Delivery of Halifax armoured police vehicle delayed

The delivery of a new armoured vehicle to Halifax Regional Police from the supplier in Newmarket, Ont., has been delayed.

A municipal spokesperson said Monday it’s expected the vehicle will be sent to the police department in the spring of 2021. The original delivery plan was to have it delivered here this spring.

“The reason for this (postponement) is due to production shortages and delays, some of which can be attributed to COVID-19,” said Maggie-Jane Spray, a senior communications advisor with Halifax Regional Municipality.

Halifax city hall authorized the contentious purchase last year. Public tender details available online show the vehicle costs $353,280.

Municipal officials are considering ways to cut costs, because of the hit to city hall coffers by the economic impact of the coronavirus, but Spray said the police armoured vehicle won’t be affected.

“This purchase will be moving forward, as the tender has been awarded,” she told HalifaxToday.ca via email.

Police brass have said the armoured unit, a model from Terradyne Armored Vehicles Inc., is necessary equipment that can be used to help protect citizens and police officers in potentially life-threatening situations, such as an armed standoff.

Halifax police couldn’t say with certainty the vehicle would never be deployed during any given community protest or rally.

Critics have charged the unit, known as a Gurkha MPV, is a waste of taxpayers’ dollars. And opponents say the acquisition of an armoured vehicle points to the further militarization of a municipal police department.

In May 2019, senior HRP management sent the board of police commissioners a memorandum regarding the request for an  armoured vehicle. The board has a mandate to “provide civilian governance and oversight of police services” within the
Halifax region, according to the municipality’s website.

The memo says, in part, the new addition to the police department’s fleet “will be used sparingly.”

It says the main purpose for having such a vehicle is to allow police to “rescue an injured person from a hostile open-air environment and to enable tactical officers to safely approach a dangerous situation.”

Opponents of the purchase have said they’re skeptical about how sparingly the unit will be used, and stressed other needs in Halifax Regional Municipality would benefit more from the public money approved for it.

The municipality’s initial procurement plan for its armoured vehicle was to cost $500,000. It was one of the items in HRM’s 2019-20 budget passed last spring.

Tender details say the vehicle is to include a front-mounted, detachable power ram “capable of conducting mechanical breaches.” It’s also supposed to have a public-address system.

Other police forces in Canada use armoured vehicles, including those serving smaller cities such as Fredericton, N.B., which added one to its fleet in 2018. Late last year, armoured police units were unveiled in Saint John, N.B., and Brandon, Man.

In Nova Scotia, the purchase issue sparked debate last year among Halifax regional councillors and in the community at large.

Supporters see the armoured vehicle as a valuable, emergency-response tool. It can get closer to an active-shooter site than other police cars, and could be used during a natural disaster.

Many foes feel the military-looking vehicle will be used more often than senior police officials say, for other more innocuous things, simply because it is equipment that’s stored here and can be deployed in a hurry.

Coun. Shawn Cleary (Halifax West Armdale) has been a vocal critic of the armoured vehicle acquisition. He was unsuccessful in 2019 in his attempt to have the item purged from the municipality’s capital budget.

The board of police commissioners held a virtual meeting Monday to discuss roughly $5.5 million in proposed cuts to the police force’s 2020-21 budget, due to the fiscal pressure on city hall caused by COVID-19.

Michael Lightstone is a freelance reporter living in Dartmouth