Community Safety Update (May 2022)
Back in February, I wrote about a new Transit Safety Plan that was approved by council along with additional funding to help put that plan into action. If you haven’t had a chance to read through that post, please take a few minutes to review it first. The rest of this post will provide you with an update on that work. I will also have a separate post to discuss the recent conversations regarding police funding.
An update report will be presented to council on May 24th and I’ll include some excerpts from that report below to provide more details about the implementation of the changes. To start, one area I have been concerned about is whether we felt we were getting value for the security guards working in the transit centres. Considering they can’t actually take action beyond notifying Transit Peace Officers, I wasn’t sure if that was a great use of money. Here is an update on what has happened since deploying security guards:
“Calls to the Transit Control Centre have increased 400 per cent since security guards were added to the transit system. As a result of increased reporting, there has been a 54 per cent increase in events dispatched to Transit Peace Officers. As such, the demand to respond to calls for service has meant the ability for the Transit Peace Officer team to conduct crime prevention patrols has been reduced by half.”
Considering the cost to have a Transit Peace Officer working in every location where the security guards currently work would be much higher, I want to make sure that everyone involved in ensuring the safety of transit users feels that is providing us with the best value. Using the same budget, I know it wouldn’t result in having the same coverage. The key is determining if we feel there is truly a need to have a security guard present at all times or if it would be better to have a Transit Peace Officers at specific times where we feel there is the greatest need.
Speaking of Transit Peace Officers, there is a new deployment model to help provide greater coverage of our transit system. Here are the details from the report:
“With the addition of two three-year term sergeant positions created through the Transit Safety and Security report (OCM01037), the Transit Peace Officer team was able to develop a new deployment model. The new deployment model will see 35 percent of Transit Peace Officer resources dedicated to foot patrol and Community Outreach Transit Team (COTT) by July 2022, to increase their capacity for proactive patrols.
Starting May 22, 2022, Edmontonians will start to see the Transit Peace Officer foot patrol teams referred to as Transit Community Action Teams (TCAT), as a more consistent presence on the LRT and platforms throughout the transit network. These teams will consist of 11 Transit Peace Officers and will work split shifts between 7 a.m. and 1:00 a.m. Using a theory of change and evidence-based practices, TCAT will use a high-visibility and high-engagement deployment model aimed to reduce and prevent crime and disorder in assigned hot spots.”
One final update is that council will be debating a motion from Mayor Sohi to allocate $5 million on teams that would patrol our downtown, Chinatown, and transit hubs. This is in addition to everything above. This funding would be used to expand the existing HELP and PACT units which are made up of police officers and social workers who work together to address crime and disorder. This motion came forward based on feedback from the public, including business owners and representatives from our downtown and Chinatown. This motion will be debated by council next week and I plan to support that motion as those additional resources are needed.
As mentioned at the top, I will be writing a separate post that will cover our recent conversations about police funding. I realize that even though crime in Edmonton went down by 12% in 2021, which is more than the national average, there are still some serious issues that need clear action. Specific to our transit system, I’m encouraged with the additional resources that are being provided to ensure that people feel safe using our transit system and enjoying our downtown and Chinatown.
