Oxford, N.S. is taking on a review of its policing services, just as the Municipality of Cumberland launches a similar review.
For Oxford Mayor Greg Henley, the reason for the review is simple.
“It’s sheer cost. It’s not really a knock against the local detachment. It’s the cost,” Henley said, explaining that roughly 40 per cent of the town’s residential tax revenue is spent on policing.
Oxford is an inland rural town of just over a thousand people, located right off the Trans-Canada highway in northwestern Nova Scotia.
The town has its own government separate from the Municipality of Cumberland, which surrounds it geographically. It is the world’s largest producer of frozen wild blueberries and is home to Oxford Frozen Foods, a major employer in the region. The large processing plant stands out among the small homes and other businesses on Main Street.
While it once had its own municipal police department, the town currently contracts the RCMP for policing, as is common in small rural communities throughout Nova Scotia. Only 10 municipalities in the province have their own police departments.
While Oxford has a regional RCMP detachment in town, the mayor said officers are often swapped between branches across Cumberland County — a large, sparsely populated region of the province. It is situated next to Colchester County, where the April 2020 mass shooting began.
Oxford pays for roughly three RCMP officers to cover their community at an annual cost of $560,000. The cost factors out to just over $400 per resident, which Henley says is more than what residents of Halifax pay, noting that the low crime rate “makes it a lot safer in Oxford” than Halifax.
“The biggest issue is they’re unable to supply the coverage that we’re paying for due to the fact that they’re short-staffed. I don’t blame the officers around here,” Henley said.
The Municipality of Cumberland is conducting its own review of policing and council has agreed to issue a request for proposals for police services.
“If (Cumberland) decides to pull away from the RCMP… that will affect our decision,” Henley said.
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The town’s mayor said Oxford council had originally started a policing review about four years ago, but debate recently ramped up again last fall.
“I think it’s been an ongoing process,” Henley said. “And finally, it got to the point where all of a sudden we’ve got retroactive pay for the RCMP… We’re tapped out.”
The review is just a way of “opening doors and seeing what’s behind it,” Henley said, noting that the process will take several years. Options that could come out of the town’s review include remaining with an RCMP contract, combining police forces with a nearby town, or creating a new municipal police force.
The nearby towns with existing independent police forces are Amherst and Truro, but they are roughly 30 and 60-minute drives away, respectively. The neighbouring small town of Springhill disbanded its municipal police force when it joined the Municipality of Cumberland in 2015 and has since been under RCMP policing.
If Oxford were to consider its own force, Henley said the town would have to consider the costs of a jail and patrol vehicles, neither of which the town currently has.
Henley said he is just trying to work out a better deal for the town.
The cost of policing is “just not working for small communities,” he said.
Local opinions on RCMP policing in Oxford are mixed.
Eric Mosher runs GJDE Enterprises, a gift store in town. The shop is one of the few remaining small businesses downtown — a lively splash of colour among nearby vacant storefronts.
Mosher heard about the policing review from his customers but said he is happy with the RCMP in town and that they have been helpful the few times he has needed to call over the years.
“I think a lot of time, if it isn’t broken, don’t fix it. My store is kind of a nostalgic store, and that’s how I feel. Change isn’t necessarily a good thing for the sake of change,” Mosher said.
Down Main Street towards the edge of town, Rosemarie Spencer was walking to work along the empty, crumbling sidewalk as heavy car and truck traffic rushed by. She has lived in Oxford for about a year and a half, immigrating from Jamaica for work.
“I want the RCMP to stay because definitely, I feel very safe here,” Spencer said, noting that she had seen three RCMP cars pass by on her walk.
She hasn’t heard of any major crimes and said the town feels peaceful.
“I’ve lived somewhere else in Canada and I’ve never seen so much police around, so for me it’s a good thing seeing them.”
Not all residents are happy with the RCMP’s service, however. Fran Trenholm has been in town for almost 30 years and said organizations can become too complacent. She wants residents to have a vote on policing options in Oxford.
“My biggest issue with the RCMP is that they are supposed to be in service to us to make our community safe. And I don’t feel safe and a lot of people that I know around here don’t feel safe either.”
Trenholm said that while relations with the RCMP have been “going downhill” for some time, some of her distrust comes from the police response to the 2020 mass casualty event.
“There’s just been so much go down with the RCMP and the public that it’s just not a very conducive relationship any longer. And I think we need change.”
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