Council mulls boosting RCMP budget

Prince George police will have to wait at least another week to find out if they will have additional boots on the ground next year.

RCMP Supt. Warren Brown made his case Wednesday in front of city council during the first 2016 budget meeting Wednesday.

The detachment is asking for funding to bring on seven additional officers over the next three years, beginning with three new faces in 2016.

As it's been for the past decade, the contracted amount of local RCMP members is 128, while the city has budgeted for 121 since 2009.

The only time the detachment has met the budgeted amount of members was in 2010.

Last year, the detachment asked for and received an on-paper increase to the contract amount from 128 to 135 in an attempt to provide enough so-called hard vacancies (actual empty positions, as opposed to positions vacated due to parental leave or injury, or soft vacancies) to fill those 121 spots.

The RCMP is asking for 143 contracted spots by 2018. Bringing on three members next year would add $481,369 to their existing budget.

It wasn't a decision council members were eager to jump on and they approved the RCMP budget as presented without any additional service enhancements.

"Once an increase is made, it's never going to go back," said Coun. Terri McConnachie.

Coun. Jillian Merrick noted that even maintaining the police services at the status quo required a nearly $840,000 increase over last year's budget.

Brown, who joined the local RCMP in December following the departure of Supt. Eric Stubbs, praised the work of his predecessors for planting seeds for programs that are working today.

"But I reference that because we are continually, excessively high in crime here and it seems that the perception of crime in our city is acceptable and I'm not willing to tolerate that," Brown said.

"And I do think with some effort we can start to drive our crime rate down and not be the leader in B.C. for population for crime rate."

Brown presented statistics for criminal code offences for Prince George and four comparison cities (Kamloops, Kelowna, Chilliwack and Nanaimo) between 2009 and 2013.

While the crime rate has gone down by 14 per cent in Prince George, it still has the highest crime rate per 1,000 people (140) out of the five municipalities.

He also drew comparisons for the amount of people in custody annually; Surrey imprisons 7,000 people per year, while Prince George - with a much smaller population and police force - houses 4,500 per year.

"I provided that to you... because it demonstrates the high crime rate, the high risks that we face and just the care and attention around some of the folks that are vulnerable," said Brown.

But addressing some of the vulnerable areas, such as the Car 60 initiative for mental health support and the domestic violence unit, takes attention away from every day policing and leaves those on staff running ragged, said Brown.

He said overtime costs are rising and there's thousands of hours owed to members that they don't have the time to take off.

Mayor Lyn Hall urged his council colleagues to take another look at Brown's request.

"What we're paying in overtime might cover off the increase in three staff," Hall said.

Council eventually agreed to discuss the issue further at the Dec. 2 meeting, following further information from finance director Kris Dalio as to the exact impact on the budget.

Figures Dalio had on hand indicated that the three-member addition would be a 0.54 per cent increase to the tax levy. Brown's other request to hire a second municipal staff member to lighten the data processing load would be a 0.008 per cent increase.