Photo Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/me659/
I should have mentioned in my last post that I am not intending to single out any specific funding request for scrutiny in the 2014 budget decision process. I am looking for input on all the funding requests included in the 2014 supplemental budget list.
Today, I want to focus on a request from the leadership of the Kamloops RCMP for an additional domestic violence officer. This would mean $148,120 in added cost to the community. Reported domestic violence has spiked in Kamloops 36% in the last four years. Last year, the RCMP asked for a mental health officer and a domestic violence officer. We funded the mental health officer and the RCMP moved an existing officer off of general duty and into a domestic violence role.
The video clip below shows a clip of me asking Inspector Jennie Latham (who we are unfortunately losing to Ottawa) about moving around internal resouces. I've also included the RCMP business case.
Again, welcome your thoughts!
Business Case for Kamloops RCMP domestic violence officer. by Arjun Singh
The big 'media factor' here is the 36% increase figure, when actually only a 1 year increase of 8.9% with a deployment of a public duty officer into the domestic violence area. It's hard to say what the impact that the newly deployed officer had. I feel we should continue with the existing force and the deployment strategy to see if it can be reduce or hold the line at the 8.9% figure. I feel it's very hard to justify an officer for the $148K amount to at best case reduce the yearly climb? I do support addressing domestic violence, but unfortunately I feel the methods used and the justice system don't seem to support addressing the real cause. Police are constantly appearing at calls that are often just a repeated offence, and powerless to do much to stop the repetition. Thus I wonder 'how much' of the 8.9% increase is repeated offences at the same addresses. Bottom line I can't support bringing an additional officer for this price tag, nor should council. The first thing I feel the RCMP have to work with the justice system to reduce the violence with a more effective program to stem the tide. Thus they should work with existing officers and present a better business case next year. I also would like to see a figure on what percent repetitive calls are in the current workload. This indicates our 'system' is not working if the percentage is high.
Posted by: Jim Moorhead | February 18, 2014 at 01:55 PM