The number of calls is escalating and, due to provincial budget cuts, the amount of front-line resources has decreased, creating a challenge for the Southern Georgian Bay OPP, which took over policing in the community in 2018.
One area of concern is the increase in 911 calls.
In his crime stats report presented at the Midland Police Services Board (PSB) meeting this week, Interim OPP Detachment Commander Joseph Evans said the number of 911 calls has more than doubled, mostly due to pocket dials. He said there were no exact numbers indicating how many of the 920 calls made during 2019 were pocket dials.
"The disptacher can hear background noise or the rustling of fabric in the pocket," said Evans. "It's because smartphones have touch screens, which light up and the emergency call button is right there at the bottom and you'll see calls have gone up."
Starting in May, emergency dispatchers will be able to use their discretion with 911 calls. Evans said disptachers are specially trained in this matter and will be given the latitude to not send an officer to every call. However, they will be following up on calls that are deemed as pocket dials to make sure it wasn't a real emergency.
"We have information that comes in with every phone call, we have coordinates and so on and so forth," said Evans.
The number of some calls have almost doubled. For example, the number of break and enters rose to 105 in 2019 compared to 50 in 2018, while the number of car thefts increased to 12, compared to six in the previous year. Overall calls for service in 2019 were 13,485, compared to 11,349 in 2018.
But Evans pointed out to the members of the PSB that that may be because numbers from the first month-and-a-half of 2018 are missing because the OPP started policing the area in mid-February of 2018.
Another reason he feels the numbers are higher than anticipated is because of the feedback he has heard about the OPP's service and people's trust in it.
"I've been told that myself as I'm filling up the cruiser at the gas pump, 'We're so happy that you folks are here,'" said Evans, adding that he has also been told that it appears the OPP is only working on speeding enforcement. He said that is not the case: "It starts with a traffic stop and that can lead us to prevent other infractions. We're not just going to turn a blind eye to speeding."
Talking about some policing challenges, Evans said, $67 million has been cut from the OPP budget provincially.
"It has affected us in frontline bodies to all resources, cars, and radios," he said. "It’s reduced the number of people we could employ. We’ve lost 5% feet on the front line. We’ve lost 5% in cars."
Mayor Strathearn said he thought the OPP was doing a good job, particularly around the clearance rates for calls.
"Calls have doubled, but what's interesting to me is the clearance rates statistics," he said. "They speak well of the work that's being done here, especially when you look at the number of calls for service (13,485)."
Strathearn said he hopes, over time, to see a decline in statistics around property crime.
"You're seeing officers are now more and more familiar with the environment they're working in and as a result they're more successful in apprehending people in particular categories of crime," he said.
Crime is usually driven by drugs, Evans said.
"People have to live, if they don't have jobs, they get government support and if they're not qualified for that, they might steal it from somebody and that's how that criminal circle starts," he said. "We get a lot of negative press, people may say this isn't a safe place. It's a very safe place. Every area is dealing with its crime portion, their homesless, and mental health. We're no different than anybody else."
Evans said he was also concerned about distracted driving, even though it's down to 89 from 303 in 2018.
"(Impaired driving) has been taken over by distracted driving, which includes use of cellphones and eating or reading or doing something else," he said. "We give a lot of educational warnings to people. But we’d rather give a ticket than have them get into an accident."
Evans said he also wants to focus more on street crime in the Southern Georgian Bay area. "We're only a 98-member detachment and we have lots of calls of service to attend to, so we would like to keep working on that," he noted.
