Mixed reviews on government’s plan to change Nova Scotia policing

The Nova Scotia government is embarking on a plan to change the way policing is done across the province by ensuring forces meet a standard and by integrating more police into communities.

The plan was detailed in a report last week by Deloitte, which the government said indicated that six “foundational” changes are needed to bring better policing to the province. Some of those include giving the RCMP more jurisdiction over provincial policing matters, a new funding model and bringing on more community-oriented officers.

While some parts of the plan are positive, the director at the Clairmont Centre for Community Safety Research at Dalhousie University worries that the key parts in the report will not be fixed by the province’s plans.

“I don’t want to be completely negative about the report…There are things to like in it, which were a long time coming to ensure quality policing across the province,” Chris Giacomantonio, told CityNews in an interview. “Some of the suggestions do not seem to provide obvious value and may actually set back some gains that have been made in recent years.”

The reason for the comprehensive review of policing was called out in the Mass Casualty Commission, something that detailed the failure of policing that led to the largest mass killing event in recent Canadian history. It highlighted issues such as poor co-operation and coordination between the RCMP and municipal police.

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Themes from the almost 7,000 respondents

• Increased police presence and participation in community events for relationship building
• Integrated response to mental health calls
• Enhanced streamlined data sharing among police services
• Increased training/cultural awareness and diversity within the workforce
• Better triaging of complaints
• Clarity and role of police in the community

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One of the ways the government is attempting to tackle the issues is by expanding the provincial police force: the RCMP. This is a recommendation the government says will not only help bring a high standard of policing across the province, but will also increase service in rural communities.

However, Giacomantonio has “guarded skepticism” on whether this change will actually solve the province’s problems.

One of the issues he takes with the report is how it details that police are being asked to do things “beyond the traditional responsibilities.” These are issues like bylaw calls and mental health crises. These conclusions, he said, are something that could have been written 20 years ago.

“Their proposals are also aligned with thinking that’s a bit out of date, which is that we should increase police capacity to deal with these things, rather than we should increase the capacity of other systems,” Giacomantonio said.

Those other systems are the mental health centres, community outreach programs, food banks and housing supports that over the last several decades have been slowly receiving less funding, he noted.

Instead, the report recommends the province create community safety officers to be out in the community, able to do minor crime intervention.

Giacomantonio also takes issue with the idea that the public is asking for police to be more visible. He pointed out that on page 106 of the report, it notes that 36 per cent of people who responded are unsatisfied with the police presence in the community. But on the flip side, it means that 64 per cent of people are satisfied.

“It also draws a kind of false conclusion that if those 36 per cent of unsatisfied people become satisfied, then people would be safer and quality of life would be better,” he said. “Just increasing police visibility, especially through the use of community safety officers and special constables rather than police, is unlikely to solve that problem, and it’s also unlikely to solve the mental health crisis response problem.”

Throughout the 128-page report, the idea that police should be more visible at community events shows up a dozen times, although this is a desire from the public, Giacomantonio said it should not be a priority.

“No serious person thinking about what it is that police do and what should really matter, should think that additional money should be put forward so that police can have greater visibility — independent of some specific crime concern — at public events,” he said.

Mix of feelings

Despite some issues with the report, Giacomantonio said there are some positives, like having a unified records management system across all police forces. That’ll help the forces catch suspects across county/city lines. He also said he doesn’t take much issue with the heightened standards.

“Having greater adherence to standards is a good idea. That was left to kind of wither for too long, and it’s a good thing to do,” he said.

However, some municipalities across the province fear that forcing more reliance on the RCMP might not be a good thing.

Bridgewater Mayor David Mitchell said his community is happy with its local police, adding that most of the other 10 municipalities with their own police forces are happy with theirs. Mitchell questions whether the RCMP can meet the staffing levels required to provide specialized services across the province.

The last reasonable change Giacomantonio said is the way the province is billing RCMP services to the municipalities, but one mayor says her constituents worry it could be a negative change.

Truro Mayor Cathy Hinton said residents are worried that changes contemplated by the province will raise costs for municipal policing.

Minister of Justice responds

Days after the announcement, Minister of Justice and Attorney General, Becky Druhan was on The Todd Venoitte Show, responding to the worry around the report.

When asked why she believes the RCMP should get an expanded role in policing across the province, she said the recommendations followed “extensive consultation.”

“We need more integrated, standardized policing across the province so that we don’t have variations associated with geography and other factors,” Druhan said. “And the recommendations are clear that one of the important elements of this was expanding the provincial police (the RCMP).”

The minister mentioned that the RCMP police 80 per cent of the province and 50 per cent of the population, meaning they are involved in the majority of investigations that happen in Nova Scotia.

“That means that just by virtue of that exposure, they are going to be subject to criticism. And so when there is an opportunity to evaluate and consider policing, they have such a big role, it does make sense that often their actions are being scrutinized,” she said.