Nearly $4 million in assessment growth funding is being sought by London, Ont. police to cover the hiring of 24 new full-time equivalent members as the force looks to keep up with the city’s growing population and a higher number of daily calls for service.
Members of the city’s Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee (SPPC), which includes all members of city council, will discuss the request at their meeting on Tuesday, along with several other business cases for funding.
Assessment growth refers to the additional property taxes collected by the municipality from new and/or expanded homes and businesses. City hall has $14.1 million in available assessment growth funding, of which $12.7 million is 2023 assessment growth, and $1.33 million is left over from 2022.
City staff have allocated roughly $11.9 million of the $14.1 million pot to go toward 20 business cases, of which London police’s is the largest at $3.95 million. Nearly all of it has been earmarked for the hiring of 24 new full-time-equivalent positions, including 20 officers and four civilian staff.
The new hires will help close a front-line staffing gap at a time when the city’s population is expected to grow from 422,324, as recorded in the 2021 census, to 429,700 by the end of this year, police say in their business case. Population projections that went before council late last year projected the city would further hit 481,700 by 2026, and 554,500 by 2036.
Police brass have reported officers dealing with a significant increase in calls for service from the community in recent years that have been more complex and more volatile.
Last spring, outgoing police chief Steve Williams pressed police board members to approve the hiring of 52 new front-line officers, citing a 72 per cent increase in emergency calls over the previous year, and the resulting redeployment of various front-line duty members, including from COR, the Community Oriented Response Unit.
Williams noted that public complaints about response times had risen nearly 300 per cent since 2019, and that roughly 3,100 occasions had been recorded in 2021 in which front-line officers worked 10 to 12-plus hour shifts with no relief periods.
The police board later endorsed the recommendation. The assessment growth funding request going before councillors next week is a component of that overall 52 hire plan, which will be spread out over three years, said Deputy Chief Trish McIntyre.
The plan is for 17 new members to be brought on this year, with 17 or 18 each in 2024 and 2025.
“There’s a definite need to add resources to the London Police Service. We are short-staffed. We can see this reflected in our call times. Our response times, especially for non-emergency issues, has gone way up. Our complaints from the public on poor service times has gone way up,” she said.
“It’s a significant ask, but there’s a significant need in the city to be able to do the work that we do with a reasonable amount of time and of course, keep the citizens of London safe.”
Speaking with Global News on Friday, London Mayor Josh Morgan said he was supportive of the police business case.
“I’m supportive of this because it is part of a larger plan to address issues, it’s not just an outright request for officers, but part of a thoughtful and detailed plan, and this is the first segment of the asks of that plan,” said Morgan, who is also chair of the SPPC.
“We have certainly seen in our city both an increase in the population as well as an increase in crime severity. This is a challenge that I hear very often from Londoners, that they’re unsatisfied with the level of service that they’re getting, the response times.”
According to the business case, the assessment growth funding would see 17 new front-line officers hired, including 15 constables and two sergeants, in a bid to shrink what police say has been a growing gap between the number of police officers relative to the population.
Police say London’s officer-to-population ratio is 145 officers per 100,000 people, compared to the provincial average of 181 to 100,000. That gap, they add, is exacerbated by a roughly 30 per cent jump in violent offences from 2020 to 2021, which hinders their ability to deal with non-violent crimes in a timely manner.
According to Statistics Canada, London’s crime severity index was 80.09 in 2021, the third-highest in Ontario.
“We’re still seeing that high, high volatility. The complexity of those investigations remains high, so it takes us longer to be able to service those types of calls. And then our calls are triaged, so our response time remains poor on non-emergency calls,” McIntyre said.
“We know that our response times have risen dramatically in the last three years, particularly for those non-emergency call Code 2, Code 3 calls… so when our officers do arrive, although it’s often late and not in a timely manner for the complainant, they’re met with enormous frustration at the door. And rightfully so.”
The city’s property crime rate stands at 4,346 per 100,000 residents, 86 per cent higher than the provincial average, according to police.
McIntyre says officers attending non-emergency matters often spend the first several minutes de-escalating and speaking with residents about their late arrival.
“It’s so frustrating for our members, because at the end of the day, they just want to go and serve the community, they want to be responsive,” she said.
“They feel that psychological pressure of checking on at the start of their shift and seeing all of these calls waiting to be serviced in the queue. We’ve seen our queue at enormous levels, and it’s almost like you’re asking our officers to move the sand from the beach… they’re like, where do I start?”
The 15 constables will address demand and allow police to repopulate the redeployed COR Unit, while the two patrol sergeants will “allow for a proper supervision ratio, ensure effective oversight, and further mitigate risk in frontline service delivery,” police say.
The assessment growth funding will also allow for the hiring of one constable in the Academic Training Unit, one constable in the Practical Skills Unit, one human resources specialist, two maintenance technicians, and two part-time communications operators, police say.
One new detective constable will also be hired in the Sexual Assault and Child Abuse Section, the business case says.
Roughly $550,600 in one-time capital funding is also being sought for the acquisition of five new police vehicles, new equipment, such as computers, tablets, and body armour, and space renovations at police headquarters to accommodate the new hires.
Other business cases going before councillors on Thursday include roughly $833,000 for the construction of a new fire station in southeast London, $627,000 for a new aerial firefighting apparatus to combat more high-rise fires as the city grows upward, and $601,000 to expand garbage, leaf and yard waste collection to newly-constructed homes.
— with files from Amy Simon
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