Saskatchewan police services are being forced to accept more and more provincial responsibilities, including potentially paying nearly $250,000 annually to handle 911 service expenses, which is frustrating Moose Jaw’s police chief.
Rick Bourassa offered his concerns during the Board of Police Commissioners’ April 10 meeting.
While providing an update about the Moose Jaw Police Service’s operating budget, Bourassa said he planned to meet on April 11 with officials — including the minister — from the Ministry of Justice and Attorney General about three financial issues that he wants addressed.
The first is police services have been tasked with guarding prisoners in provincial court, which is a provincial responsibility. Moose Jaw has been forced to redeploy one member to handle this task and sit in court daily, managing offenders; sometimes, two officers are required depending on the situation.
Deputy sheriffs should handle those prisoners, but there has been “very little movement” to remove those responsibilities from police, while there was no money for that in the recent provincial budget, either, said Bourassa.
One full-time officer spends 2,080 hours annually guarding prisoners — instead of being on the street — and costs the MJPS over $142,000.
“So we have removed some budgetary pressures, but we’ve increased some resource pressures by having police officers … having to do that,” he added.
Secondly, since 2019, the police service has been prosecuting certain provincial statute offences even though that’s the Crown prosecutor’s job. The MJPS hired someone several years ago to handle those situations, but the costs “increased and increased and increased” because the number of offences continually rose.
One officer spends 1,040 hours annually handling these duties, which costs the MJPS over $72,000.
Bourassa said the main issue driving the increase in offences is enforcing speed limits on Highway 1, as an average of 30,000 lead-footed drivers have been caught annually since 2019. The agency plans to redirect an officer to handle those offences, with that person taking on that responsibility by late April.
Thirdly, and perhaps most concerning financially, is the government’s plan to force police services to fund the provincial 911 system, Bourassa said. Normally, residents pay $2 per month on their bills to fund this system, but the province informed police agencies over a year ago that they would cover the expenses as the government adopts a federally mandated next-generation system.
The initial cost for the MJPS is $231,000 in 2025, while that is expected to increase annually by $166,800 in the following years and follow the inflation rate.
Bourassa noted that the $231,000 expense equals an officer spending 3,000 hours annually responding to 911 calls.
The province has notified all major municipal police forces that they will have to handle these extra 911-related costs, he said. However, the government offered one alternative, which was, for $1 million a year, all 911 calls would be routed through Prince Albert.
The MJPS’s senior leaders were not keen on that option because they believe the in-house communications officers know the community best and provide other important services, the chief continued.
Added Bourassa, “So, there are a number of provincial responsibilities our budget is carrying that it should not be carrying and that our resources are handling that they should not be handling.”
The board also heard that members of city council attending the upcoming Saskatchewan Urban Municipalities Association’s (SUMA) spring convention will speak to the justice and policing minister about these — and other related — financial issues, while they’ve already met with community MLAs about these concerns.
The next police board meeting is Wednesday, May 8.
