Police services are once again hard at work preparing annual budget submissions for the next fiscal year. The cost of policing continues to mount year after year, and the justifications seem to repeat year to year as well. The budget for Canada’s largest municipal...
Over the decades, many communities in Canada have experimented with different versions of a curfew for children and adolescents. Most often, anyone under the age of 16 or 18 must be off the street by a specific time, such as 10pm. The aim is to reduce vandalism and...
The RCMP’s ill-advised seizure of firearms from abandoned High River homes has eroded confidence in the federal police and may have the unintended consequence of endangering more lives in future.
The Frontier Centre recently released a backgrounder I co-authored over the last few months on the effect of police levels on crime. The conclusion was simple: the evidence suggests that Canadian cities have sufficient police resources. This has predictably ruffled some feathers. I’ll address some of the criticisms I’ve received, though, frankly, most of the points were already addressed in the paper.
The indictment of former U.S. president Donald Trump for crimes invented by his political opponents is the most egregious example yet seen of the weaponizing of the law. The United States is now full of examples. However, in Canada, we also see the law being...
OTTAWA, REGINA - Last week, two things happened that could have profound impacts on natural resources development in Saskatchewan. One is a hint the federal government might want to take control of natural resources away from the provinces, and the other is the...
It was James Q Wilson’s now legendary “broken windows” hypothesis which stated that when a neighbourhood, or a city, had become rundown and uncared-for – when its buildings and trains were covered in graffiti, its streets strewn with rubbish, and its youth allowed to indulge in flagrant displays of delinquent bravado – a climate was created in which serious crimes such as murder and robbery could run amok.
Public feedback on Frontier critique of Winnipeg policing agrees with broken windows principles.
Frontier’s 2004 police charticle again shows Winnipeg with the second highest police per capita in Canada. Instead of increasing police numbers, Winnipeg needs to make smarter use of its plentiful police resources.
Although the performance of the Winnipeg Police Service improved slightly in 2003, its relative efficiency is still lower than that of most other large metropolitan forces in Canada.
The human damage of inflexible zero tolerance policy
In 2000, Winnipeg had the fourth highest level of police strength of Canadian cities, at 176 officers per 100,000 population, a reduction of six from 1999’s proportion.
Winnipeg’s police force performs the single most important function of government, ensuring public safety.
Statistics on the use of police resources show that the City of Winnipeg has a larger police presence than other parts of Canada, even though crime rates here are not proportionately higher.
In 1999, Winnipeg had the second highest level of police strength of Canadian cities, at 182 officers per 100,000 population. Only Thunder Bay had more police, 187 per 100,000 population.