Hamilton Police Board Wants More Savings, Surly Hamiltonian Says Cut the Mounted Unit

Good for the Hamilton Police Board for asking the Hamilton Police to go back and look for savings. The Spec has the story here. Noteworthy numbers:

"The board voted — five for, one against — Monday to table it after a one-hour discussion about the $158-million budget, which is approximately $4.3 million more than in 2014 and represents a 2.95 per cent increase. The portion council is being asked to allocate is about $148.9 million because the police expect to raise more than $9 million through provincial grants and fees."

I would be curious to know how the council portion has changed from year to year.

The fact that a 2.95% is considered low considering how much the police budget go up over the years is pretty sad. For suggestions on what to cut, I would consider the mounted unit which I believe costs around $600K per year. Probably more important is finding any work that can be done by civilians (which are way cheaper than uniformed employees) that is being done by uniformed employees.

Lloyd Ferguson's Temporary Police Services Board Unlawful According to the Province

A bit strange that apparently the province has ruled that councilor Lloyd Ferguson can't replaced the suspended Terry Whitehead on the Hamilton Police Services Board.

I'm guessing a solution would be for Whitehead to resign and open up the spot for Ferguson. That may stop the proceedings, which could be good for Whitehead but he probably wants to remain on the board. It really does seem like the inmates are running the asylum at the police services board and giving a lot of support to chief Glenn De Caire.

I'm guessing at this point that council would prefer to not to reappoint De Caire to another term, but that's the police services board decision. If De Caire were not to be appointed to another term I would have to think another city would think twice about having as their chief someone who has been so defiant towards council, so the stakes are high for De Caire.

Hamilton Police Chief Reduces Budget Request

Here's a Spec column from Andrew Dreschel with some news on the 2013 Hamilton Police budget:

"Police Chief Glenn De Caire has lowered his controversial budget request.
Instead of asking for a 5.25 per cent increase for 2013, the chief has cut it to 4.75 per cent.
That drops his total hike to $6.4 million, down about $679,000 from his original $7.1-million request.
The vast bulk of the decrease comes from phasing in the hiring of 20 new officers to spread the financial impact between 2013 and 2014."

I continue to question why these new hires are needed with decreasing crime rates in Hamilton, at least partially due to aging demographics. Especially how expensive pay, benefits and pensions are for regular constables.

I also question the $600K horse unit and it looks like councilor Terry Whitehead does too:

"Whitehead thinks a better solution is for the chief to scrutinize some operational decisions, including the effectiveness of the action teams and horse unit."

Here's an interesting post on the blog Marginal Revolution suggesting doubling the number of police officers in the US. I'm not sure the arguments apply to Canada.