Western Standard - Kevin Halwa of the National Police Federation on Alberta provincial police service

00:00:00.000 there's been a concept um brought forward by the provincial government uh the county government

00:00:04.880 specifically uh to look at uh provincial policing uh alberta provincial policing service for the

00:00:11.200 province alberta um there was um and that came as a result of the fair deal panel uh who uh did some

00:00:17.760 surveys and talked with some albertans and then uh pricewaterhouse cooper uh report that that was

00:00:22.880 created by pricewaterhouse cooper for the for the provincial government um unfortunately that um

00:00:30.320 neither the fair deal panel report or the pricewaterhouse cooper report um really effectively

00:00:35.680 addressed the primary concerns that um alberton has brought forward

00:00:42.720 okay um yeah well some of the concerns and i i saw that in in what you're talking with your call

00:00:46.960 to action for example and i know that is somebody living outside of the city uh was was what we feel

00:00:52.160 to be inadequate police coverage in rural areas and response times and uh you know with a proposed

00:00:57.680 police provincial force i guess there wasn't anything necessarily saying that it would a

00:01:00.800 provincial one would be any better in that circumstance the the problem is a little deeper

00:01:04.080 than that no you're absolutely right the um the problem is much deeper than that um the pricewater

00:01:10.080 host cooper report actually basically suggests to duplicate what's already in place um um you know

00:01:17.600 as far as the number of detachments and that sort of thing uh however model a of the proposed uh plan

00:01:24.000 actually calls for about half the number of fully trained police officers so how how half the number

00:01:28.400 of fully trained police officers remotely could address uh things like uh response times is beyond me

00:01:35.360 uh when we're talking to think about things like response times obviously we are also in the same

00:01:40.400 breath talking about um the number of police resources to begin with to go to those rural areas

00:01:45.680 um and that is the number the so the size of the the the force um right now under the provincial

00:01:52.160 policing services agreement again that's the contract uh that the alberta government has with

00:01:56.240 the government of canada to provide policing for services for the province the number of those

00:02:02.320 police resources to respond to those calls and in the in the the far reaches of the province

00:02:07.680 that's controlled completely and 100 by the provincial government it is the provincial minister that

00:02:13.120 decides what the what the makeup of the force is and under the contract if the provincial minister

00:02:18.880 wants to increase those numbers he can do so by filling out a form and and uh and um advising

00:02:25.280 the commanding officer of the rcmp in alberta that wants to increase the the um the numbers of police

00:02:31.200 officers let's say by 200 uh members whatever it is uh decide where those places want to be and then

00:02:36.240 by the contract the government has the canadian government that is has uh 12 months to provide those

00:02:41.040 resources um so if we want to resource uh or increase resources i should say into those rural areas

00:02:48.240 that can easily be done but it's one of those things that um unfortunately the rcmp seems to

00:02:52.880 um uh take the brunt of uh as far as um slow response times when there is slow response times and

00:02:59.520 i i don't agree that there always is slow response times uh as far you know further you live away from the

00:03:04.320 the the pizza place the longer it takes you to get your pizza as well let's see you know it's

00:03:07.600 not not that much different than with policing um but those number of resources those are completely

00:03:13.920 under the purview of provincial government and not the rcmp yeah so i mean going beyond and we'll go

00:03:19.360 into the costs a little bit too because that was some of the stuff in the reports and the transition

00:03:22.640 and things like that but a lot of the motivation uh for people pushing for provincial forces is a

00:03:27.920 feeling that and and we've seen sort of a recent example possibly coming up with the news of

00:03:32.080 direct federal interference in rcmp operations and and uh you know the politicization of the force

00:03:38.240 and i mean hey i guess there's no guarantee that provincial force would be immune to such things as

00:03:42.880 well but that is a serious concern for a lot of people on the ground and they sometimes feel that

00:03:47.200 the rcmp might be representing ottawa more than local interests uh how would people be more comforted

00:03:52.480 in that front well you know it's another great question and i'm glad you brought it up because it's

00:03:56.880 that's another comment that's often made by the provincial government and uh let's be clear it

00:04:01.680 is just not true it is not factual at all article 6 of the provincial policing agreement um that

00:04:07.360 clearly states that the provincial policing report uh the provincial policing priorities come from the

00:04:13.040 provincial minister period full stop that's where the priorities come from uh ottawa looks after under

00:04:19.040 the provincial policing agreement ottawa looks after some of the administrative uh type portions of it but

00:04:23.440 as far as the boots on the ground stuff the stuff that uh affects everyday albertans that that comes

00:04:28.400 from the provincial minister and nobody else um any any thought that um it there is influence from ottawa

00:04:35.920 as far as what is important and what is uh being uh enforced and what is being investigated in the

00:04:41.280 province is simply not true okay and then uh so as i said i live rurally though just outside of calgary but

00:04:48.960 it's just a matter of jurisdiction it's kind of frustrating the average police response time in my area

00:04:52.960 is 40 minutes even though i'm 10 minutes from the city but that's because turner valley is our

00:04:56.320 detachment they only have so many officers i understand that they got a lot of area to cover

00:05:00.480 yes yes foothouse county is very large yeah i got robbed a couple of times with the pub i owned and

00:05:06.480 and uh i got a lot of interaction with our local rcmp over the course of that crime wave uh they're

00:05:12.240 very good officers and and uh i was satisfied with it but things i did notice over that period of time

00:05:17.120 was for one almost none of them were from the area originally like that's one of the things with the

00:05:20.720 federal force we get people transferred in from outside areas it's just the nature of it uh but

00:05:25.760 does that potentially cause a bit of a hindrance in i guess uh you know interaction or or knowing about

00:05:31.280 the local issues things such as that going on you know whereas a homegrown officer might not have that

00:05:36.000 difficulty well you know that's a fair comment um uh you know as as you're well aware our rcmp draws

00:05:43.120 resources and applicants from across the country and across the globe really um but that is not any

00:05:48.080 different than any other municipal police force in the province or in north america uh both edmonton

00:05:53.360 and calgary who i always used to compare because they are the largest municipal uh forces in the

00:05:58.480 province um they not only draw from other parts of the country but across the globe they both have

00:06:04.000 a very large uh foreign recruitment uh program where they will go place across to places like the

00:06:09.040 london met and scotland yard and those sort of places recruit uh trained police officers and bring

00:06:14.080 them back to calgary and edmonton to serve that is not unusual um it's the same thing uh you know opp

00:06:20.560 and quebec uh those sort of places provincial police forces they draw from resources from other places

00:06:26.960 of the province no question about it um the but you also bring up a very good point and i think it would

00:06:32.720 um i think to reasonably expect um a young member to join uh police service and do it do his his or her

00:06:42.240 uh complete uh service in a very small community in the province was not only um not beneficial to that

00:06:50.320 community but also not beneficial to the member uh that you know there becomes uh it's for example

00:06:55.840 if you need to get better at um um or you want to develop a aspect of first nations policing and

00:07:03.040 develop that repertoire of your skill sets um they're not all places in the province are you able to do

00:07:08.640 that just because there is not that community to work with uh if you want to develop your skills as

00:07:13.440 a inland water transport operator well you can't do that in many places in alberta a lot of places in

00:07:19.520 alberta um change is good uh change a change develops people and as a result those new people

00:07:26.000 that come in they also have new skill sets to bring to those communities there also becomes the issue of

00:07:30.880 um you know do we really want the same person policing the community for 25 30 years that's works

00:07:37.680 fantastic when uh when all the stars align but i'll tell you that's that's very often not the case

00:07:44.240 um and not only does it become uh miserable uh for the community uh to be stuck with a police officer

00:07:50.480 that does not jive well in the community uh but also it becomes very uh frustrating for the police

00:07:55.200 officer that's uh not happy there as well and it's just bad for everybody sometimes change is good

00:07:59.600 change is good and that develops skill sets and brings in a new uh new um a new fresh set of eyes

00:08:05.760 if i can use that term okay so in jurisdictions where there already are you know provincial forces

00:08:10.720 as you mentioned with quebec and ontario there still is an rcmp presence though and they still

00:08:14.800 take part in those provinces right yeah and from a federal standpoint so uh federal policing uh they

00:08:20.720 would uh but as far as provincial mandates uh yeah not they they wouldn't be doing any of that sort of

00:08:26.160 stuff so the so the um the bulk of what uh every an everyday person would see um yeah you wouldn't

00:08:34.720 see that from the rcmp it's fed the arts the federal members in the rcmp working on larger federal uh

00:08:40.640 projects um international terrorism uh board integrity that sort of thing uh they're not the

00:08:45.040 members that are going out and you know investigating you're breaking and your robbery to your to your pub

00:08:49.200 uh that you mentioned yeah okay so with the costs uh you know in that that study that came out uh

00:08:55.040 seeing uh that the transition costs could total about 366 million over or six years and such but uh

00:09:03.120 would that still i mean to be a sunk cost initially and and uh conceivably re you know right i guess ironed

00:09:09.200 out over the time well that's uh let's we need we need to be clear this so the 366 million dollars that's

00:09:15.200 the estimated transition costs for model a which is the cheaper the cheaper the two models are

00:09:20.320 proposed that's if it's on time and if it's on budget um to not to belabor the point with surrey

00:09:26.160 police service for example but surrey police service originally estimated their transition

00:09:30.000 costs or one-time transition costs at 19 million dollars they have ballooned to well over 85 million

00:09:34.560 dollars uh for those of your listeners that are good at math that's you know a little over 400

00:09:39.040 overrun uh so if we're even remotely as close to uh being as accurate on um the provincial

00:09:44.880 policing transition you could easily see that number be over a billion dollars uh make some

00:09:49.440 more comparisons you know city of surrey we're talking about uh population of about a half

00:09:53.360 million people give or take a little bit as opposed to 4.4 million people in alberta uh one location as

00:09:58.720 opposed to 117 locations you can quickly see how transition the entire province would be much more

00:10:03.920 complicated and as a result i would suggest that even easier to be uh cost overrun but that's that 366

00:10:10.880 million dollars in model a and again that's the model that called for about half the number of

00:10:14.880 fully trained police officers um that's just the one-time transition cost we also have to include

00:10:20.160 or consider the um the federal subsidy or the federal portion that is paid for the um provincial

00:10:27.200 policing services which currently right now is 30 percent so under the provincial policing services

00:10:32.560 agreement despite whatever the number that 30 works out to the federal government agrees to pay

00:10:37.920 year after year after year 30 of that provincial policing costs if any of your uh listeners have

00:10:44.000 had the opportunity to travel some of the highways in alberta over the last year or so you may have

00:10:47.760 seen some of our billboards that said 165 million dollar reasons 165 million reasons to keep the rcmp

00:10:53.760 well in full fairness when we had those billboards commissioned we underestimated the cost um thankfully

00:11:00.160 to the benefit of price water cooper they've crunched the numbers a little better we've since confirmed

00:11:04.320 those numbers and if we were to do those little billboards again now they would say 185 million

00:11:09.200 dollar reasons to 185 million reasons sorry to keep the rcmp and that's where that 30 comes from in 2021

00:11:17.360 uh the 30 subsidy worked out to 185 million dollars to the promise holder that's 185 million dollars that

00:11:24.320 taxpayers like you and i did not have to pay um 185 million dollars that could be spent on other things

00:11:30.080 that actually could um reasonably uh affect um uh you know the public you know it's you know we talked

00:11:37.600 a while ago about um um you know in increasing police resources conceivably you could put a police

00:11:45.120 officer in every street and corner in every township or range road but it won't make a lick of difference

00:11:49.040 if we don't have the commensurate services in the other aspects of the criminal justice systems to deal

00:11:53.200 with those issues if we don't have enough judges we don't have no ground prosecutors if we don't have

00:11:56.880 enough courtroom space we don't have enough parole officers probation officers etc etc etc to actually

00:12:01.760 deal with those uh offenders it's all for lost uh because as you know we have only a certain number

00:12:09.520 of time and i say we the criminal justice system has only a certain number of time to get a person

00:12:13.840 through the criminal justice system before the charges need to be with withdrawn under the jordan

00:12:18.080 decision from the extreme court of canada so um yeah you also have to get so when we get back to the

00:12:24.160 costs we also have to consider that uh 30 subsidy now that was 185 million dollars in 2021 what does

00:12:31.360 30 percent work out in 2022 2025 who knows is it 200 million is it 210 million i don't know but the

00:12:37.840 point is is that the second that we move away from the provincial from the rcmp providing the provincial

00:12:42.720 police uh services for the province of alberta that 30 is gone never to return and that's the

00:12:48.960 difference has to be made up by the pro by the taxpayers of alberta yeah so has there been a i

00:12:54.880 i should know this actually but i there hasn't been anything formal in starting to move towards

00:12:59.040 a provincial force yet there's just been a lot of discussion have uh has your organization been

00:13:04.240 invited to uh participate in those discussions or deliberations well that's uh you know we we we will

00:13:09.680 speak with whoever would like to speak with us and that's why one of the reasons why i'm happy to come

00:13:12.640 on your show um we have uh conducted a series of town halls across the province from one corner to the other and

00:13:18.800 met with uh basically anyone that was able to work the internet and say i want to attend more than

00:13:22.640 welcome to come and we had people from our uh sessions uh come from government come from uh you

00:13:28.640 know ma and pa kettle and the uh general citizens uh as all the way up as far as mlas and and uh ministers

00:13:36.080 uh show up to our sessions and they're always more than welcome to come uh the provincial um sessions

00:13:42.000 have not been quite as public uh they have met with some municipality leaders um i understand that the

00:13:47.120 more recent ones sessions being conducted by minister shandro have been a little bit more um uh open as

00:13:53.440 far as dialogue goes but the ones previous to that i you know of course we weren't invited we weren't

00:13:57.840 allowed to attend we were more than willing and wanting to attend those sessions we weren't allowed

00:14:02.240 to or were invited to um i understand the the first ones um there wasn't real any uh question or answer

00:14:10.640 or discussion more of uh this is what we think and this is the way we wanted to do um my understanding

00:14:17.040 uh from speaking with some municipal leaders um the more current ones uh conducted by the the now

00:14:23.920 minister of public safety or sorry the public minister uh minister shandro i understand those um

00:14:31.520 more recent um sessions are a little bit more uh uh you know conversation uh which is good which is a good

00:14:38.400 sign okay well i appreciate you coming on to talk to us about it where can people find more information

00:14:44.000 then about your your initiative and where you're working on these things certainly uh if you go to

00:14:48.080 our website at keepalberta rcmp.ca there's a whole pile of information there's including

00:14:52.560 stats and other information and a link to that provincial policing services agreement that i mentioned

00:14:57.040 great well uh thanks again for coming on and we'll see how things iron out there there's some

00:15:01.040 pretty uh politically volatile times in alberta right now so uh we'll see what happens in the in

00:15:05.680 the months and years to come so thanks very much thanks again

Western Standard - August 02, 2022

Kevin Halwa of the National Police Federation on Alberta provincial police service

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