How should police change?
Almost every time I engage in a discussion on the topic of defunding the police with anyone, no matter their colour, I end up spending most of the time explaining that defunding the police does not mean taking away all of their money and making all of us unsafe. I much prefer rethinking policing. The term “the police” refers to individuals.
The term “policing” refers to a process.
If we rethink policing, we would ask, “What are all the things the police do?”
We would then ask, “What part of society could best deal with each particular aspect?”
We would then, likely, find that much of what the police are responsible for would be more efficiently served by other parts of society.
Rethinking policing would likely result in a refashioning of our social order so that more emphasis and funding is placed on preventative action, not on punitive police action.
Criminalizing people suffering from social discrimination is not an appropriate solution; removing discrimination from all parts of society is. Elka Enola, Oakville
Re Police chiefs now face an uphill battle, June 7 Let’s start now! Let’s stop calling them police; let’s start calling them peace officers, instead.
Let’s change police colleges to peace studies.
Let’s expand peace studies to include mental health intervention and community involvement.
Let’s get rid of all the old police unions, draw up new model of collective agreements and require all peace officers and the mental health intervenors and community development officers who work together to become members of the same new peace officers’ union.
Let’s change the Police Services Act to the Peace Services Act.
Let’s demilitarize them: let’s take away their riot gear and deadly weapons.
Let’s avoid the possibility of using deadly force.
Let’s take away arrest quotas and promote peace initiatives.
Let’s never send only peace officers to respond to domestic disturbance calls; they must always be teamed with mental health workers and their highest priority must always be de-escalation.
Let’s give all peace officers body cameras and sound recording equipment, and make it an offence not to avoid using them or to tamper with them.
Let’s cut their budgets by 30 per cent and reallocate the money to areas where the money will be put to better use. Let’s buy more bicycles and fewer squad cars.
Let’s hire many more civilians for the peace service and greatly strengthen civilian, not political, oversight; let’s get rid of professional police chiefs — municipal, provincial and federal — and the paramilitary structures that have inspired the bullies in these forces.
It’s time for a clean sweep. Dirk Jol, Port Perry, Ont.
Years ago, Toronto police officers wore pastel blue shirts and their cars were a bright yellow, with the insignia “To Serve and Protect” on the side. The officers appeared approachable and the cars were easy to spot when help was required. Today … we have men and women in black. Many, overweight, with bulging muscles, can look quite menacing. In a group, they look somewhat like stormtroopers. Today’s police vehicles look like stealth cars and are hard to locate in an emergency.
I guess these are reasons why some people perceive today’s officers as the enemy, rather than ones wanting to serve and protect, which I believe most of our officers want to do. Unfortunately, bad apples do exist. Michael Forster, Toronto
Re Canada’s got a racism problem that is uniquely ours, Cohn, June 6
Martin Regg Cohn’s column highlights the original structural racism issue in Canada in its title, but, then, only obliquely speaks of it.
I was expecting that he would focus on the treatment of Indigenous peoples from the very beginning of our country and continuing in the present
It is not “uniquely ours.” Rather it reflects the values and methods of colonizing regimes everywhere: These people are below us. We want their land, their resources. We will dominate them, work to eradicate them if possible. This is our “original sin.” In a second story, Minister of Indigenous Services Marc Miller is quoted as saying he was “pissed and outraged” by violence against Indigenous people.
I applaud his reactions, but feel
“pissed and outraged” that Indigenous people are served by a man not of their race and background.
Is this the best the government can do? Brenda Doyle, Toronto
Peel police begin process of implementing body cameras, June 6
I question the use of body cameras when all an officer needs to do is turn it off.
I question the use of body cameras when it is the person wearing the camera who needs to be educated, and those not capable of being educated should be dismissed from the force.
I question that the citizens of cities whose biggest budget is usually the police force should be asked to finance the cost of cameras on top of the monies presently spent on policing services.
Surely better recruitment of police officers would be a wiser path for cities to follow. Bonnie Bacvar, Toronto
Re Demands for reform bring scrutiny to police budget, June 5
Toronto’s recovery from COVID-19 requires transformational change that puts the basic needs of people first.
I agree with Anthony Morgan, a racial justice lawyer, when he states, “there is an alarming disparity between funding of social well-being services and policing.”
As he points out, “police services have dramatically outstripped the rate at which we fund parks and recreation, social support and housing, shelters, employee benefits, arts and culture.”
Our priorities have to change so that, as Morgan states, they reflect “reinvestment for neglected people” in ”neglected communities.”
Socio-economic inequalities are unjust.
Shree Paradkar, a columnist for the Star, states: “Racial justice is about righting wrongs.” Shari Baker, Toronto
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