City council approves police modernization report
Windsor city council approved the Association of Municipalities of Ontario's (AMO) Policing Modernization Report Tuesday evening.
The matter had previously been held over so that Al Frederick, the chief of police for the Windsor Police Service, could attend. He did attend Tuesday night and answered several questions from councillors, most relating to the rising salaries of police officers in recent years.
While Frederick did approve of the report, he was very pessimistic that anything would change, even going as far as holding up a previous, very similar report from a few years ago.
Ballooning salaries
He expressed concerns, echoed by many on council, that their hands are essentially tied when it comes to salaries. Frederick, along with several of the councillors, urged the province to step in to help curb soaring salaries, not only for police, but other public-sector jobs, such as emergency services.
Due to arbitration, generally what one community pays their police has ended up being very similar across the province. And there's not much police chiefs at the city level can do about it. Instead, Frederick says he has been trying to control costs by shrinking the number of staff, primarily through attrition in recent years.
The president of the Windsor Police Association declined to comment Tuesday afternoon before the council meeting, opting to defer commenting pending the outcome of the report.
The report touches on several issues, including ballooning salaries for police officers. Frederick said police salaries make up 90 per cent of his budget, and if other costs like gas for police cars is added in, it's closer to 96 per cent.
Officers in Ontario are well compensated for their work, notes the AMO report. For example, the estimated provincial average salary rate for an Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) constable in 2014 was $94,702, according to the report. That's before overtime, vacation and statutory holidays, shift premiums and benefits, which combined brought the estimated cost of an OPP constable to $130,542 in 2014. In comparison, on the other side of the river in Detroit, the maximum salary for a police officer was $51,748 US last year. While the report notes that rate is very low, the report also makes sure to note that Ontario officers are "well paid" by Canadian and North American standards.
While Frederick acknowledged most of his officers make around $90,000, he commended them for their work and said citizens get what they pay for.
"Our officers are well paid, but they deserve every nickel of it," he said outside chambers after the report was approved by council.
Crime is dropping, but costs are rising
Many have questioned, in Windsor and across the country, why if crime is dropping the costs of fighting crime are rising so dramatically.
One of the reasons is due to the fact that 20 per cent of Windsor's police time is spent on actual criminal matters, while the remaining 80 per cent is spent on dealing with calls relating to social issues, such as mental health issues, pointed out the police chief.
After the council meeting Tuesday night, Frederick spoke with reporters and said that while he agreed with many points in the report, his force has long been implementing some of the recommendations, such as 'civilianization' of the police force.
"I think that's a recommendation we've been really doing for 50 years," he said outside of city council chambers. "Can we look look for other places to civilianize? Yes, but I think that it's getting lean — that idea is not new anymore."
Instead, one of the key ways he has reduced costs is by reducing the number of sworn officers on the Windsor force by eight per cent, which amounts to about 40 officers over the past four years. The majority of those positions were in middle management and the reduction was achieved through attrition and retirements, he said.
Frederick sees the way most likely way forward to control costs will be through further regionalization, not further civilianization. When asked if increased regionalization would mean further job cuts within the Windsor Police Service he said: "Not planned. No."
