A clear path to reform

Sweeping changes urged in how policing is done in Toronto carry a familiar ring — and for good reason. Several key recommendations made public on Thursday from a special task force aiming to modernize the Toronto Police Service were also issued last year by the consulting firm KPMG.

From amalgamating police divisions to shrinking staff and expanding the role of civilians, proposals set forth in KPMG’s 64-page report represented a reliable road map for reform. Instead of immediately implementing even a few straightforward changes, the Toronto police board voted last December to create a new task force with a mission to produce yet another report by the end of this year.

The first fruit of this process, revealed in Thursday’s interim report, confirms that policing in Toronto is sorely in need of revitalization. To its credit, the task force has drafted several familiar — but nonetheless worthwhile — recommendations that, taken together, would go a long way toward building a more effective and efficient police service. Proposed changes include: Redrawing divisional boundaries with an eye to closing some police stations, starting with the amalgamation of divisions 54 and 55 in midtown Toronto.

Weaning officers away from their dependence on mobile work stations, in police cruisers, in favour of more portable “smart devices.”

A three-year freeze on promotions and new hires with a goal of reducing the police force’s uniformed strength through attrition.

Overhauling the paid duty program, which allows off-duty cops to earn extra money by performing tasks such as standing around at constructions sites to direct traffic, at almost twice their normal pay. It’s proposed that officers be eligible only for paid duty work that requires their special skills and training.

An end to the controversial TAVIS program, saturating troubled areas of the city with specialized rapid-response units. Instead of building relationships, this heavy-handed approach tends to leave communities increasingly mistrustful of police.

Having highly paid uniformed staff concentrate more heavily on serious police work instead of responding to various bylaw infractions, noise complaints and other picayune matters.

“You want your police where you need them most,” said task force co-chair Andy Pringle, who also heads the police services board. “They’re highly trained. You don’t want to dissipate that service by calls that other people can handle more effectively.”

These welcome proposals will now be subject to community consultations leading to a final set of recommendations expected by December.

Police union leader Mike McCormack wasted no time in going on the attack Thursday, especially criticizing any downsizing of uniformed staff. He even warned on CBC’s Metro Morning that “job action” may be undertaken by officers “stressed by the workload.”

That would be a gross overreaction to a set of reasonable efficiency measures designed to better protect Toronto residents at reduced cost. With the city’s policing budget now ballooning beyond $1billion, it’s essential to find savings. And with almost 90 per cent of that spending going to wages and benefits, there’s little alternative to shrinking the force.

Perhaps McCormack and fellow members of the Toronto Police Association should have taken that reality into account before wringing a series of extraordinary wage increases from a compliant police board. It’s time they understood that such largesse has consequences.

What needs to be done is ultimately no mystery. The task force is arriving at answers that others have largely proposed. What was previously lacking was the political will to carry them out. The panel’s final recommendations remain to be seen, but just as important is the question of what will actually be done by a police board that has proven all too docile in the past.

Report confirms that policing in Toronto is sorely in need of revitalization