robert Del Greco said the former chief "engaged in wrongdoing," quickly accepted responsibility and "ought not to be the scapegoat for deficiencies in the police department, for things that were not of his doing."
Cmdr. Holmes has been under investigation by the city's Office of Municipal Investigations for his work at Slippery Rock in 2007 and 2008.
OMI Director Kathy Kraus declined comment as did Cmdr. Holmes. His attorney, Patrick Thomassey, revealed Friday that Cmdr. Holmes' outside employment has been the subject of federal scrutiny as part of a yearlong probe of the police bureau and the dealings of Mr. Ravenstahl and his administration.
"I'm confident that Eric didn't do anything wrong whatsoever. We've turned over lots of records to the U.S. attorney and it's going to be up to them how to proceed," Mr. Thomassey said.
Mr. Toprani reviewed outside employment policies in other departments -- all of which seem more comprehensive and specific than the police bureau's short policy, which appears to be modeled on a model policy drafted in 1997.
"Boston," for instance, "has in essence placed a blanket prohibition on guard, security and private investigation activities," the report said.
Rather than dwell on specific instances of alleged misconduct by Pittsburgh police officers, Mr. Toprani's report took a broader approach and denounced the existing policy climate that made the situation conducive for both Mr. Harper's and Cmdr. Holmes' private ventures.
"Existing policies fail to properly address matters related to outside employment and in some instances, namely those of private security and investigation firm ownership, run afoul of state law," Mr. Toprani wrote.
Mr. Toprani recommended seven steps the city should take that would boost monitoring and supervision of officers' outside employment.
"The city should look to industry best practices and develop a strong, detailed policy," Mr. Toprani said.
73 Californians outraged after police acquire military armored vehicle to patrol city
Published time: December 23, 2013 19:41 k Djansezian / AFP
Police in Salinas, California are under fire after the department acquired a heavily armored military vehicle for SWAT team operations.
The $650,000 vehicle was gifted to the Salinas Police Department from the government through the 1033 program, which redistributes used equipment to other agencies. According to KSBW, the truck was used in Iraq and Afghanistan.
According to numerous outlets, police stated their SWAT team was in desperate need of a new vehicle. KSBW added that the new truck, built to withstand rifle fire and minefield explosions, has already aided officers looking to arrest a dangerous suspect. The individual was apparently spotted via the vehicle’s high observation deck.
While Police Chief Kelly McMillin believes the vehicle “provides a high capability of protection for our officers and the community,” other members of the community have been outspoken in their disagreement.
Posting on the police department’s Facebook page, citizens criticized the acquisition as excessive, as well as a sign of the militarization of law enforcement.
“That vehicle is made for war,” wrote one commenter. “Do not use my safety to justify that vehicle,” another one wrote. “The Salinas Police Department is just a bunch of cowards that want to use that vehicle as intimidation and to terrorize the citizens of this city.”
“To stop gang members?” asked a commenter. “Hmmm gang members don't riot in mass numbers. It's right in front of our faces and we don't see it. Why would the ARMY!!! give something like that for FREE!!! Let's think for once people.”
In an interview with the Salinas Californian, McMillin said he wasn’t surprised at the reaction. However, he disagreed with the charge that the truck’s arrival suggested a more militant police force.
“An allegation that we are militarizing has to be that we were patrolling the streets in platoons in greater numbers, that we were setting up checkpoints and searching people in and out of neighborhoods,” he said.
McMillin acknowledged that the truck looks intimidating, but insisted it would only be used to protect officers and citizens alike. As commenters continued to criticize the move, however, the police chief took to Facebook and made another statement.
74
“Every man and woman in the Salinas Police Department took an oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States,” he said. “We take that oath seriously. I thank God we live in a country where we can have this conversation, challenge each other, and challenge the government on how it does its job. Even though I may not agree with all of you, thanks for having a civil discussion.”
Editorial: Washington high court ruling on police records emphasizes public interest
The Spokesman-Review
December 22, 2013
Open government received a boost Thursday when the Washington Supreme Court narrowed the parameters governing when law enforcement agencies can automatically deny public records requests. And it was a Spokane legal tussle that helped shaped that ruling.
The recent case stemmed from a confrontation between a Seattle man and an off-duty Seattle police detective. That legal wrangling was settled early this month, and it cost the city of Seattle $235,000. Fortunately, the high court decided to go ahead and issue its ruling, which sets an important precedent.
In 2009, the Seattle man, Evan Sargent, blocked a West Seattle alley with a truck while picking up laundry for his mother’s business. This apparently angered Detective Donald Waters, who was off-duty and looking for a parking spot. The parties disagree on what happened next, but the incident escalated and Waters ended up arresting Sargent, alleging assault. The prosecutor’s office declined to file charges, and Sargent sought records related to his case and an internal investigation of Waters’ actions.
Sargent was rebuffed, with the Seattle Police Department claiming disclosure would hurt an investigation.
However, as the majority opinion noted in its 5-4 ruling, the guidelines for when police agencies can turn down records requests without justification were outlined in a case brought by The Spokesman-Review. In a 2001 ruling, the court said police reports become public when a case ends, and “the end” is defined as when it’s turned over to a prosecutor.
In the Spokane case, the newspaper sought an incident report when an assistant city attorney was arrested for drunken driving and attempted assault. The Police Department refused, even though the case was in the prosecutor’s hands. The
75 court ruled the report was no longer subject to the blanket “ongoing investigation” exemption, and that the burden shifted to the police for justifying nondisclosure.
That was a critical ruling, because a 2001 audit by Northwest newspapers showed that more than half of law enforcement agencies did not believe police incident reports, which provide the first details of alleged crimes, were public documents. But without them, the media struggle to produce timely reports about criminal activity and how police respond.
Thursday’s ruling reinforces the limits on police agencies trying to clamp down on information. The majority opinion, authored by Associate Justice Barbara Madsen, cites this critical line from the Public Records Act: “The people, in delegating authority, do not give their public servants the right to decide what is good for the people to know and what is not good for them to know.”
The dissenting justices said the ruling would cripple police investigations, but that’s speculative.
If police agencies end up petitioning the Legislature for broader discretion, they should be required to produce concrete examples of compromised investigations. “Trust us” is not a provision of the law; nor should it be.
Specially trained Milwaukee officers work to help homeless
By Ashley Luthern of the Journal Sentinel Dec. 23, 2013 As temperatures plunge and winter sets in, homeless shelters in Milwaukee are filling up, and people who need help could be left out in the cold.
Until three years ago, many homeless people faced getting tickets from the Milwaukee Police Department. Now those same individuals are interacting with specially trained officers who guide them to resources.
The six officers on the department's Homeless Outreach Team, a part-time assignment added to regular duties, primarily work in Police District 1. The team will expand next year, with 30 additional officers receiving training in January and taking the concept citywide.
Outreach officers carry basic supplies, such as socks, and build relationships with homeless people and the agencies that serve them, said Lt. Karen Dubis, who created the team with Capt. Stephen Basting in 2010.
Nearly all of the homeless team officers have crisis intervention training, a 40- hour course that teaches officers to recognize signs of mental illness and to interact with those individuals. New team members will be mentored by veterans of the program.
76 Homelessness has been a challenge in District 1, which covers Milwaukee's downtown, lakefront and University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. The area contains about 60% to 70% of the city's homeless population, Dubis said.
It was after participating in a national Problem-Oriented Policing Conference that Dubis brought back new ideas to address the city's homeless population.
"When somebody is urinating in public, it definitely is a problem, but if this person is intoxicated and homeless, instead of issuing a citation, we should hear their story of how they got where they were at that moment," Dubis said.
On a recent afternoon shift, Officer Eric Ratzmann scanned downtown streets and doorways, looking for people who could be homeless and checking on those he's worked with before.
He spied a man wearing several hooded sweatshirts hunkered in a bus stop at the corner of N. 4th St. and W. Wisconsin Ave. He parked and walked over to ask if there was anything the man needed.
Ratzmann learned the man's name — Dale Pavlenko. He has been homeless for 10 years.
"In the winter, all the shelters fill up fast," Pavlenko said, when Ratzmann asked if he had a place to stay that night.
Pavlenko said that, during the week before when temperatures reached single- digit highs, he had slept near the heating vents of the Police Administration Building, just blocks away from where he stood talking to the officer.
Ratzmann ducked back into his SUV to retrieve his business card.
"If you want to get more aggressive with finding a place, come and see us. We can help you," Ratzmann said as he handed the card to Pavlenko. The officer asked if he knew where to get free meals, and the man nodded.
"I've been doing this for a while," Pavlenko said. "You kind of figure it out."
Ratzmann has met people who are homeless for a variety of reasons: alcohol or drug abuse, mental health struggles, loss of a job or an unexpected illness.
Many people who are homeless defy stereotypes, he said.
He recalled a couple who camped out on the city's near south side. Their clothes were neat, their campsite tidy and they both had full-time jobs. They just couldn't afford an apartment.
In January, 1,449 people were counted in the Point in Time survey of the homeless conducted by the Milwaukee Continuum of Care.
77 Point In Time surveys have shown that total homelessness has declined nationwide by more than 9% since 2007 but has increased 8.1% in that same time period in Wisconsin, according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
Ken Schmidt, executive director of Hope House, a shelter for individuals and families, says he's noticed the increase.
"The economy has been really stubborn," he said. "A lot of the folks in shelters, a good percentage of them, work. We just find that folks are having a harder time competing when times are tough."
The sheer number of people applying for jobs can force overqualified people to apply for entry-level jobs, whereas in better economic times those individuals could have higher-paying jobs and afford housing, Schmidt said.
This winter, families are doubling and tripling up in homes, while local shelters are opening up overflow warming centers. With the growing need and dropping temperatures, the partnership with Milwaukee police has been beneficial, he said.
Schmidt praised the department for developing a program absent pressure from homeless advocates or the public.
"They did it on their own," he said. Chicago murders drop in 2013. Good police work, or something else? Chicago police credit new techniques targeting gangs and violence-prone neighborhoods with the sharp drop in homicides, but analysts say changes in gang disputes may be a big factor.
Christian Science Monitor By Mark Guarino, Staff writer / January 2, 2014 The announcement from famously crime-ridden Chicago that violent crime in general, and homicides in particular, fell dramatically in 2013 compared with the year before quickly produced claims of credit from the Police Department.
But some analysts are suggesting the drop – homicides fell 18 percent from 503 in 2012 to 415 in 2013, while shootings plummeted by 24 percent – can be attributed to other factors, including some that are internal to the gangs responsible for the bulk of the city’s violence.
“More intelligent policing prevents murder,” Chicago Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy told reporters this week, saying the drop is attributed to a number of restructured policing techniques. They include launching a “gang audit” to focus on individual gang members and turf conflicts that may become factors in future violence, and concentrating efforts in more than 20 “impact zones” on the city’s South and West sides, where crime is more rampant.
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But according to Arthur Lurigio, a criminal justice professor at Loyola University in Chicago, the dramatic surge in homicides in 2012 made it an unreliable benchmark for determining if the lowered number of homicides the following year was the result of a specific change in policing strategy. In fact, when compared with the 2011 total of 435, homicides in 2013 were only 5 percent lower.
“The unusual spike in 2012 was attributable to a confluence of factors that came together that we are not likely to see in subsequent years,” Professor Lurigio says. They include: An unusually warm winter and spring, and an “unprecedented gang fragmentation” that increased tensions in the city’s most crime-ridden neighborhoods. Since then, Lurigio says, gang structures have tightened so that there is more control of the streets.
“There was more of a resolution this past year in that they were able to mark off space and maybe negotiate around their differences,” he says. Nevertheless, he adds, the proactive police presence also helped establish more stability in high- tension neighborhoods.
Putting Chicago’s trends in an even broader historical perspective, a report published by Yale University’s Institution for Social and Policy Studies in December said that, despite the 2012 jump, homicides in Chicago are at a historic low when compared with data going back as far as 1965.
The report notes also that the greatest proportion of homicides in Chicago involves street gangs, and in particularly, factions operating within the same gang organization.
“The nature of gang homicides in Chicago has changed from one between warring distinct gangs to one between related or affiliated gangs,” it says.
Meanwhile, even as the Police Department claims credit for the declining levels of murder and other violence, its allocation of resources is being questioned.
In 2013, Chicago spent nearly $100 million in overtime pay for police, triple the $32 million budgeted by the city for the year and almost double what it spent on police overtime in 2012. The city is budgeting $70 million for police overtime in 2014.
The police union has long complained that relying on overtime drains resources, and is not a reliable strategy for fighting crime. The union argues for more hiring, saying the city is compensating for its diminished police ranks by moving rookie cops, who have little experience, to “impact zones” where crime is rampant.
“From a budgetary standpoint, it’s not sustainable,” agrees Loyola’s Lurigio. “It’s also not sustainable for a long-term police strategy. If you want people close to the ground, you don’t want cops driving around in cars, you also want cops who can get a firm grasp of what’s gong on, and who are going to be known to the people in the neighborhood.
79 “If you have ears to the ground regularly,” he continues, “you’re going to listen in a different way, you’re going to be more informed about the intelligence you’re going to gather. You want a more sustained presence.”
Bratton Takes Helm of Police Force He Pledged to Change
By J. DAVID GOODMAN and JOSEPH GOLDSTEIN Published: January 2, 2014 The New York Times Minutes after the bagpipes faded and he took the oath of office on Thursday, Police Commissioner William J. Bratton signaled that he intended to shift the nation’s largest police department away from an aggressive style of patrolling New York City that had alienated many minority residents.
In his first policy message to the city and the police force he now commands, Mr. Bratton said that the tremendous strides the department had made in reducing crime should long ago have given way to fewer confrontational encounters between the police and the public.
“Crime is down to such extraordinarily low levels in this city versus where it was that there is an expectation — or there should be an expectation — that the intrusion of police into citizens’ lives should also diminish,” he told reporters after being sworn in. “But we had the reverse happening.”
A day after he officially took over the department on Wednesday in a private ceremony, Mr. Bratton said it was unfortunate that relations between the police and the community were marked by “disconnect” and “alienation.”
Mr. Bratton’s remarks, often introspective in tone, differed markedly from those of his predecessor, Raymond W. Kelly, who often bristled at the suggestion that his strategies were sowing discord.
“We will all work hard to identify why is it that so many in this city do not feel good about this department that has done so much to make them safe — what has it been about our activities that have made so many alienated?” Mr. Bratton said, speaking to a packed hall at Police Headquarters in Lower Manhattan.
He pledged a new era of policing that would be “a collaboration unlike any that we have ever seen” in New York. “That’s why I came back,” he said.
Mr. Bratton, the city’s 42nd police commissioner, must now deliver on the campaign promises of Mayor Bill de Blasio, who vowed to make changes to the stop-and-frisk tactics that were the dominant theme under Mr. Kelly. But with the Police Department coming under increasing criticism, substantial changes already began taking root toward the end of Mr. Kelly’s tenure, with street stops falling precipitously since early 2012.
80 Mr. Bratton outlined in the most concrete terms to date how his crime-fighting strategies would differ from those of his predecessor. He singled out Operation Impact, Mr. Kelly’s signature program, which involved sending rookie officers to high-crime neighborhoods to seek out suspicious behavior and confront it. The program led to a soaring number of recorded street stops and angered some residents of neighborhoods such as Brownsville, Brooklyn, who complained of a dragnet approach, particularly in public housing. “The former commissioner, his opinion was that stop, question and frisk and Operation Impact were the way to go,” Mr. Bratton said. “It really is a difference of opinion.”
While Mr. Kelly’s crime-fighting strategy involved relentless enforcement of even minor violations, Mr. Bratton, 66, suggested that approach was coming at too high cost.
“I am quite comfortable that we can have less and achieve the same results,” Mr. Bratton said.
Mr. Bratton returns to a department he ran from 1994 to 1996. During that period, he changed the posture of the Police Department from one focused on responding to crimes to one that sought to prevent them, in part through an intense focus on low-level, quality-of-life offenses. Since then, he has spent years consulting departments around the country. He was also the chief of the Los Angeles Police Department.
There he received wide praise as he led a police force that had been plagued by corruption and brutality out from under a federal consent decree in the 2000s. He reached out to the department’s critics early on, and won over most of them by the time he stepped down in 2009, despite a doubling in the number of stop-and- frisk encounters during his tenure.
On Thursday, Mr. Bratton said he would also look to the nation’s other police departments for ideas and inspiration — a striking note of humility for the head of a department that had long seen itself to be the leader in innovation.
Mr. Bratton said returning to Police Headquarters was like coming back to a familiar home that had been remodeled. He said a bottle of Champagne from Mr. Kelly was waiting for him with a note: “Happy New Year, Good Luck.” Mr. Kelly did not attend Thursday’s swearing-in.
While drawing firm distinction with Mr. Kelly, he also offered kind words, saying that under his leadership the Police Department kept the city safe not only from crime but from a terrorist threat that registered far less during Mr. Bratton’s previous tenure. Mr. Bratton’s compliments were in stark contrast to speeches on the day Mr. de Blasio named him as commissioner; neither uttered Mr. Kelly’s name in their prepared remarks.
Mr. Bratton also praised the department’s strategy to suppress violence associated with the informal youth gangs responsible for many of the city’s shootings. Mr. Bratton said he would seek to build on the successes of that
81 program, known as Operation Crew Cut and begun in 2012. He said he would seek to expand it and involve more narcotics officers.
Tracking technology promises more efficient officer deployment
Black box devices attached to radios track officer movements and deploy appropriate resources to target risky crime areas.
Date - 3rd January 2014 By - Jasmin McDermott - Police Oracle 5 Comments An intelligence-led command and control system that can match demand with resources by documenting officer locations and plotting high risk crime areas will improve public confidence, it has been claimed.
The software uses data transmitted from black boxes attached to either an officer’s radio or within a police vehicle to map the location of every officer on duty.
Information about previous crimes, the locations of victims and offenders is overlaid onto the map and “geo fences” are created to highlight areas of particular interest.
The information, accessible by command and control operators, is then used to deploy the closest and most appropriate officers to an incident depending on their skills set. The software also has an integrated diary system, which notes all victims of crime and flags individuals who require further police contact.
The software also combines real-time feedback directly from police vehicles with GPS from hand-held radios.
In addition, the Northgate technology can also monitor individual officers’ driving behaviour as well as highlight any issues with vehicles.
In an interview with PoliceOracle.com Rob Watts, of Northgate, said that the system will not only improve public confidence but will also enhance officer safety by allowing senior leaders to know where all their officers are.
He said: “This is about getting the right resource in the right place at the right time.
“What this system does is to map where resources are along with where crime is to collate areas of interest to the force.
“The officers will then be tasked to go to certain locations and with the different risks in that area.
82 “In a lot of cases it is about deploying the nearest available resource. With this system you can see which is the nearest, appropriate resource and deploy it accurately.
“In effect it is about managing the resource more appropriately and getting that resource to the right place to show that areas are being policed and that the force is managing against crime that is taking place.”
The system is due to be rolled out in Staffordshire Police in March.
Mr Watts added: “All police forces are under pressure with the Comprehensive Spending Review to make cut backs and provide more with less.
“However, many forces have not got control over their resources to understand where they are after they are given their briefing and tasking.
“With this we will hopefully reduce the pressure on forces and help them allocate more money to be put to frontline officers.”
Staffordshire’s Assistant Chief Constable Julian Blazeby said the technology would improve incident management.
He added: “As well as helping us to reduce crime by enabling more police time to be spent on active patrol, this new technology will lead us to be more operationally efficient and effective, so that we can deliver a high quality of service.
“The solution offers a host of benefits and advantages. These include an improvement in the effectiveness of frontline staff, giving officers more time out of the station to focus on key tasks and offering reassurance to the public.”
2013: The year policing changed
The extraordinary significant of events over the last 12 months should not be underestimated, says Dr Tim Brain.
Date - 2nd January 2014 By - Dr Tim Brain - Police Oracle 5 Comments Only the perspective of history will tell us the true significance of the events which have unfolded in the year just ending. Matters that seem of great significance now might merit only a footnote in this future history. Conversely, others of seemingly lesser note might assume greater importance.
So what might our putative historian be writing about of 2013? I would venture to say that our learned sage would identify 2013 as one of the most significant years in the evolution of policing in the British Isles, ranking along with 1829 (the creation of the Metropolitan Police), 1964 (the year of passing what is still the
83 most important of modern police acts) and 1984 (the year the Police and Criminal Evidence Act became law).
This is quite a big claim to make, so on what foundations does it rest?
To start with it does not rest on the policing events of 2013. This has operationally been a relatively quiet year; no mass murders, no riots, no operational ‘causes célèbre’. Those events that have grabbed the headlines, such as the brutal murder of Fusilier Lee Rigby in May, were dealt with professionally and proportionately. Potentially the most significant operational policing event of 2013 is the fracking demonstrations in Sussex, presaging further environmental protests as more fracking opportunities are explored and the prospect of building Britain’s first nuclear power station for almost 30 years draws on.
No. The claim for the historical significance of 2013 rests upon what has happened to the police constitution – and the very fabric of its personnel structure.
Brave new world
The year was the first full 12 months of police and crime commissioners and marked a distinct increase in political influence over the police and the concomitant decrease in the independence of chief constables. Any doubt about this effect was demolished by the resignation of Carmel Napier as chief constable of Gwent. The arrival of the PCCs was accompanied by a massive turnover in personnel in the chief constable rank, with half being appointed since the November 2012 elections. This new chief constable cohort will inevitably be more accommodating to the new realities of political power.
At the national level the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) was effectively sidelined as the national policy-making and operational coordinating body by the College of Policing, officially launched in February. Any lingering doubt about the downgrade in ACPO’s status was removed by the Home Secretary’s speech in October in which she formally announced the end of ACPO’s ‘monopoly’. The autumn official launch of the National Crime Agency emphasised this direction of travel, as its Director General possesses directional powers, albeit in limited circumstances, over chief constables.
Before any members of the Police Federation feel a warm sense of Schadenfreude over ACPO’s discomfiture, it is necessary to recollect that this was the year that the government snapped its fingers in the face of Federation protests and threats to strike and in which it nearly imploded following membership criticism over its handling of major issues, not the least the ‘Plebgate’ affair. Of the staff associations, only the Superintendents emerged with its reputation intact.
The year also marked the formal end of the monopoly of chief officer posts being occupied by police career professionals. The December Police Grant Settlement contained a £3 million element for the College of Policing to start the process for
84 training direct officer entrants, a consequence of one of the Winsor Report’s recommendations. After years of hesitation and procrastination over the principle of direct entry it looks like the Home Office means business this time. Our future historian is likely therefore to be studying a junior, middle and senior officer cadre significantly different in experience and qualifications from the current one. That the system for identifying and progressing the service’s leaders had to change is without doubt, but the system recommended by Winsor is not without significant risk in implementation.
Agreements and determinations in the police negotiating and arbitration processes also signalled the end of the ‘special’ treatment of the police compared to other professions when it came to pay and conditions of service, further consequences of the Winsor Review. As a result police pay in future would be no more exceptional than nurses, teachers, firefighters and the armed services. Not bad professional company to be in, but not as good as the special status awarded to the police under the Edmund-Davies pay scheme.
Change and its cost
In terms of resources another 16,700 Full Time Equivalent police posts were lost in the year ending March 31 2013, taking the total lost since 2010 to 38,000. With the continuing effects of spending reviews and Treasury statements continuing to unfold there is no medium term end to staff losses.
The year also saw the three constituent parts of the UK go their separate ways over police governance. In England and Wales the classic Tripartite structure ended with the new powers of the PCCs, the College of Policing and the NCA. In Scotland the new national force came under the governance of a police board nominated by the Scottish Justice Minister. Only in Northern Ireland did a vestige of the historical Tripartite System remain.
Were there any positive features to 2013? There were. Not least in February Ipsos-MORI published its regular opinion poll of public trust in key professions. Despite the fallout from such issues as Plebgate and Hillsborough in 2012, 65 per cent still trusted the police to tell them the truth, not so high as the 89 per cent that trusted doctors but hugely better than the 18 per cent registered for politicians. How will that figure rate in 2014 with, until the last few weeks of the year, the service suffering a similar battering? We have just a few weeks of waiting before we find out.
There is another, highly positive feature. The service is massively coping with a period of unprecedented organisational change, and doing so in the absence of any centrally directed change-management programme.
In sum, our future historian will find plenty to ponder when it comes to 2013.
Dr Tim Brain is a former chief constable of Gloucestershire and an Honorary Senior Research Fellow at Cardiff University. His book, A Future for Policing, was published by Oxford University Press in October 2013.
85 Mental health nurses to be posted in police stations £25m pilot scheme to ensure people get the treatment they need and cut reoffending will initially run in 10 areas Haroon Siddique The Guardian, Saturday 4 January 2014
Mental health nurses are to be posted in police stations and courts in a £25m pilot scheme designed to ensure people receive the treatment they need and cut reoffending rates.
The government scheme, which will initially run in 10 areas and be rolled out across the rest of the country by 2017 if successful, was welcomed by mental health campaigners, confident that it would prove its worth.
The majority of people who end up in prison have a mental health condition, a substance misuse problem or a learning disability and one in four has a severe mental health illness, such as chronic depression or psychosis.
"Too often people with mental health illnesses who come into contact with the criminal justice system are only diagnosed when they reach prison," said care and support minister Norman Lamb. "We want to help them get the right support and treatment as early as possible. Diverting the individual away from offending and helping to reduce the risk of more victims suffering due to further offences benefits everyone."
The money will be made available over the next year to bridge the gap between the police, courts and mental health services in Avon and Wiltshire, Coventry, Dorset, Leicester, London, Merseyside, South Essex, Sunderland and Middlesbrough, Sussex and Wakefield. The Department of Health said it would ensure people receive the treatment they need "at the earliest possible stage". It has been estimated that police officers spend 15% to 25% of their time dealing with people with mental health problems. Policing minister Damian Green said: "Officers should be focused on fighting crimes and people with mental health conditions should get the care they need as early as possible. These pilots will not only ensure that happens but in the longer term will help drive down reoffending by individuals who, with the right kind of treatment, can recover fully."
The scheme comes nearly five years after the landmark Bradley report said too many offenders with mental health difficulties and learning disabilities were ending up in prison without access to appropriate treatment. One of its recommendations was that all police stations and courts "should have access to liaison and diversion services".
Andy Bull, deputy chief executive of the Centre for Mental Health, said: "The fact that this is a new investment in a new form of service – or one that is patchy at present – is hugely encouraging. This will genuinely help a lot of people." But he
86 said it was crucial that services were available when mental health issues had been identified.
Paul Jenkins, chief executive of Rethink Mental Illness, said there had been some frustration at the amount of time it had taken to implement such a scheme since the Bradley report, but welcomed the "really significant initiative", which he said would easily demonstrate its worth. "There's immense potential to divert people away from expensive prison sentences," he said. "But in the short term we might just see it be less hassle for the police in terms of processing people, which will also save money."
Dallas police overhaul use-of-force training after criticism from recent shootings Posted: January 4, 2014 - 1:00pm
Associated Press DALLAS (AP) — The Dallas Police Department plans to overhaul its use-of-force training program after criticism stemming from recent shootings by officers, according to a published report.
The Dallas Morning News reports the department is preparing to replace its current crop of rank-and-file instructors with sergeants, increase the frequency of training for veteran officers and consult with experts about best practices.
Police Chief David Brown said the overhaul is designed to rebuild public trust.
The department dismissed two officers in two months, citing internal investigations that concluded both violated the department's deadly force policy when they shot suspects without apparent provocation. But critics say that reforming the training program that teaches officers how and when to use deadly force amounts to only a simple cosmetic change amid public pressure, and won't address deeper issues.
Deputy Police Chief Albert Martinez told the newspaper that the department doesn't believe there are major flaws with its training, "but we know it can be better."
The overhaul is among many policy changes the department has implemented since a July 2012 shooting of a South Dallas man nearly sparked a riot. The department has also modified its foot chase policy, is field testing new cameras worn on uniforms and has begun alerting the FBI of all shootings.
Those reforms were accelerated in October, after a neighbor's surveillance video captured Officer Cardan Spencer shooting Bobby Gerald Bennett. Bennett had a knife and was mentally ill, but was standing still with his arms at his sides at the time of the shooting.
87 Currently, veteran officers go through four hours of live simulations of potential deadly force encounters every two years. Martinez said the new goal is to have officers complete annual training, though he also said the department will need more trainers to cycle 3,500 sworn officers through the program.
Martinez said the sergeants will undergo the same certification process as the previous instructors, who were senior corporals, and will meet with experts across the country to learn about what policies and practices work best elsewhere.
"We want supervisors to be able to critique the officers and be able to talk with officers who may not have performed at the level we want them to at those training scenarios," Martinez said. He said that senior corporals have a harder time doing that because they are instructing peers.
Retired Dallas police Sgt. Keith Wenzel teaches street survival classes nationwide and once ran the department's training program. He called the overhaul "nothing more than political grandstanding."
"I don't think it will have any effect on the culture of the department, and if it did, it would take two to 10 years to make a difference," he told the Dallas Morning News.
Wenzel said more frequent training and more supervision is positive, but said rank doesn't affect training ability.
"A good trainer is a good trainer," he said. "Are you telling me that because he's a police officer that he doesn't possess certain skills? It's a skill set, not a rank set."
Training to aid mentally ill a priority for Maine police Most officers in Portland and elsewhere in Maine are learning how to intervene amid a mental health crisis. By David Hench [email protected] Portland Press Herald
When Portland Police Chief Michael Sauschuck was a young community policing officer, he and his partner were called to the Casco Bay Lines parking garage for a person behaving and driving erratically.
They found the man, a driver of a Cadillac in the upper levels of the parking garage, but could barely communicate with him.
“This individual truly believed in his mind we were agents of the devil and we were there to kill him,” Sauschuck said. The officers ended up in the cab of the car, fighting to keep the man from putting it in gear and running them over.
88 The experience helped convince Sauschuck that he should enroll in the department’s first Crisis Intervention Team class in 2001.
“When something like that happens, you play those conversations in your mind: ‘Did I do absolutely everything possible to help this individual?’” Sauschuck said. “I knew personally and professionally I needed more information.”
Now, 12 years later, every officer in the state’s largest municipal police force, the first to embrace crisis intervention training, has completed a 40-hour course in identifying and responding to the array of people with mental illnesses that officers encounter.
The achievement comes as the number of police calls related to a person’s mental health has been climbing for years, in part because residential facilities for people with mental illness have closed.
Portland identified 4,013 calls for service in 2012 that related to a person’s mental health, up from 3,311 the year before. Numbers for 2013 have not yet been compiled.
The stakes on such calls can be high.
Some are mundane – people talking to themselves or acting strangely, who are deemed to be no danger to themselves or others despite their abnormal behavior and who cooperate with police. Others are more perilous, both for officers and the person in crisis.
A 2012 report by the Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram found that 42 percent of the 57 people shot by Maine police officers since 2000 were mentally ill, and they represented 58 percent of the 33 people killed in officer- involved shootings.
The report found that most officers lack the specialized training in recognizing and de-escalating confrontations stemming from mental illness.
City Councilor Ed Suslovic, chairman of Portland’s public safety and health and human services committee, said having every officer trained to deal with people in mental health crisis is an important achievement that will pay off.
“It’s notable it’s been a long time since we had a fatal shooting where a police officer shot someone who was having a serious mental illness situation,” Suslovic said. “That shows how important the CIT training is and really how the entire department gets it when it comes to the challenge.”
But the training does not prevent deadly confrontations.
South Portland Police Chief Ed Googins said he is also committed to the program. All but two of the officers in his 53-person department have been certified in CIT. He notes that both of the city’s fatal police shootings in 2006 and 2008 involved people with a mental health crisis. In both cases, CIT-trained
89 officers were on hand but did not have an opportunity to mitigate the threatening behavior that led to the use of deadly force.
Googins says the training is an essential tool for modern police work.
“This really is developing career-long survival skills, because mental health calls, we’ve had a number of them go very badly over the years,” he said.
Portland is the largest, but not the only, police department in Maine to provide CIT training to all of its officers. In addition to South Portland police, Sanford police and the Kennebec County Sheriff’s Office also have trained all or nearly all of their officers.
Like many medium-sized departments, Portland and South Portland originally intended to have one officer on each shift trained in crisis intervention.
But mental health calls can take time and often overlap, so it was determined that it was not effective to have just one or two people on a shift trained, Googins said.
Laura Usher, CIT program manager at the National Alliance on Mental Illness headquarters in Virginia, said some agencies around the country believe that rather than train every officer in crisis intervention, it’s better to train people who are suited to that approach who can be called upon by officers who are not.
Sauschuck, however, believes every officer could potentially encounter a person in crisis, and waiting for a specialist can be imprudent or impossible.
“My argument from the beginning was we don’t train specific officers in OUI enforcement or defensive tactics,” he said. Sauschuck said dealing with people in mental health crisis has become part of the job of an officer. “When we talk about verbal judo or we talk about crisis intervention team training, these are officer safety or community safety classes.”
At the heart of it is getting people the help they need while ensuring public safety, said Jenna Mehnert, executive director of the NAMI Maine, the state affiliate of the National Alliance on Mental Illness.
“There are ways to make those situations more complicated or heated, and other ways to handle it where you can help calm somebody down and get at the root of what’s going on and address that, instead of just the behavior that’s presented in front of you,” Mehnert said.
A person with serious mental health issues may exhibit frightening behavior but is more likely to be a victim than a perpetrator, she said.
“We want to make sure people with mental illness get services and that we do not criminalize mental illness any further,” Mehnert said. “We want people in law enforcement to have another skill that helps them get through their day and make it home at night. ... We have many people whose only [criminal] charges, unfortunately, are related to assaulting nurses and law enforcement.”
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The program has gained in popularity, but still only 2,800 law enforcement agencies, out of 20,000 nationwide, have trained officers in CIT.
Portland is one of six departments nationwide that have been identified as learning sites by the Bureau of Justice, which endorses the crisis intervention training.
Maine has a $90,000 annual contract with NAMI to coordinate CIT classes in the state. The classes are taught by local mental health professionals, and that give officers contacts in the treatment community.
The week-long training involves classwork and role-playing.
“The effectiveness of this CIT training are the role plays that officers are put in, to actually deal with folks that are exhibiting symptoms or behavior similar to a type of mental illness, be it depression or schizophrenia, whatever it is,” said Googins, who undertook the training about four years ago.
“We’re having to use our skills to de-escalate the call, establish a rapport and get the person the help they need,” he said. “The idea is to do it with the least amount of force, and be effective – not just saying, ‘We’re clear, send us to the next call,’ but we’ve done something that might negate a future callback.”
33 cops killed by gunfire in 2013, the lowest number since 1887
By Matt Pearce Los Angeles Times December 30, 2013
In 2013, some of the year's biggest headlines involved cop killers.
There was MIT Police Officer Sean Collier, who authorities said was shot and killed by the Tsarnaev brothers after the Boston Marathon bombings in April.
There was Christopher Dorner's vengeful rampage across Southern California in February. Two of the four people he killed were police officers.
Yet those tragedies would prove the exceptions in 2013, which may have been one of the safest years in modern history for American police.
According to a preliminary report by the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund released Monday, 111 law enforcement officers died in the line of duty in 2013, the lowest number since 1959.
[Link to the LEOMF data here: http://www.nleomf.org/facts/research-bulletins/ ]
91 Most of the deaths came in traffic accidents, said the nonprofit, which tracks law enforcement deaths and maintains the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial in Washington.
The most dramatic number in the report may be the 33 officers killed by gunfire, the lowest number since 1887, when the country's population was more than four times smaller than it is today.
It's also a steep drop from two years ago, when 71 officers were shot and killed on the job in 2011. A majority of 2013's shooting deaths came from handguns, most often during an ambush.
Such a fatal attack happened last week, on Dec. 23, when a suspected bank robber killed a police officer and critically wounded another officer on a roadway in Tupelo, Miss., authorities said. The suspect, Mario Edward Garnett, 40, was killed in a shootout with Phoenix police after another bank robbery in Arizona on Saturday.
The fund said the year's 46 police roadway deaths were the lowest number since 1991. Eleven of those deaths came from officers being hit while outside their vehicles.
"The only good news is zero deaths, but this very significant drop in law enforcement fatalities the past two years is extremely encouraging," the fund's chairman and chief executive, Craig W. Floyd, said in a statement. "Our organization, in partnership with others, is working hard to create a new culture of safety in law enforcement that no longer accepts deaths and injuries as an unavoidable part of the job."
The 2013 number continued a general decades-long decline for law enforcement deaths since a peak of 280 deaths in the early 1970s. Like much of the U.S., which has seen violent crime rates near their lowest point in generations, life for police officers seems to have gotten safer.
But the number of justified homicides by police officers has increased over time, according to the latest available statistics from the FBI, which do not include 2013.
Officers killed 414 people in the line of duty in 2009; 397 in 2010; 404 in 2011; and 410 in 2012. The 400 mark had not been exceeded in the preceding decade, according to the FBI's justified homicide statistics. There were 308 such killings in 1999.
Judge tosses police unions’ suit over Breathalyzer tests By Julia Marsh January 2, 2014 | 5:12pm New York Post
92 A Manhattan judge has tossed a lawsuit by police unions complaining that mandatory Breathalyzer tests for officers who had used their guns violated collective bargaining agreements.
Judge Paul Wooten wrote that “The New York City Police Commissioner has full authority to institute and impose a new policy requiring all police personnel to automatically undergo blood alcohol testing in all cases where police personal discharge a weapon that results in injury or death.”
He said the breath tests were a necessary tool to “investigate accusations of malfeasance as a matter of public policy and safety.”
Wooten noted that EMS workers are subject to similar testing.
The plaintiffs in the 2012 suit– the Sergeants and Patrolmen’s Benevolent Associations– lost a similar case in federal appeals court last year.
The policy was adopted in 2008 after the Sean Bell shooting in Queens where one detective—who never used his weapon– had been drinking before the incident.
The city’s law department was happy with the decision. “We are pleased that the state court, along with other recent courts, has recognized the Police’s Department’s right to test an officer’s sobriety when he or she is involved in a shooting incident,” said city attorney Eric Eichenholtz.
The union said they would appeal calling the tests “a very important issue.”
Utah’s largest police forces use Tasers more than any other weapon
BY JANELLE STECKLEIN
THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE
PUBLISHED: DECEMBER 29, 2013 09:18PM
The man was armed with a gun — until he threw it at a Salt Lake City officer standing about 15 feet away.
Then the man tried to jump into a vehicle with children inside and flee.
The officer reacted quickly, pulling out his Taser and zapping the guy for 5 seconds until he dropped to the ground.
The incident was one of 118 during the past three years in which a Salt Lake City officer used a Taser on a suspect, according to use-of-force statistics released by the department as part of a public records request.
93
The Salt Lake Tribune collected and analyzed data on each case in which an officer used a weapon against a resisting suspect for Utah’s three largest traditional police forces — Unified, Salt Lake City and West Valley City — from 2010 through 2012.
The analysis found departments by and large are using force at similar rates.
Officers are given such tools so they will emerge the victor in a struggle with an unruly suspect, according to Geoffrey Alpert, a University of South Carolina professor and expert in police violence.
“It’s going to be in response to something that a suspect is doing,” he said, noting that use of force is not random. If you’re in a fight, “you have all these tools that you use so that you win the fight.”
But he said each use needs to be considered in context to determine whether an officer was justified in using the weapons or whether some departments are using them more frequently than others.
For instance, it’s important to consider factors such as how many citizen encounters are occurring, how often officers have the opportunity to use deadly force, crime rates and whether the use of force is legitimate and lawful, he said.
The chiefs at Utah’s three largest police departments say they carefully monitor the use of deadly force.
Salt Lake City, for example, in response to The Tribune’s records request, released dozens of pages outlining each Taser deployment, the deploying officer’s name and a description of why the officer used the stunner.
“Our goal is to always minimize the risk,” Salt Lake City Police Chief Chris Burbank said. “Both to the victims, the involved parties and the officers. We need to balance that always.”
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Tough to compare • Unified and Salt Lake City each has 420 peace officers. West Valley City employs 194.5 sworn officers. Unified and Salt Lake City officers come into contact with more than a million people each year and take hundreds of thousands of reports. UPD estimates about 200,000 reports and Salt Lake City closer to 400,000. West Valley City said it’s hard to pin down how many contacts officers have but place the number in the hundreds and hundreds of thousands and said they took an estimated 58,000 initial reports.
“You look at the number of people we deal with,” Burbank said. “We have a lot of activity going on in Salt Lake City that they don’t have. In percentage of contacts, [our use of force] is a really low number.”
94 But the chiefs caution against comparing each entity with the other because while statistics may look dramatic on the surface, they don’t tell the entire story.
“If we were to compare ourselves to Sandy, we’d look like we were out of control,” Salt Lake County Sheriff Jim Winder said. “It’s a bedroom community, lower crime rate.”
Burbank said the numbers aren’t as important to him as reviewing each use of force to make sure it complied with department policy. He said he has disciplined, retrained and even terminated officers in instances of inappropriate use.
National comparisons are also difficult. Alpert said while national mandates require departments to report annual crime statistics, reporting use-of-force statistics is entirely optional, though he would like to see it be made mandatory.
Still, West Valley City Police Chief Lee Russo said the use-of-force numbers paint a picture of whether officers are receiving adequate training and the tools needed to do their jobs.
“Certainly you need to look at those statistics and determine what types of contacts are we having,” Russo said.
He uses that analysis to determine whether there are new strategies, technologies or opportunities to improve his agency “not because we’re doing anything wrong, but we’re always looking to do things better,” he said.
“Every agency needs to be doing that. Nobody should be [sitting back] and believing their policies are sufficient now and forever.”
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The Taser • During the past three years, Burbank’s officers used Tasers at a similar rate to Unified Police officers, but they used batons seven times more frequently than West Valley City.
Burbank said he is not sure if his department’s numbers reflect an actual strike on a person or simply a deployment of the device — such as using it to gain entry or simply pulling it out of an officer’s belt.
“I question the other numbers that you’ve gotten from other agencies,” he said, noting that the baton is considered a lesser use of force than the Taser.
“If you’ve only had one [deployment], why would you bother carrying it?” he asked.
Ultimately, Taser use was a common thread across all three departments.
Salt Lake City had the most Taser deployments, followed closely by Unified Police.
95 But it was Unified’s use of the device that increased the most since 2010, more than doubling.
Winder acknowledged his department’s numbers are up but he attributes that to adding more than 100 officers with the addition of Midvale and Taylorsville to the ranks and about 100,000 new residents to the coverage area.
“I don’t think our use has gone up, as much as the volume of reporting by increased officer [numbers],” he said.
Winder said officers in his department use fewer impact weapons — such as batons — and instead rely more heavily on Tasers, which is good from his point of view.
“From my standpoint, 29 years of [policing], it’s a lifesaver,” Winder said of the Taser. “It’s superhandy. It reduces the assaults [on officers]. It sure has saved a lot of problems for us and the public.
“It’s significantly reduced our use of K-9. It’s reduced our officer-involved shootings. It’s reduced our officer injuries. Now they’re not having to wrestle suspects. They can just Tase them.”
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Policies and review • When it comes to regulating Tasers and use of other weapons, The Tribune analysis found the three departments each have similar policies outlining when officer’s can use force against a suspect.
Perhaps the highest level of review comes from the Salt Lake County District Attorney’s Office, which closely scrutinizes each officer-involved shooting.
Since 2010, the three departments have been involved in 24 total shootings. The District Attorney’s Office has found 84 percent — or all but four shootings — to be justified. West Valley City and Salt Lake City each had two unjustified- shooting findings, while Unified was found to be fully justified in every shooting it was involved in. In the unjustified shootings in the past three years, no officers have ever been convicted of criminal wrongdoing.
Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill said Utah law defines certain circumstances in which use of force is justified and implies a review must be conducted. Historically, the district attorney’s office has been tapped to conduct that review.
He said it’s difficult to analyze shootings due to perceptions that agencies might have conflicts of interest investigating themselves, that the system isn’t fair or transparent or that there are questions about whether cases are getting objective reviews.
“[The] majority of the time you’re going to find these cases justified because first, officers are well trained and second, use of force is a reality of policing,” he said.
96 “But the integrity of the system isn’t measured by all the justifications you find, but by being able to recognize and capture that one [shooting] that is not justified.”
And with any use of force, each department has procedures in place to review it.
Both West Valley City and Salt Lake departments have citizen review panels.
West Valley City’s panel reviews every use-of-force incident, even if it didn’t result in a complaint. The city’s Professional Standards Review Board then keeps detailed statistics of every incident, which was what the department quickly released to The Tribune. Salt Lake City’s board reviews any complaint filed against an officer for using force and every officer-involved shooting.
Burbank said his department also does a lot of national comparisons and pays close attention to case law, which is always changing.
“In this day and age, we have a small world,” he said. “You’re very naive not to be looking at a broader picture. If we don’t learn from our mistakes or the mistakes of others, we might fall into the same pitfalls or traps.”
Unified Police has an internal affairs system it uses to monitor use-of-force incidents and Winder said he closely monitors complaints against officers.
“We like to ensure that we don’t have spikes in utilization, and if we do, we want to correlate that to something specific,” Winder said.
New demands changing the face of police hiring pools Article by: SHANNON PRATHER , Star Tribune Updated: January 4, 2014 - 8:14 PM More chiefs looking for four-year degrees, people skills and critical thinking.
Jackie Duchschere started her career in the unsparing world of politics after earning her bachelor’s degree. In her work at a state agency, her problem- solving and people skills were tested almost daily.
She’ll now plug those skills into her new job as a Columbia Heights police officer.
Being an officer these days is as much about brains as it is about brawn as more suburban police chiefs seek out job candidates with four-year degrees and previous professional experience, often in outside fields, including teaching, political science and corporate America.
Minnesota has long led the nation in peace officer standards; it’s the only state to require a two-year degree and licensing. Now, a four-year degree is becoming a more common standard for entry into departments including Columbia Heights,
97 Edina and Burnsville. Many other departments require a four-year degree for promotion.
It’s not a rapid-fire change, but rather an evolution sped up by high unemployment that deepened the candidate pool and gave chiefs more choices. Officer pay and benefits can attract four-year candidates. Edina pays top-level officers $80,000; Columbia Heights pays nearly $75,000.
Nowadays, officers are expected to juggle a variety of tasks and that takes more education, chiefs said. Officers communicate with the public, solve problems, navigate different cultures, use computers, radios and other technology while on the move, and make split-second decisions about use of force with a variety of high-tech tools on their belt. And many of those decisions are recorded by squad car dashboard cameras, officer body cameras and even bystanders with smartphones.
Those higher community expectations and scrutiny are why Columbia Heights Police Chief Scott Nadeau said hiring officers with a four-year degree and some life experience is a top priority.
Still, there is healthy debate in law enforcement, with some chiefs favoring direct experience over pedigree.
Broad skills
Along with Duchschere, Nadeau recently hired a former schoolteacher with a master’s degree. He also has hired one officer who will finish his bachelor’s in business administration next year.
“Officers with education seem to do better with problem solving,” Nadeau said. “You need that breadth of knowledge. You need to know what is the difference between an immigrant and a refugee.”
That’s different from when Nadeau was hired, when chiefs literally sized candidates up, favoring those over 6 feet tall with broad shoulders.
In his inner-ring suburb of 20,000 made up of 16 percent foreign-born, officers are more likely to encounter a confused senior citizen than an armed gunman. During his career in Brooklyn Center and Columbia Heights, Nadeau says he has never had to discharge his gun, but he’s faced some rapid-fire questions from immigrant groups about racial profiling and from residents irked at efforts to stop jaywalking across Central Avenue.
The community problem-solving role for police warrants more education, Nadeau said.
“Officers need to fully understand the problem, provide a thoughtful analysis of alternatives, research best practices and assemble a plan that includes multiple stakeholders and leverages community resources to reduce or eliminate the problem,” he said.
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A changing mold
Although her father is an Eden Prairie policeman, Jackie Duchschere says that for a long time “I just had the wrong idea of what you needed to be to be a police officer.” She is 5-foot-4 and describes herself as a bit of a “girlie” girl.
“Even though my dad isn’t this big macho guy, I was completely thinking about the physical aspects of it and I didn’t fit the mold.”
Duchschere, 26, has worked as a Columbia Heights community service officer part time to get her foot in the door. She starts her new job early this year pending background and health assessments.
“My biggest tool will be my ability to communicate with people — be smart and quick on my feet,” she said.
In Edina, Chief Jeff Long said, “We are not just hiring people who want to drive fast and make arrests. We are hiring people who want to get out in the community and participate. We really focus on candidates who have prior life experience coming in.”
Some of Long’s recent hires include two Target corporate employees and a YMCA executive. Many of these professionals are taking pay cuts to go into policing, he said.
Long, who will become Lakeville’s police chief this month, said that hiring practices started to change about a decade ago but that there’s been a big push in the last five years. It’s easy to be selective. His department had 400 applicants for their last job opening.
Broadening role
More education also coincides with greater expectations for police from residents and city officials. Two years ago, for example, Edina police started overseeing the city’s community health department, which handles pool inspections and hoarding investigations, Long said.
“That is the trend in law enforcement. People have that expectation that it’s not just cops showing up. It’s an entry into the social services arena,” Long said. “We want to do more social work when we are on the street. We call an advocacy agency every time we go in on a suspected domestic abuse case.”
Even conventional police work takes more education.
“You used to do a photo lineup, get the guy ID’d and you were done,” Long said. “Now you need DNA, a forensic trail, video and accounting.”
99 Burnsville Police started requiring a four-year degree in 1969. They relaxed the policy briefly in the late 1980s because of a thin candidate pool, but Chief Eric Gieseke said he firmly enforces it today.
“The community wants a professional agency and they expect us to be highly trained and highly educated,” Gieseke said. “The job has become more complex. You introduce technology. The laws are ever-changing and expectations in the community have not declined.”
Gieseke said larger urban departments, which hire more officers, may not have the luxury of considering only candidates with four-year degrees.
The Minnesota Board of Peace Officer Standards and Training, or POST Board, licenses officers. Its executive director, Neil Melton, said the board doesn’t track the number of officers with two-year versus four-year degrees but said the trend in some departments is to hire and promote officers with more education.
Debate about what’s needed
There is a back-and-forth in the law enforcement community about what qualifications predict a good officer. Maple Grove Police Chief David Jess said he values education but doesn’t require a four-year degree.
“I like to leave it open because there are plenty of people with two-year degrees that are good police officers,” he said.
Jess said he’s found experience to be a better indicator of success than education alone. He favors a candidate who has worked as a reserve officer or in a smaller department. He recalls once interviewing a highly educated candidate with no law enforcement experience who said his goal was to become the department’s forensic psychologist — a position that doesn’t exist.
“There was a total disconnect with the type of work we do,” Jess said.
Once in the door, many officers with two-year degrees utilize the city’s tuition assistance program to earn their bachelor’s degree.
The Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office, which provides police services for several north suburbs, requires only a two-year degree, but a four-year one gives candidates an edge, said spokesman Randy Gustafson.
“We are held to a higher public scrutiny level. You need people who are able to meet that public demand and the demands of technology,” Gustafson said.
Gustafson said today’s squad cars are like “driving a high-tech computer.”
He also noted that, for the first time this past year, the sheriff’s department put its new hires through 40 weeks of training and department shadowing.
100 “It’s a lot of money and you want to make certain you have a really good candidate who makes it through. … You can always teach specific competencies. You can’t teach character.”
Mental health support gets cash boost By Leicester Mercury | Posted: January 07, 2014
Leicester will benefit from a share of an extra £25 million to provide professional support in court and police stations for people with mental health problems.
The cash will be used to fund mental health nurses and professionals – ensuring people with mental health and substance misuse problems get the right treatment as quickly as possible, and help reduce re-offending.
Announcing the funding, Norman Lamb, the Government's Care and Support Minister, said: "Too often, people with mental health illnesses who come into contact with the criminal justice system are only diagnosed when they reach prison.
"We want to help them get the right support and treatment as early as possible.
"Diverting the individual away from offending and helping to reduce the risk of more victims suffering benefits everyone."
Ten areas across the country, including Leicester, will be testing out a model of "liaison and diversion" services to ensure quality of services are consistent. If successful, the services will be extended to rest of the country by 2017.
Policing Minister Damian Green said: "In the longer term it will help drive down re-offending by individuals who can recover fully."
Kate Davies, national director for Health and Justice, Armed Forces and Public Health commissioning at NHS England, said: "It will mean better outcomes for patients and for the criminal justice system."
More cuts on the way for Humberside Police on top of budget reduction By Grimsby Telegraph | Posted: January 06, 2014
HUMBERSIDE Police has to save another £1 million this year after a fresh round of Government spending cuts.
The force will have to make the cuts on top of £5 million it already needs to save in 2014-15.
101 Chief Constable Justine Curran is currently finalising a review of the force to see where savings can be made. The report will be given to Humberside Police Crime Commissioner Matthew Grove, who estimates that the force needs to save up to £30 million by 2018.
Mr Grove said: "We still have to find significant savings over the coming years due to previously- announced reductions in Government funding and increased costs, but we understand the national requirement for policing to make its contribution to bringing public finances back into balance, so we have been planning for this for some time.
"This resulted in my challenge to the chief constable to redesign the force and create a more effective and sustainable policing model for the future, which meets the needs of the public within the resources we have available to us."
The cuts were announced by the Home Office, which has reduced funding to police forces across the country to protect national police funding.
Mr Grove said: "Despite the financial pressures, the chief constable, her officers, staff and I are committed to serve and protect the public while coping with the increasing effect of austerity on the service.
"These pressures are shared by our community safety partners and the residents we work for.
"We will strive to change the way we work to ensure that we provide the best possible service to the public with the resources at our disposal."
North East Lincolnshire councillors have shared their reaction to the latest cuts.
East Marsh ward councillor Stephen Beasant, pictured, said: "My concern would be how this will impact on frontline staff and community policing. As yet we do not know where this money will be cut from.
"The police are already sharing resources and have cut out many services already.
"I think it will be very difficult to make further cuts without impacting on service."
Sidney Sussex councillor Hazel Chase, who sits on the safer and stronger communities panel, said: "Any further cuts from central government are going impact on local communities.
"More cuts will have to be made to meet the government's targets."
Waltham ward councillor Iain Colquhoun said: "Nobody likes cutting budgets, but Mr Grove has a track record of getting more from less. You don't just get a good service by throwing money at it."
102 Policing Minister Damian Green said police forces are still performing well despite the cuts being made.
He said: "The police reforms we have introduced have seen the biggest change to the policing landscape in a generation.
"These reforms are working and crime is falling.
"We have put policing back in the hands of the public through directly-elected police and crime commissioners.
"We have given chief constables greater operational independence by scrapping national targets.
"These are the most radical reforms in the history of policing. And the police continue to rise to the financial challenge.
"The proportion of officers on the frontline is increasing, crime continues to fall and victim satisfaction is up."
The money being saved from the police forces will go towards extra money for the Independent Police Complaints Commission and Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC).
It will also go towards a £50 million police innovation fund, which individual forces can apply for money from.
Mr Green said: "HMIC have identified there are areas where the police can make further savings without affecting the service to the public.
"For example, this could be through greater collaboration across operational and support services, through improved procurement of goods and services, and by improving productivity."
Police Salaries and Pensions Push California City to Brink
The New York Times By RICK LYMAN and MARY WILLIAMS WALSH Published: December 27, 2013 DESERT HOT SPRINGS, Calif. — Emerging from Los Angeles’s vast eastern sprawl, the freeway glides over a narrow pass and slips gently into the scrubby, palm-flecked Coachella Valley.
Turn south, and you head into Palm Springs with its megaresorts, golf courses and bustling shops. Turn north, and you make your way up an arid stretch of road to a battered city where empty storefronts outnumber shops, the Fire
103 Department has been closed, City Hall is on a four-day week and the dwindling coffers may be empty by spring.
The city, Desert Hot Springs, population 27,000, is slowly edging toward bankruptcy, largely because of police salaries and skyrocketing pension costs, but also because of years of spending and unrealistic revenue estimates. It is mostly the police, though, who have found themselves in the cross hairs recently.
“I would not venture to say they are overpaid,” said Robert Adams, the acting city manager since August. “What I would say is that we can’t pay them.”
Though few elected officials in America want to say it, police officers and other public-safety workers keep turning up at the center of the municipal bankruptcies and budget dramas plaguing many American cities — largely because their pensions tend to be significantly more costly than those of other city workers.
Central Falls, R.I., went bankrupt in 2011 because its police and firefighters’ pension fund ran out of money. Vallejo, Calif., went bankrupt after more than 20 police officers suddenly retired from its force of 145, fearing that if they waited they would lose their contractual right to cash out their unused sick leave and vacation time; the payouts totaled several million dollars, and Vallejo did not have the money. Miami weathered such a run in September 2010, when 154 police and firefighters retired en masse after city commissioners voted to make it harder to retire before age 50, use intensive overtime to raise pensions, and earn cash payouts.
Here, under the budget enacted last spring, about $7 million of the city’s $10.6 million annual payroll went to the 39-member police force. The situation was so dire that an audit, compiled weeks before municipal elections in November but not made public until later, showed that Desert Hot Springs was $4 million short for the year and would run out of money as early as April 2014.
So at a tense meeting last week, the new City Council voted unanimously to slash all city salaries, including those of the police, by at least 22 percent, as well as to cap incentive pay and reduce paid holidays and vacation days. For some officers who took advantage of overtime and the other extra payments, the cut could be as much as 40 percent, the union says. Management had already taken a hit: the former police chief and one of two top commanders retired this month, not to be replaced.
Wendell Phillips, a lawyer for the Desert Hot Springs Police Officers Association, quickly filed a fact-finding request with the state’s Public Employment Relations Board, calling the cuts illegal and vowing to go to court if they were not overturned.
“All they are going to end up doing is driving away their best, experienced officers and creating a police force made up of people who couldn’t get a job on another force,” Mr. Phillips said.
104 Even those trims, draconian as they were, will not be enough to close the budget gap, Mr. Adams said. More than $2 million more needs to be found before the end of the fiscal year in June, promising months more of bitter wrangling and cuts.
“My idea is that we put up a thermometer outside City Hall, showing how much progress we are making as we close the budget gap,” said Russell Betts, a city councilman and a supporter of the newly elected mayor, Adam Sanchez, who came into office promising to deal with the chronic budget problems once and for all.
“I think we’re going to turn this crisis into a positive,” Mayor Sanchez said. “We are not going to go into bankruptcy. That is not an option. We stumbled, but we’re going to get back up again.”
Cities have run into fiscal difficulties for many reasons, and few are as all- encompassing as the decades of economic decline and official mismanagement that made Detroit the nation’s largest city ever to enter bankruptcy. California cities have had particular trouble with public-safety pensions, which are among the richest in the nation.
Calpers, the huge and politically powerful state-run pension system that covers Desert Hot Springs’ workers, has steadfastly maintained during California’s recent spate of municipal bankruptcies — Vallejo in 2008, San Bernardino and Stockton in 2012 — that under state law, cities cannot reduce the pensions of public employees. San Jose, the state’s third-largest city, passed a ballot initiative in 2012 that authorized it to lower city workers’ pensions, but a state judge ruled on Monday that this path, too, is illegal.
Police officers here, as in many California cities, can retire as young as 50 with 30 years of service and receive 90 percent of their final salary every year — drawing those pensions for decades. Police unions say the fault lies with state and local politicians who failed to adequately fund the pension system over the years, and inflated benefits during boom years. Others wonder whether such salaries and pensions were ever affordable, particularly in cities as small and struggling as this. In Desert Hot Springs, for example, for every dollar that the city pays its police officers, another 36 cents must be sent to Calpers to fund their pensions.
The average pay and benefits package for a police officer here had been worth $177,203 per year, in a city where the median household income was $31,356 in 2011, according to the Census Bureau. All of this had gone largely unnoticed until becoming the center of debate during the recent municipal election.
“I was in shock, like everybody else was,” said Regina Robinson of the day she learned how much some city workers were earning. She owns Just Gina’s hair salon, one of the few businesses on the downtown stretch of Palm Drive, the main street.
Mr. Adams said that California’s rich police pensions were first offered to prison guards by former Gov. Gray Davis more than a decade ago. The move set off a
105 chain reaction, with the California Highway Patrol soon clamoring for the deal, and then city police officers all over the state.
This is not Desert Hot Springs’ first experience with fiscal problems. In 2001, it went bankrupt after losing a $10 million lawsuit brought by a developer who complained that the city was thwarting his efforts to build affordable housing. The city had to borrow to pay the judgment and is still paying off that debt — a struggle for a working-class town.
A sharp increase in gang and drug crimes in the 1980s led the city to disband its police force and contract with the Riverside County sheriff for law enforcement, but that proved highly unpopular and, in 1997, the city re-established its force.
A sweep by the local police and the county sheriff in 2009 led to dozens of arrests and was credited with easing what had been a growing gang crime problem. This was followed by the hiring of a dozen more officers onto the small force and the overwhelming passage of a new utilities use tax and a public safety tax, both dedicated to the police and other public safety departments.
Now residents are wondering whether the city will be forced to disband its police force a second time.
“Nobody wants to get rid of the police force,” Mr. Betts said. “People just don’t think the county would do as good a job.”
Mr. Phillips, the police union lawyer, said the current crisis had been driven by the new majority on the City Council — including Mayor Sanchez and Mr. Betts — that was philosophically opposed to tax increases. The union’s own proposal to address the budget shortfall — by cutting the size of the force and filling in with overtime work for which the officers would defer payment for 17 months, as well as raising the local sales tax — was rejected by city officials, who said it would only delay the reckoning.
What makes Desert Hot Springs’ troubles so heartbreaking is that a potential solution lies beneath the hard-baked ground. The resort sits atop one of the world’s finest sources of mineral water: piping hot, unusually clear and free of the sulfurous odor that many springs produce.
Small spas have been a part of the landscape here for decades, and there are still 22 of them, though many are struggling and in poor repair.
One of them, however, Two Bunch Palms, became a hot destination for Hollywood celebrities and global wellness tourists until it went into foreclosure in 2010 and briefly closed. Now, a new team of Southern California investors has bought the property with hopes to revive and expand it.
Mayor Sanchez hopes that the revitalized Two Bunch Palms will help spur the growth of other businesses in the city.
106 “We must get back to marketing and promotion,” he said. “We’ve got to return a sense of pride to Desert Hot Springs.”
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