Small towns and cities across Alberta are threatening to withhold money for the RCMP who patrol them unless the province comes up with a more equitable solution to help pay for policing costs.
“We’re trying to bring this to a crisis,” said Don Weisbeck, mayor of Brooks, which is one of 30 municipalities threatening to withhold funding as of June 1 as a way to catch the government’s ear.
Weisbeck said that in the five years he has been mayor he has seen studies, assessments, task forces and meetings about police funding, but no more money.
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“It comes down to dollars,” said Weisbeck, who added the communities are modelling their protest on a Saskatchewan case where municipalities withheld funding until the province anteed up more money.
Under the present funding formula, the Alberta government pays the complete bill for police in counties, municipalities and towns under 2,500. Communities of more than 2,500 pay the entire tab.
Brooks pays $1.1 million for 14 RCMP officers. A $70,000 a year provincial grant for police services was frozen 10 years ago.
In Three Hills, deputy mayor Arlin Koch said the net amount of money the municipal government spends on five RCMP constables and one sergeant, minus fine revenue, is $259,000, about 19 percent of its budget.
He said the large proportion of money spent on police means other services suffer in the town of 3,400.
“It forces extreme budgetary pressures,” he said.
The threat has caught the government’s attention. The solicitor general’s office has agreed to meet with members of the Alberta Urban Municipalities Association and the Alberta Association of Rural Municipalities to come up with a new funding formula by June 30.
“That’s the latest promise,” Koch said.
AUMA president George Rogers doesn’t know if withholding funding is the solution, but understands his members’ frustrations.
“The government has to put more money in policing,” said Rogers, who is mayor of Leduc.
Some communities in Alberta have doubled in size in the past five years with no increase in police funding by the government.
“Some of the communities have explosive growth,” said Rogers, pointing to an influx of agriculture workers in Brooks and oil workers in High Level and Fort McMurray.
“The issues are way beyond their control,” he said.
A report commissioned by the AUMA last year identified several concerns with the police contract:
- The cost of a major criminal investigation such as a murder.
- Police meeting the needs of the community.
- Formal assessment of police services.
- Impact of First Nations on policing in some municipalities.
- Changing economic conditions that can generate social problems.
- Level of policing provided by the province.
