Downtown business rep seeks more focus on addiction, mental illness

More effort is needed to address issues like addiction and mental illness, a downtown business representative told a city council committee.

Brent Penner, executive director of Downtown Saskatoon, the downtown business improvement district (BID), addressed the planning, development and community services committee on Monday about the future of the community support officers program.

Downtown Saskatoon runs the program and Penner expressed his desire to see it continue. He added that addiction and mental illness, which were intended to be addressed by the program, need more attention.

“It’s time to act,” Penner said. “It’s time to do things better.”

Coun. Troy Davies pointed out to Penner that support for programs to address mental health and addiction does not lie within the jurisdiction of city hall.

Penner acknowledged a wider approach is needed that includes the province.

The committee gave a unanimous endorsement to continue the community support officers program until 2023. The program was introduced in 2012 and made permanent in 2015.

Community support officers wear uniforms and patrol the three core BIDS: downtown, Broadway and Riversdale. They help address some issues related to mental health and addiction that might otherwise be handled by police. They also issue some bylaw infraction tickets.

Penner said the five-day-a-week program will probably need to be expanded sometime soon.

“The issues that they deal with do not go away on Sunday and Monday,” Penner said.

Elisabeth Miller, a senior planner with the City of Saskatoon, said discussions are happening about expanding the hours and days the program operates.

The proposed budget for the program next year is nearly $478,000.

Once considered controversial due to questions about its effectiveness and struggles with how to measure success, the program now seems to be widely accepted and embraced.

Saskatoon police Chief Troy Cooper wrote a letter of support for the program, saying it has helped free up police officers’ time so they can deal with more serious matters.

Cooper pointed out the community support officers have been issued police radios with a global positioning system to help them function more efficiently and safely.

Of the business owners who responded to a city-commissioned survey, 88 per cent said they want the program to continue, a city report says.

Community support officers were involved in 52 police dispatch cases in 2012. That jumped to 1,132 cases last year and 718 cases up to August of this year. Community support officers responded to 78 per cent of last year’s 1,132 calls without police support.

Calls included drunkenness, disturbances and panhandling.