Police Receive 5.58 Percent Budget Increase To Fight Increasing Criminal Activity
By Robert Thomas
If you were to listen to the reasoning for it Moose Jaw is set to change its moniker from the Friendly City to more of a notorious Gotham City with the criminal element freely running amuck except we don’t have Batman to come to our aid.
On Wednesday evening the special meeting of Council voted unanimously to approve the requested 5.58 percent or $565,322 increase to the Moose Jaw Police Service (MJPS) budget.
The increase will see the MJPS receiving 22.55 percent of the City’s overall operating budget or $565,322.
The impact of the increase to the MJPS accounts for a 1.61 percent increase property taxes. When added to the 3.84 percent the City needs to maintain its programs the total property tax increase is 5.45 percent.
During the Budget deliberations Council indicated the amount was reasonable given what is actually going on crime wise in Moose Jaw and the MJPS’ need for resources to carry out initiatives (which were not named) to combat it.
“As chair of the (Moose Jaw) Police Board (of Commissioners) I am happy to move this,” Councillor Dawn Luhning said, adding the request included funding for “concerns providing additional resources are for some of the things and initiatives about what has been going on in this city.”
Although she did not name the initiatives the MJPS is set to undertake the budget submission says the MJPS wants to target “serious crimes including gangs, guns and drugs.”
Additionally the area of “child exploitation and (sexual) abuse” is named in the budget document and stated as a serious Moose Jaw problem in Council’s budget discussion.
The objectives for the increased funding to the MJPS - Source MJPS 2022 Budget request
The request for funding includes expanding the MJPS by three officers and other unnamed initiatives. The additional funding request is made in a backdrop of falling reported crime rates and crime severity indexes.
Councillor Heather Eby, and former member of the Moose Jaw Board of Police Commissioners, said she saw no indications crime was down but it was actually up and changed from what crime had been like locally in the past.
“Crimes have changed in our community…I have no indication they have lessened,” Councillor Eby said in supporting the motion.
“It is an increase to our budget and we have already approved a lot of increases to our budget,” she said.
The seeming lack of support from the Province to fund additional police officers in comparison to other cities was a concern to Councillor Crystal Froese.
“We have the same issues in that we are not funded as much as they (other cities in the province) are,” Councillor Froese said, adding our proximity to Regina had their crime and criminals spilling over into Moose Jaw without the Province providing more resources.
“This is really (needs to be) noted it is a stressful situation for our police officers but they don’t have the resources,” she said in support of the request.
Councillor Froese said the City needed to look at presenting a resolution at the upcoming SUMA convention about increasing the Province’s financing of police forces especially for the problem of Internet Child Exploitation.
Board of Police Commissioner’s member and Councillor Doug Blanc said he fully supported the increased funding to the MJPS because of what was happening with crime in the city and how, despite the statistics showing otherwise, is actually heading upwards and becoming worse.
Councillor Blanc gave the percentage year over year increases of serious crimes in the community in stating he supported granting the MJPS the large increase.
The actual increases are:
53 sexual assaults Year To Date (YTD) compared to 32 incidents YTD last year
11 assaults against police YTD compared to seven (7) YTD last year
15 thefts over $5,000 YTD compared to 10 YTD last year
657 YTD of theft under $5,000 compared to 524 episodes YTD last year
27 YTD for Crystal Meth related offences YTD to seven (7) for YTD last year
496 crimes against people (assaults) YTD a drop compared to 517 episodes YTD in 2020
“The ones that are alarming is Methamphetamine (a) 285.7 percent (increase),” he said.
Councillor Blanc said he supported having the Province pay for additional officers. At the present time the Province pays for four member of the MJPS.
“I believe we are under-represented (in Province funded officers),” he said.
It needs to be noted other police forces who provide more extensive public budgets and media updates and questioning seemed to receive more funding from the Province for the number of officers and on a per capita basis as well than Moose Jaw does.
It’s a concern Mayor Clive Tolley said he would bring to the next meeting of the Board of Police Commissioners at their next meeting.
Throughout the discussion the three present Council members on the Moose Jaw Board of Police Commissioners (Councillors Blanc, Luhning, Jamey Logan) and former members (Councillor Eby) did not reveal exactly what initiatives the MJPS are undertaking.
Although it was not included in their budget release confidential sources told MJ Independent as well as provided documentation proving the MJPS had committed $100,000 on the foundation of a SWAT team - a measure which included two officers training with the Regina Police Service (RPS) SWAT team.
Our sources pointed out the toughening of the MJPS was being done behind closed doors as the same time as the MJPS was publicly stating the PACT (Police and Crisis Team) was the best area to emphasize.
PACT is where an officer is partnered with a mental health worker from the Saskatchewan Health Authority to help de-escalate situations in a less confrontational manner.
It also needs to be noted that when he received a five year contract extension in 2018 MJPS Chief Rick Bourassa stated the MJPS focused on crimes when the police became aware of them. At that time Chief Bourassa indicated the MJPS were concentrating on opiates.
In the recently released video “Stop Mething Around - A Family Affair”Inspector Devon Oleniuk said Meth’s appearance in the community pre-dated 2016.
Additionally in 2017 an MJPS spokesperson told the now defunct Moose Jaw Times-Herald there was no gang activity at that time behind Crystal Meth.
In the end Council voted unanimously to approve the MJPS budget.
EDITOR’S NOTE - As a full disclosure it was revealed in October that MJ Independent had been under investigation by the Regina Police Service (RPS) to determine who our sources were passing confidential MJPS information to us. We declined to provide the identity or identities of those sources and will continue to do so.
It was revealed the RPS was conducting the investigation at the behest of MJPS Chief of Police Rick Bourassa.
Information used in this story as well as our attempts to get additional details and ask questions about the MJPS budget came in part because of what our source(s) have provided to us. Thank you.