Police board discusses draft business plan
City police are unrivalled when it comes to community partnerships, a consultant developing a business plan for the city police services board told its members Tuesday afternoon.
Mike Mitchell, contracted along with Moe Hodgson, provided a report on the first draft of the 201719 plan to the board, which then spent more than two hours discussing and offering input for the precursory blueprint.
Mitchell, who has completed plans for dozens of forces across the province, said the work the city police department does daily with local organizations is “unequalled.” The consultants spend about three weeks gathering input for the plan from inside and outside the service.
“We were astounded, really, we we got in here and started dealing with them,” he said, attributing that as a reason why the service has a high clearance rate when it comes to solving crime – points he and others agreed should be included in the plan.
Workload and succession planning are the two greatest areas of concern, Mitchell said.
He wrote about the current “inability” of each platoon to handle how much work they are getting, noting “to be effective ... something has got to give there.”
Mitchell recommended looking at ways to direct some of the workload to other agencies. For example, he pointed out that officers are not getting to noise complaints with any expediency. “Maybe there is another option that would be more effective in the long run.”
As for human resources, Mitchell said it is clear that there will be much transition in the service over the next three years and suggested more work will have to be done when it comes to crafting career development plans and preparing for promotions.
The purpose of Tuesday’s meeting, with an earlier start time, was to allow board members to discuss the general direction of the preliminary document and provide input, board and steering committee member Ken East explained.
Board chairman Bob Hall noted the plan is still a “living document” and that all members would have ample opportunity to voice their opinion.
Toronto lawyer Mark Sandler, who was appointed late last year by the Ontario Civilian Police Commission to temporarily administer the board, called the draft plan a “good document to begin with,” before describing the areas he would like to see it cover.
He agreed with suggested categories including technology, adequacy of facility, succession planning, governance and workload.
Sandler, who also said he didn’t think the wording was positive enough, added the fact that the service has one of the highest crime clearance rates in the province should be acknowledged up front.
The most difficult issue the board will have to deal with – what he called the elephant in the room – will be the force’s high officer-to-civilian employee ratio, he said.
The “view out there” is that the budget is going up and the service is not using its resources effectively enough – something Sandler said he has seen “no evidence of.”
Hall called the plan a “great working document” that is part of a health, transparent process.
His suggestions included refining its focus – by not getting too much into police operations for example, not identifying specific positions in it because of uncertain budget implications and paring down the “prose” so so the plan is less than its current 15 pages.
The last business plan was longer than those produced by the 12 largest police forces in Ontario, including Toronto and OPP, Hall told the board.
“Sometimes I think less is more. Let the board zero in on specific issues.”
He also suggested adding a “financial accountability” category to identify the concerns of funders, to show the board is aware and efficient with taxpayers’ money.
After more discussion, the categories were changed to community wellness, organization wellness (with workload and succession as sub-categories), infrastructure and technology (with information technology and facilities as sub-categories), governance and future of policing.
Board member Coun. Dan McWilliams asked if there was any kind of trends when it comes to noise complaints – an issue he has voiced frustration with police having to deal with in the past. He wanted to know if they come at any particular times or areas.
Police Chief Murray Rodd said they spike in the fall when students return to local campuses, but that officers work hard with programs to promote being good neighbours. “It does happen on any street in the city and at any time of the week.”
When the city used bylaw officers to respond to noise complaints, “it created more havoc for us,” Deputy Chief Tim Farquharson added. “We’ve tried everything ... we end up having to go. The last resort comes down to us.”
Mitchell expects to have a second draft of the plan to board members by early next week, with a third draft to be put before the group at its next meeting April 26 at 5 p.m. The final plan must be completed by May 1, the board heard.